Now Show Me Yours
Why is Young America’s Foundation barring a reporter from Campus Progress?
By Julie Brinn Siegel, University of Pennsylvania
Thursday July 13, 2006
Two weeks ago, my editor here at CampusProgress.org, our daily web magazine, asked me if I would like to cover the Young America’s Foundation (YAF) National Conservative Student Conference, set for July 30 to August 5 in Washington. I’m a firm believer that if I want to learn, I can’t always be surrounded by people with whom I agree, so I wanted the assignment. I contacted YAF’s spokesman, Jason Mattera, to obtain press credentials. I thought this was going to be a routine process.
I was wrong. Mattera not only refused me credentials, but, ultimately, he did so in the name of ideology. Here is my unedited email exchange with Mattera:
Me:
I am interested in covering the Young America’s Foundation National Conservative Student Conference at the beginning of August. Could you please let me know what the process is for obtaining press credentials? Thanks so much for your help!
Mattera:
What news outlet do you work for?
Me:
Thanks for your quick reply. I’ll be reporting for Campusprogress.org.
Mattera:
LOL
Me:
Jason, I’m a little confused as to what that means. Could you please clarify?
Jason:
L·O·L
1) Laugh out Loud
2) Lots of Laugh
Me:
Does that mean you’ll issue me credentials, or not?
Jason:
I’ll tell you what… Since you are student, I’ll let you apply for a conference spot just like any other student. You must send in a resume, picture, and write a page on why you want to attend the National Conservative Student Conference. The essay should detail the activism you’ve done in college and what activism tools you expect to bring home from the conference. I can’t promise anything, but that’s your best shot.
(The conference costs $375 to attend.)
I wrote back that I was not interested in attending as a student but rather wanted to cover the event. After describing CampusProgress.org’s qualifications as a publication (see below), I again requested that if the conference was open to the press, I be granted credentials. This was Mattera’s response:
Our event is open to real members of the press. You will not receive press credentials. My advice for you is to watch it on C-SPAN. If you have a problem with that decision, you can complain to the Foundation’s media department spokesman. Oh wait…that’s…me. :)
Besides being insulting, Mattera is plain wrong. I am a student journalist. In high school I was the managing editor of The Lions Tale, my high school’s award winning newspaper and I am now on the staff of the Penn’s newspaper, the Daily Pennsylvanian. I’m admittedly new to the journalism game, but CampusProgress.org is a platform for student journalists.
 | | The author on Halloween. |
CampusProgress.org is a real publication. In less than eighteen months, it has attracted over 2 million readers. Its content has been reprinted or cited by a wide range of media, including The American Prospect, The Nation, ABC News, CNN, Wonkette, and Daily Kos. CampusProgress.org pieces are featured daily on Google News. The site features journalism, opinion, and multimedia from students and other young people, and it has offered many pieces about campus life, public policy issues, media, and culture. It also has featured articles by or interviews with Barack Obama, Paul Krugman, Al Franken, Margaret Cho, Kendrick Meek, Thomas Frank, Janeane Garofalo, Jonathan Kozol, Stephen Colbert, Morgan Spurlock, Larry David, Dee Dee Myers, Seymour Hersh, Dave Eggers, and many others. Campus Progress has a point of view, but then so do Fox News, The National Review, Human Events and many other press outlets familiar to Mattera.
More troubling, Jason Mattera’s problem goes beyond CampusProgress.org. Ben Adler, an editor of CampusProgress.org, emailed Mattera to better understand his objections and asked Mattera if two progressive publications with whom we share content – The Nation and Alternet – would be given press credentials if they asked. Mattera responded that “The Nation and Alternet would also be denied press credentials.” The Nation was founded in 1865, and its contributors have included Hannah Arendt, James Baldwin, George Bernard Shaw, Emily Dickinson, Albert Einstein, Robert Frost, Carlos Fuentes, Langston Hughes, Martin Luther King, Jr., Arthur Miller, Jean-Paul Sartre, and William Butler Yeats. Sounds like a real publication to me. Apparently, Mattera is set on excluding media outlets whose views don’t mesh with YAF’s.
