Hey, everybody! Watch Kromko vs. the whole wide world from last night’s Arizona Illustrated!
This article appears in Oct 25-31, 2007.
Water Sports
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Hey, everybody! Watch Kromko vs. the whole wide world from last night’s Arizona Illustrated!
This article appears in Oct 25-31, 2007.
Getting hassled by The Man Mild-mannered reporter More by Jim Nintzel
Comments are closed.
You were sitting so close. Why didn’t you cockpunch him, Nintzel? Opportunity wasted.
is bill buckmaster a vampire?
Water shortages are a serious matter. LINK
Every molecule of water you drink has been through millions of human beings. ALL water is “Toilet to Tap” water. Is there some shipment of water arriving in the atmosphere from outer space every day that we aren’t being told about? And every year the mains get filthier and where’s the money going to come from to repair those? ABout a week after all the new water mains are in, and people start talking about restricting shower time, someone is inevitably going to start talking about handing the problem over to the “Private” sector… Privatize the profits!
ahh, Hell… People shouldn’t even be living in Tucson! It’s completely unnatural. There’s already 950,000 too many people here. Anybody complaining about water in Tucson is like an astronaut complaining about the air supply on the moon. I don’t even know what I mean. I just hate people acting like Tucson in 1980 was “normal” and Tucson 2007 is a perversion of God’s Perfect Kingdom. It was unnatural then and it’s unnatural now.
Why do the Tucson Police wear black uniforms? If the TPD switched to light blue, white, or tan uniforms, we’d be saving forty, fifty gallons in sweat right there. See? I am offering good old-fashioned common sense solutions to real problems.
Largest population group in Tucson: Young Hispanics.
Only population group on KUAT Friday Roundtable: Aging Anglos.
Yeah, Young Hispanics drink different water than the rest of us. How can Aging Anglos possibly comprehend Youthful Hispanic thirst? Identity Politics is for idiots.
Sprawn!, the police answer is simple — those gallons they sweat out? It re-enters the atmosphere, as you note. If we switched to lighter uniforms, that would be less water going back into the ecosystem.
So think of it as cop-armpit-to-tap water.
Ross is talking representation of opinion on the Roundtable week after week, not who’s drinking the water. Although, working from memory, hasn’t Portillo been a panelist before on the Roundtable? That doesn’t make sense since he’s a columnist, but??
Thursday and Friday was entertaining, more than informative. I kept thinking two things 1) How much do the Greens hate you? 2) What do you do when the camera is on them while they answer questions, because they always look at you at the end? What are you doing-mushing your lips together in earnest consideration or snarling?
IPH – I would welcome a diversity of opinion on the Roundtable. But is there cause for a “diversity” of opinion in this case? Is there Spanish speaking water? Is there some magical Latino Water Fairy? In Spanish and English, we’re pumping all the water out of the ground, and draining it all out of Lake Mead faster than it can be “recharged”. Yet, when it rains, the streets flood. Anyway, pointing out a lack of diverse representation is such a weak-cheese nothing of an argument. There is no possible response to it except a polite apology for not being the offended group. And if you respond to it in any other way, you’re being insensitive or racist, whatever the case may be. Maybe we can get Alberto Gonzales to torture the Colorado River…
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As to Prop 200, it seems to me that… if your cat is pooping on your bed, you don’t solve the problem by sticking a cork in it’s butt. You’ll just make your cat move to Marana, or Oracle… and join a Mega-Church, and buy an SUV. Is that what you want? Constipated cats in Escalades? NO on 200!
Well, Ross is wrong then, because Ernesto has a standing invite to be on the Roundtable whenever he wants. If he’s not there, it’s because he has other fish to fry that week. That’s his choice; it’s not The Man keeping him down.
Beyond that, KUAT’s TV and radio operations have Hispanic reporters, producers, directors and other staff, as well as a bilingual newsmagazine program and lots of Hispanic guests. When Bill Buckmaster is on vacation, Tony Paniagua hosts the roundtable.
Maybe instead of proposing a quota, we should just judge a program by the content of its content, not by the color of its skin. Which, incidentally, was all Ross bothered to comment on. Sprawn called that one right.
Why doesn’t it make sense for Ernesto to be on the show? Kimble and I are columnists, too.
Hey, Ross Jeffries, have ya heard of Portillo? He’s a hispanic guy and he’s on the round table–only slightly less boring than Ann Brown. If he wasn’t such a lazy choad he would probably have there to say absolutely nothing as usual.
Kromko was unleashed! And he got spanked like a ho bitch by Nintzel. I didn’t think that Nintzel could spank anybody harder than Croteau the night before and then Kromko comes along. He looked like Doc from “Back to the Future”. What’s up with the bizzaro rape comment?
Re: Panel members: That’s true. Many shows that discuss the issues with journalists include both columnists and hard-news reporters as part of panels.
I see a distinct difference between columnist and reporter; the school of objective journalism says that reporters, when the story is portrayed as hard news instead of editorial, are not supposed to introduce their opinion into the report. (Said with full acknowledgments that not all news organizations go by this school of thought.)
In short, my original logic to the Portillo comment, which I’m retracting, went:
Reporter = Journalist, Columnist = Journalist.
However, tone of a Reporter != tone of a Columnist.
A Reporter’s Roundtable, if taken by name literally through the eyes of this logic, means Reporters on the panel, sans Columnists.
Although, somehow I think I’ve just opened an off-topic can of worms here, though.
Foot. In. Mouth.
Kromko seemed a little too rambley to be fighting such an important issue. I hope the Proposition has better spokespeople than him. If you can’t clealry explain why treated wastewater is worse than CAP water then you shouldn’t even be on a Prop. 200 panel. And be sure not to repeat somebody’s lame metaphor about rape if you want to win the sympathy vote. Had he used a metaphor about corking a cat’s ass then it would be another story.
Larry Hecker came across as a smooth if lackadaisical hired gun; I didn’t get the sense that his heart is in this battle, probably because he knows he can always pack up his moneybags and move whenever Tucson runs out of water.
The journalists seemed like they felt tortured just attempting to converse with Mr. Kromko. Was it an especially hot day or did the power go off at the Student Union Starbucks that morning? Wake up, people. Chop chop, andale, you’re on television. Smirking and asking muted rhetorical questions won’t pump up KUAT’s ratings past “The Bionic Woman Sulks in a Dark High-Tech Room Part IV.”
Anyway, could you Prop. 200 experts post links to the Tucson Weekly articles that have fully explored both sides of the issue? I guess I missed the cover story because I was too busy trying to find flaws in Tom Danehy’s reasoning about why illegal immigrants should not be performing rap music.
Sprawn asks, “Is there Spanish speaking water? Is there some magical Latino Water Fairy?”
The Santa Cruz River is one of the main water supply sources for Nogales, Sonora and for Nogales, Arizona. The water management policies of Nogales, Sonora, in regard to the use of the Santa Cruz River, may have a direct impact on the volume of water entering the Santa Cruz Active Management Area (AMA). Additional pumping of Nogales, Sonora Santa Cruz River well fields could reduce both small flood flows and sub-flow, thereby reducing the recharge in the Santa Cruz AMA.
Jim Nintzel notes, “KUAT’s TV and radio operations have Hispanic reporters, producers, directors and other staff.”