That letting in a CampusProgress.org reporter was “laugh-out-loudable” to Mattera seems to indicate his disdain for people with whom he disagrees politically. Yesterday on our blog I expressed my belief that informal debates between friends with different views often yield the most creative solutions to problems. It is in the absence of such questioning that bad policy (like going to war in Iraq without fully thinking through the aftermath of invasion) is made. More than that, Mattera’s sheer disdain indicates that YAF’s conference might be a Coulter-esque bashing of ideological opponents full of name-calling and grandiose rhetoric. But I’ll never know if I’m not permitted to cover it. (Watching on C-SPAN, per Mattera’s suggestion, if C-SPAN does show the YAF conference, does not equal covering the event. You miss the hallway discussions, the tabling and the breakout sessions that C-SPAN cameras don’t reach.)
Campus Progress and the Center for American Progress routinely grant press credentials to our events to conservative media outlets like CNS News, the Washington Times, Human Events, and others. The National Review covered our Campus Progress National Student Conference last year and again this year.
The author of those National Review pieces? Jason Mattera!
Yes—the same Jason Mattera who has refused Campus Progress a press credential for the Young America’s Foundation annual conference has twice written web pieces about the Campus Progress annual conference – the second time, just days after he denied me access.
An intern from the National Review obtained press credentials from Campus Progress by email in advance, precisely what Mattera denied me. He presented himself at this year’s Campus Progress conference, signed in, and was granted full press access to the event.
Campus Progress is pleased to allow conservative media to cover events; we don’t discriminate among reporters based on their views, and we’re proud of our programs. Why is YAF hiding from Campus Progress?
Note: While I would like to cover YAF and report accurately, accuracy about Campus Progress may not be Jason Mattera’s strength. Last year, Mattera’s multiple errors in his piece on our conference were amply documented on this website by Asheesh Siddique. (Also, for the record, in his blog post today on this year’s Campus Progress conference, Mattera repeated the Washington Post’s misquote of remarks at yesterday’s conference by rapper Fat Joe. Read what Fat Joe actually said and watch the video here.)
Editor’s Note: Read more about this matter, including a National Review reporter asking YAF to reconsider and let CampusProgress.org cover the YAF conference, on the Campus Progress blog: here, here, here, here.
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Comments
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That is ridiculous… What is Mattera so scared of?
— lauren - Jul 13, 10:16 PM - #Lauren, he’s not afraid, he’s part of a movement that automatically assumes that anyone who disagrees with them is a lunatic. For example, if you thought that invading Iraq was a bad idea, you had a screw loose.
— Rick - Jul 14, 11:31 AM - #I’m not surprised by this at all considering the conservative movements heart-rending love of hypocrisy.
— Joseph Parise - Jul 14, 11:33 AM - #I’ll be taking this asshole apart (again) in this weekend’s Assclowns of the Week. Don’t worry, Julie. Your fellow libs have your back.
— jurassicpork - Jul 14, 12:15 PM - #(This is the right tagline.)
— jurassicpork - Jul 14, 12:16 PM - #From the sounds and looks (if your check out his pics) I’d say that with Jason Mattera what you’re dealing with here is just a snippy little conservative closet-case bitch.
— Dave - Jul 14, 12:16 PM - #Mattera is a pathetic excuse for a human, and he sucks at his “job”. Who is the responsible adult in that student organization, surely that adult would not like the negative attention that Mattera prick is getting for the organization.
— phenics - Jul 14, 12:47 PM - #It’s not just jurassicpork and your fellow libs who have your back…so does this conservative. While I agree with the conservatives ideologically, I hate the way they act most of the time. (Though I could say a few things about some libs too… :-))
— Scott - Jul 14, 12:56 PM - #Yes this is a great story though!
— Cassandra - Jul 14, 01:21 PM - #He’ll carry his embarrasssment for the rest of his life.
He blew it.
Sad.
— Protagonia - Jul 14, 01:29 PM - #Remember how the Soviets used to send their reporters to the U.S.—while U.S. reporters were virtually banned in the USSR?
John Dean has it right. Thes e are NOT conservatives. They are authoritarians.
The Democrats are now the true conservatives.
— Dave in Columbus - Jul 14, 01:37 PM - #This is the same Jason Mattera who started a whites-only scholarship fund at Roger Williams University to protest affirmative action and support “equal treatment for all students.” Of course, at the time, he conveniently brushed aside the fact that he himself got $3,500 from the Hispanic College Fund. So, acting out on behalf of SELF-SERVICE rather than ACTUAL PRINCIPLE is really nothing new to him.
Hate to link to FOX NEWS, but check it out:
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,111664,00.html
— tmt - Jul 14, 01:41 PM - #sorry, make that $5,000 he got from the Hispanic College Fund
— tmt - Jul 14, 01:42 PM - #thanks to alternet’s peek, you can see the video on crooks&liars of the same jason mattera on hardball stumbling over chris matthew’s question “you’re 21, why don’t you enlist to fight in iraq?”
i, thinking that jason’s refusal of julie’s press credentials to a national conference is indeed a national story, wrote a letter to chris matthews suggesting he look into it.
my letter and links for the above available on my blog skippy.
— skippy - Jul 14, 01:44 PM - #You have to include a picture of yourself in your application; Why? This is generally avoided in the US due to discrimination potential, but YAF doesn’t mind.
— McMike - Jul 14, 01:44 PM - #I think everyone should write to Rich Lowry and ask him about his view on this point.
— Max Renn - Jul 14, 01:49 PM - #Who is Rich Lowry and why will his view matter? I would like to kick this up the line to whomever is responsible for this little puke Jason. Anyone with contact info?
— Lori W - Jul 14, 02:00 PM - #I love YAF’s blurb about him:
” Jason, no typical button-down traditionalist, graduated summa cum laude from Roger Williams University with a double major in business management and communications.”
Man, nothing says “not button-down traditionalist” like a guy whose academic career ended with BAs in business management and communication!
Also, to be fair, even the state’s Republican Party condemned the RWU College Republicans under his tenure, and actually stripped them of their affiliation with the national party! I don’t think this guy is representative of the party so much as one of these Coulter-esque crazies that we’d all be better off ignoring.
— Jacob Fawcett - Jul 14, 02:08 PM - #I don’t think this guy is representative of the party so much as one of these Coulter-esque crazies that we’d all be better off ignoring.
Either you are the single most gullible person on the face of the Earth, or you are a Republican plant. I’d bet money on the latter, because it’s physically impossible to have your head buried in the sand for that long.
Go git that chickenshit Mattera Julie, show him what it means to be fearless!
— Jay Brida - Jul 14, 02:20 PM - #“While I agree with the conservatives ideologically, I hate the way they act most of the time. (Though I could say a few things about some libs too… :-))
”
I’ve got to agree with Scott. I’m politically conservative (on most things, but not all), but I’m more interested in truth than mere ideology. As a Catholic, I am commanded by my Lord to seek the truth, for He is the Truth. I know certain things to be true that are on the “conservative” side of the fence (e.g., abortion is murder), as well as certain truths on the “liberal” side (e.g., the death penalty has become more about vengeance than justice). See Catholics neither Democrat nor Republican
“The Democrats are now the true conservatives.”
Sorry, “Dave in Columbus” – I can’t fully agree with you there. If we look at all the politicians, they are all so muddled and huddled to the center, it’s hard to differentiate who’s on what side. (Just look at the Senate vote today that overwhelmingly went against funding a border fence. Half of these Senators made up the overwhelming majority that voted on May 17th to authorize the same fence!)
Maybe it’s time for a 3rd party (or even a 4th party as well) to shake up the rock-heads in D.C.
— Orthodoxy - Jul 14, 02:26 PM - #I read the story about Matera denying press credentials to Siegel on Alternet. Here’s the text of a letter I emailed to YAF. I also nominated Matera for “Hypocrite of the Week” on Buzzflash.
Letter text….
I understand from a news story that YAF spokesman Jason Matera declined to offer
press credentials for the YAF student conference to Julie Brinn Siegel, a student
at
UPenn and a reporter for Campus Progess.
What gives here? How can you get your message out if you try to restrict reporting
on YAF activities by anyone not already in agreement with your agenda? It’s not
very
savvy and speaks to very little self-confidence. And Matera’s decision certainly
violates
the spirit of a free press, which our Founding Fathers thought was essential to
our
republic.