God forbid they be allowed in front of the camera occasionally. We know for which group that spot is reserved.
i’m not sure what the hispanic/water comments are all about.
perhaps it is a reference to desimation of native cultures and the natural envrionment in mexico where u.s. water consumption has drained the colorado delta area into a wasteland?
here in the u.s. while the mostly white male pudits flex their water trivia and swagger about in a pissing match of theory and hyperbol all hoping they’ve got it right (its all a grand experiment afterall) it sure would be nice to see some coverage about teh eyeballing of tribal water throughout the southwest as the settlers thrist for sprawl.
but to foucs on white male media thing: has anyone noticed that the peole who say “aw common lighten up.” are usually the white males?
if a group of staunchly heterosexual investors/editors/writers were to start up a LBGTSwhatever pub. here in tucson how much clout would it have?
but mention “white male” and all the white males circle the wagons firing off salvos of “liberal guilt!” “quatas don’t work!” etc.
and who can blame them.
their jobs are on the line.
from what i can tell from looking at the paper and the byline, the tucson weekly the top positions are held by anglo males.
is this true?
in a town with so much diversity it seems kind of odd yes?
or to paraphrase the weekly somewhat danehy headline: oh those wack mexicans are doing again!
— The Santa Cruz River is one of the main water supply sources for Nogales, Sonora and for Nogales, Arizona. The water management policies of Nogales, Sonora, in regard to the use of the Santa Cruz River, may have a direct impact on the volume of water entering the Santa Cruz Active Management Area (AMA). Additional pumping of Nogales, Sonora Santa Cruz River well fields could reduce both small flood flows and sub-flow, thereby reducing the recharge in the Santa Cruz AMA.
i was posting my lousy spelling post when ross tossed off that note.
shifting water back and forth.
if us policy repsected the mexican side of the colorado i wonder if sonora would return the favor?
a bit of aqua karma.
some ideas:
http://ncseonline.org/NAE/bibliographyResults.cfm?find=historian
Ross: I’m not sure why I’m responding because you’ve ignored any evidence I’ve presented that doesn’t fit your preconceived frame. But just because you appear to have comprehension problems, let me explain to you–listening yet?–that REPORTERS and PRODUCERS are “allowed” (to use your term) in front of the camera. This week, Richard Elias will be the Roundtable guest. And once again, to bring it back to the Roundtable: Can you explain to me why you do not consider Ernesto Portillo Jr. to be Hispanic? Or is it just because he’s “aging” that he’s no longer of any value?
Santa Cruz river… water management policies of Nogales, Sonora… must stay awake… Must not succumb to boring race-based water arguments…
A few news flashes, Ross:
1. The roundtable does have a Hispanic: Ernesto Portillo and he’s been on the roundtable all the time. He writes a column for star and he blinks a lot and gives boring speeches (not last week, but he’s usually there–incredibly boring–but he is there).
2. You are reaching on the Nogales thing because Sprawn made you look silly.
3. If anyone had any doubts about prop 200 Friday night, Kromko confirmed them. If you ever wonder about the effects of hard living in the 60s and 70s, then JK is a living example. He was a doddering old fool. I had a hard time believing he could even organize an acid party anymore, let alone write an initiative about the most important issue facing Arizona without serious flaws.
— He was a doddering old fool.
what? if you’re old you can’t contribute?
bullshit.
then to attack someone with strange drug allegations?
that is classic operations around here::: attacking the character of an individual rather than the substance of their argument.
i may just voting for 200 now for the simple satisfaction of knowing i countered romo’s vote.
Ross – I think it is a good idea, indeed, to open the scope of the debate to include a wider variety of participants. We can’t hear differing perspectives until we hear them. The debate on KUAT seemed to have a narrow, almost technical focus. If we open up to include Sonoran perspectives, would we then not have to consider… Utah, Colorado, and California as well?
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I only meant to make myself look silly! And I thought I did a crack-up job of it. My only point is this: If we undid the Gadsden Purchase tomorrow, and moved the border up to the Gila River, we’d still be facing the exact same problems. The perspective that seems sorely lacking to me is that of hydrological engineers, ecologists, and science in general. We can all pretend that the Native inhabitants of the region were more in tune with nature or whatever in the past… That sounds great when you are doing a documentary about the saguaro or something, with nice slow fades between wild flowers and shots of saguaro against the moonlight, with a flute playing in the background. Nice…
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How many people living here now, whether they are indigenous, Native, border-crossers (I’m talking ALL borders North and South!), or those who were crossed by the border, would be willing to give up air conditioning, plumbing, irrigation, vaccination, roads, and so on and so forth… and return to the “balanced” interaction with the environment that was capable of sustaining say… 50,000 people in this valley? And those 50,000 would have a nice 30 year lifespan. Because that’s the deal we had with nature before we started pumping in water, and the railroads came.