Further, I saw Matera on Chris Matthews. His reason for not enlisting in the military
to actively support military and political policies he supports rhetorically is
cowardly.
What happened to putting your money where your mouth is?
I’m old enough that I was a student at Harvard when Howard Phillips started YAF.
In 1964 I joined the Peace Corps and served two years as an English teacher in
Turkey. That was putting my own money where my mouth was. Since then I have
worked in public health at modest salaries because I think the work is important
and
has been my own way of trying to make the world a better place.
Most of the young men I knew did not serve in the military because they were adamantly
against the Vietnam War. I didn’t know anybody who supported the war while doing
everything
he could do to avoid the draft, though we know now there were many who engaged
in this kind of hypocrisy. It’s never a pretty sight.
Jason Matera is still young. He and other YAFers still have a chance to do the right
thing and enlist to support our military actions. That chance was something my generation
worked hard to bring about. We did not foresee that abolishing the draft would not
take the burden off the poorest and least educated of fighting in wars they had
no
political role in starting and that the well educated would still find many excuses
not
to do military service. It is shameful, frankly.
Principles are important. And not just on the podium, but in the decisions we make
every day. None of us should advocate policies that we are not willing to support
with
our tax dollars, our personal efforts, and, if need be, our lives.
I look forward to your response.
— Colleen Clark - Jul 14, 03:39 PM - #Comments like, “Mattera is a pathetic excuse for a human” (phenics – Jul 14, 11:47 AM), don’t enhance the debate. It is possible to disagree with someone, even label them a hypocrite, and still show them respect, EVEN IF THEY REFUSE TO RETURN THAT RESPECT. We need higher standards of civility—not more venom—in our debates. Return Mattera’s pettiness with grace, just as Campus Progress has done: state the facts without the emotional drama. “By their fruits you shall know them.”
— Mark - Jul 14, 04:06 PM - #I’ve landed on C-Span’s123
— Anthony M Dambrosi - Jul 14, 04:09 PM - #in the past and found a YAF forum being cablecast.From what I saw and heard it
would be more accurate to
call them Young American
Fascists.It reeked of the elite class learning how to
deal with the special burden of owning everything and
their search for ‘good help’
Mattera is simply following the lead of the adults in the world of rightwing “journalism”, punditry, and blogging. They want to shoot down anything other than their own usually very dishonest discourse. Notice at most liberal blogs, you get the rightwing trolls posting all sorts of insulting and often inaccurate garbage – and if any liberal blog bothers to object – they start whining, that blog banned me. But go to their blogs – you can’t post a comment without joining their “team”. Mattera is a sad sort but look at his mentors.
— pgl - Jul 14, 04:58 PM - ##21 – so Mattera is also a chickenhawk? Figures.
— pgl - Jul 14, 04:59 PM - #“Either you are the single most gullible person on the face of the Earth, or you are a Republican plant. I’d bet money on the latter, because it’s physically impossible to have your head buried in the sand for that long.”
Care to put your money where your mouth is, Jay Brida? As long as you’re levelling insane paranoid accusations against people who don’t equate the entire Republican constituency with Coulter and this Mattera guy, you might as well go all the way. If you’d like to work out a way to settle this bet, email me. Or you can just google me, and back off.
— Jacob Fawcett - Jul 14, 06:17 PM - #Just because you support the Iraq War doesn’t mean you should have to go over there to fight it. You don’t see our Senators and Congressman rushing into battle.
I’m a moderate and believe people have a right to believe in policy, while at the same time, we have a volunteer military, so they aren’t required to fight it.
I think America needs a draft for the burden of these evil wars to be distributed throughout the population, much like it is in Israel.
Then we’ll see how often people will and won’t support dumb policies that get soldiers killed.
Mattera may be dumb, and a bunch of other things, but saying that everyone who supports the War in Iraq (me not being one of them) should fight it is shortsighted with our military service being voluntary in the US.
— Michael R - Jul 14, 07:30 PM - #Thank you CampusProgress and CAP for being open to conservative thinkers. Apparently, conservatives with the insecurities that Mattera has prevents them from associating with anyone who has a contradicting idea or opinion. I do not even see how he could be so hypocritical-but then I reason that he, as a conservative, does not trust the strength of his conservative arguments that would probably surface at the YAF, and probably wants to continue believing his views are pure logic rather than face the fact that someone sees the world differently than he, and is willing to report on it.
— Corey Ponder - Jul 14, 08:55 PM - #Why should you be awarded special priviledges because you’re a ‘reporter’ for Campus Progress? Granted, he didn’t have to be so bluntly rude about it, but you are a student and should have to pay just like the rest of the students that will be there. He isn’t barring you from the conference, and is instead treating you the same as any other student who would like to attend. I can’t see that being unfair, and I doubt that any liberal conference would allow a conservative blogging student to come to a $375 conference for free.
— Meghan - Jul 14, 09:59 PM - #Meghan – Apparently you weren’t reading Julie’s blog – just flying in to post a negative comment. Mattera himself was granted a press pass to cover the Campus Progress National Conference. Press pass means “for free.” Or are you implying that their $375 admission fee equates to a more “valuable” conference?
— Sue - Jul 14, 10:35 PM - #Thank you Sue. There is strong demand for our Campus Progress conference, but we don’t charge because students don’t have a lot of money and we don’t want cost to be a barrier. Presumably YAF and other groups waive their large fees in the case of students they know or want to recruit. Also, in response to Meghan, someone who attends as a reporter doesn’t get all the things that other attendees get, like a tote bag, t-shirt, meals, etc. And given that YAF’s conference is a student conference, it seems to me that they should want some of the reporters covering it to be student reporters—especially those who are writing for a student / youth audience.
— David Halperin, Campus Progress - Jul 15, 08:00 AM - #As promised. Like I said, Julie, hun, some of us have your back.
— jurassicpork - Jul 15, 01:27 PM - #Crap, html doesn’t work here, I forgot. Click on my name to access the Assclowns of the Week permalink.
— jurassicpork - Jul 15, 01:28 PM - #The picture is for a booklet that everyone will receive. There will be a description with the picture highlighting what the student has done with the conservative movement. And no, YAF does not waive fees for recruiting. They will if a student has financial need (which they have to explain they’re financial situation). I will be there!
— Mr. E. - Jul 16, 12:09 AM - #Mr. Mattera’s root problem—separate from the institutional problems of an organization that would allow its spokesman to display such poor judgment about what is a “real” press outlet—is that he thinks “LOL” is an acceptable response to a professional inquiry. If I hired someone to deal with the media and they behaved like this fellow, I’d fire them and issue an apology to anyone who’d had to interact with them.
— Sylvia - Jul 16, 04:20 AM - #Well, some libertarians have your back. Julian Sanchez posted about the whole kerfluffle over at Hit and Run.
— Greg - Jul 16, 08:41 PM - #Julie, I can assure you that there there are more than a few of us beyond the liberal sphere (libertarian in my case) who see this for what it is – and Mattera for who he is. This is another death rattle of the fat and happy right wing. Mattera is the reason why God created hate mail. And I’ll be posting about this on my blog, as Julian Sanchez did – for what it’s worth.
— Jon - Jul 17, 01:21 AM - #Julie, I have posted about the cause Mattera and I’m sure all of my three readers are outraged.
Ideology aside, Mattera is a hypocrite and just plain rude. Strange for an ideology that supposed stands for societal order and tradition.
— Greg - Jul 17, 02:48 AM - #This may be considered a little intimist, but I have to say that I truly appreciate that someone has shed light on the racism in the latino community. Matteras is a white latino, yet exhibiting racist values. This brings to the light the fact that many white Hispanics (such as Mattera) feel a real hatred for non-white latinos. They see them as “bringing the race down”. And this is not new thinking.
I grew up as a black hispanic in New York City . My father was a white hispanic, my mother was black. In order to secure housing for us (me and my siblings), my light-skinned father had to dissimulate; he went to search for the apartment alone, without his family. White hispanics owned or controlled all the housing and they would NOT rent to a Black or mixed family. This continues to this day.
There are communities all over New York City that are effectively segregated, not by White Americans but by White Latinos. When my father showed up on move-in day with his black children, the landlords were incensed. They knew that they had been tricked but they could not do anything against us, because of the housing laws which officially forbid housing discrimination. What did they do? They harassed us, they put voodoo on us (no kidding, you may laugh but a lot of people believe in this), But they could not legitimately evict us.
White latinos are usually far more racist that non-latino whites. Please believe me, I have lived it and I still do suffer for this. It was hell growing up among them. They constantly tried to tell me that I was ugly. Why? Because I have dark skin. One day, a non-latino white asked a white latina while referring to me “Isn’t she beautiful?” The other responded “Maybe for a Black.” The word black is considered an insult by latinos. The eupephemistic term is “morena” which literally means brunette. With out a valorizaton of the word black (black is beautiful) there is not even the possibity of feeling proud of being a Black latino/a. The racial exclusion is constant and brutal. One assumes that, you too, think that your black skin is ugly & undesirable and you want to lighten it, or improve your situation by marrying a white-skinned person. Every time I identify myself as a latino, I am told ” You don’t look like a latino”. Yet my grandparents were born in Mexico and my father was born in Honduras and our family speaks Spanish. However, none of that can count, unless your skin is light.
So thank you Julie and Mattera. Now maybe non-latinos will appreciate what is going on behind the scene in the latino world. Latinos have been busy pretending that they are minorities and that they need help. They routinely accept scholarships as though they are disadvantaged. Yet, in my experience many the white latinos whom I have encountered were living quite well in America and were actually benefitting from being white AND of latin descent. How can they be minorities if their skin is white, they are totally integrated into American society just as are Italians, Irish, Germans etc. Additionally, they often possess enormous resources such as real estates and fine jobs. I never hear of Irish people asking for minority scholarships, or of German people saying that they are at a disadvantage in America. The same should be said of white Cubans, Puerto Ricans, Domincans etc. People need to know that within the latino communities there is a lot of exclusion, preferential treatment, injustice and horrific racist discrimination going on. Yet black latinos are afraid to speak out. They suffer from inferiorty complexes. I have been more accepted by Black Americans than my own people. Really, I hope someone cares about what I have written here.
— Vani L - Jul 17, 07:49 AM - #Hi Julie et. al,
Click on my name for my take on the situation. Best of luck.
-John McCormack, NR intern
— John - Jul 17, 12:23 PM - #They probably wouldn’t have let you attend as a student either. Last year, I tried to attend a conference at YAF as a student to report for CP. They said that I wasn’t an “established conservative” and, thus, couldn’t attend.
— maggie - Jul 19, 03:53 PM - #So much for wanting to share your ideals…
VANI,
— PAULB - Jul 20, 03:22 PM - #THANKS FOR PUTTING RACISM INTO THIS. MYBE I MISSED WERE THE RACISM CAME FROM? GEE I GUESS WHITE PEOPLE ALL AVER ARE JUST RACIST.
THANKS, I WAS RAISED COLORBLIND BUT IN THIS WORLD RIGHT NOW YOU CANT’ GET AWAY FROM IT, EVEN IF YOUR NOT.
ALSO WHAT DOES LA RAZA TRANLATE TO?
THE RACE, THIS IS THE ACTIVIST GROUP THAT BACKS THE MEXICAN OR LATINOES. SOUNDS RACIST TO ME, HOW ABOUT YOU?
THAT WAS A BIG WIND OF AN COMMENT. IF PEOPLE ARE NOT RACIST BUT THEY ARE CALLED RACIST, IT MAKES YOU THINK WHO IS THE RACIST.
STAND ON YOUR OWN TWO FEET PLEASE.
Why don’t you just watch it on C-SPAN like he suggested?
— Jackson Albridge - Jul 20, 04:32 PM - #haha you got owned
that’s all my friend
btw to Vani – thanks for bringing race into this because that’s what it’s all about right? I mean he’s got no other reason to refuse her credentials other than the fact that he’s racist? I think there’s a little bit of bigotry elsewhere *cough*you*cough*. ahem. Anyway I don’t really blame him; this is their conference and they have the right to refuse anyone they want; no one ever said that they had to let you eat their food n stuff :P
but hey I’m just a kid so what do I know anyway…
— Dave - Jul 20, 04:49 PM - #http://media.yaf.org/commentary/quacks.cfm
now read the other side
— Stu - Jul 20, 05:11 PM - #Just watch it on CSPAN (if your lucky I’ll even wave to ya’ll from my seat) and maybe ya’ll will learn something…. oh and one other thing… why don’t you try to use other arguments than calling conservatives “fascist… racist…” etc.
— ACL - Jul 20, 05:30 PM - #I can totally understand their point of not letting a student sit next to the NY Times or the Washington Post, after all no one starts out on the top but at the bottom, perhaps cover it on C-SPAN and maybe in a few years you will be allowed inside!
— Richard Dise - Jul 20, 05:40 PM - #What you’re forgetting is that this isn’t the RNC!! This is a student convention!!!
— Lauren Patrizi - Jul 26, 10:24 AM - #hmmmm… reports are out saying that Mattera wasn’t even at your event and that he used other means (such as reading other articles to write his) this means two thing 1) Your organization is not being intirely honest and 2) It is possible to write an article from other means (like watching it on CSPAN for instance.)
Yes the conference is a student conference and not the RNC… but what is your point there Lauren?? I am exteremly happy that you can state the obvious… why don’t you write something of intellectual value next time huh? Crazy idea I know… but hey it may just be crazy enough to work
— ACL - Jul 27, 04:25 PM - #ACL, you’re apparently coming in late on this. Once again:
1. At no point did Julie ever say Jason attended the conference. We quite clearly indicated Jason wrote about us, and that’s very relevant to your second “point.”
2. Mattera was inaccurate in numerous instances. He openly admitted that his “sources” for certain quotes and events were based on reading the reports from other people who actually bothered to attend the conference.
So as already proven, Mattera did not attend the conference, made inaccurate statements about it, and then used that as a basis for suggesting our reporters do the same. Frankly, we hold ourselves to higher standards. Since this article was published, both a fellow writer and the associate editor of the National Review have agreed with us that Mattera is out of line and short on professionalism. That, my friend, is “intellectual value.” But thanks for reading.
— August J. Pollak - Jul 27, 04:57 PM - #It’s no surprise Campus Progress was barred from attending the Young America’s Foundation student convention. Progressives and radicals have a long and ignoble history of disrupting events such as this by shouting down speakers, throwing pies at people whose ideas they don’t agree with and turning their backs (like spoiled children) when someone they don’t like is speaking. Sophomoric behavior for sure, but more often than not this is how radicals and progressives choose to conduct themselves when faced with ideas they find distasteful.
The fault lies in years of such childlike disruptions, which radicals have mistaken for political discourse, not one single denied press pass.
Take Ann Coulter for example, sure she’s caustic, but in 2004 two students at the University of Arizona rushed the stage when she was speaking and hurled a pie at her – they missed and were arrested.
Daniel Pipes is routinely shouted down when speaking at universities and open-minded progressives have even tried to barricade entrances to the venues where he was scheduled to speak. Free speech only extends to those whom good radicals agree with it seems.
In short, not until radicals stop behaving like children will they be allowed into the room when the grown ups are speaking.
— Patrick - Aug 2, 03:08 PM - #Patrick, at no point has Campus Progress ever attended a conservative event where our reporters were disruptive, assaulting, committed any illegal activity, or did anything detrimental to the actual event.
Additionally, at the events you cited where Ann Coulter was assaulted, the actions were by students attending in the audience, not anyone with press credentials.
Citing the actions of people completely unrelated to Campus Progress, and for that matter the press in general, under a blanket of “radicals” is a weak, baseless, and desparate argument.
— August J. Pollak - Aug 2, 04:29 PM - #While conserative views might seem harsh, they still are others opinions. But for one to deny freedom of press & a pass to a legitimate publication is proof that steering buisness and views are still rich in todays society. Now LOL comment was just plain tacky. You should have LOL for you at the next presidential elections, no wonder why there so discouraged.
— some random guy on the beach - Aug 19, 12:49 AM - #T3SHT7
— online - Jun 18, 09:48 PM - #A bird may be known by its flight,
— Doll - May 30, 08:56 AM - #