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What we have here is completely unnatural and largely unsustainable. People aren’t going to stop having kids. They aren’t going to voluntarily give up life-sustaining medical techniques. We aren’t going to give up AC, cars, electricity, mandatory public education, mining, railroads, intensive single crop agriculture. In fact, we can’t.
I’m starting a “Mas Latinos en Fronte de Los Cameras” letter-writing campaign to KUAT. Please help.
Here is a sample letter that YOU can use:
“Dear Bill Buckmaster,
You’re looking awfully pasty. Are you a vampire? Anyway, the other day I was watching your Reporters Panel for the Proposition 200 debate, and I noticed there was a lot of pale flesh on my television screen. I was all, ‘Whoa-ho-ho! Turn the lights down!’ Then I realized, ‘Damn, that’s a lot of whitey!’
Don’t try to pass the buck, Buckmaster. You have a say in this onslaught of luminescence, and you must, I repeat, MUST require La Raza to reprazent! Buckmaster the trend, Buckmaster the system, the Buckmaster stops AQUI! One, two, Buckmaster your zapatos!
Even if you have to wear a sombrero and a floppy dark mustache, let’s get a little more Latin, hombre. From now on you will not bring on Jim Nintzel — you will presente Jesus Nintzelando to answer el pregunto, “Que es mas macho, El Hecker o El Kromko? Quien tiene El Proposition en este culo?” Comprende?
Thank you for considering my proposal, Senor Buckmaster. You are, truly, the Bill Buckmaster of your domain.
Gracias,
___YOUR NAME HERE____ “
that should be “uno, dos, buckmaster los zapatos,” idiot
DHM,
WTF?
–IPH
— You’re looking awfully pasty. Are you a vampire?
hey bill effin rocks!
took me about 20 years to get it but now seeing that smiling face of his and hearing that soothing intor music gives me a warm morphine glow.
As an aside, I thought a certain JN was very rude to that nice old man asking him questions that he couldn’t answer without putting his foot in his mouth. But seriously, rhetorically, it is kind of unfair to confront him with questions about billing logistics as if cost were the sole concern and bring up hypothetical billing costs and so on. It’s a loaded question that can’t be answered. In fact, all of JN’s questions came pre-loaded and virtually unanswerable. While it is tempting to frame things in such a manner so that you can look tough and yell, “Yes or No! Just answer the question! Yes or No, sir! It’s a simple question! Yes, or no!” Or in this case, “Where do you propose we get 23 million dollars, hmm?” It’s really not his place to answer either question, and suggesting that the proposition is somehow flawed because it doesn’t address unrelated concerns is unfair.
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I think in the interest of fairness that the whole debate centered around putting the trash fee on the water bill should just be dropped. It was wrong for the anti-trash-fee people to bring it up as a point of contention in the first place. But the retaliation is equally silly. The trash fee shouldn’t be on the water bill. It actually doesn’t make sense. Why not consolidate ALL bills into a “Publis Services” Bill and… either way is a slippery slope. And really, a trivial matter. Neither side gains ground by pushing the point.
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After 200 goes down, is recinding the Garbage Fee going to be attached to every proposition that gets put on the ballot? Isn’t there a law against that?
Why is it unfair for me to ask why it makes sense to spend a million dollars sending out a bill for trash collection when they’re already sending out a bill for water service, given that John Kromko is the one who has specifically included a provision in his initiative that no other fees could ever be added to a water bill? He has, on numerous occasions, said that the trash fee was added to the water bill in order to extort people into paying it. I think it was more a matter of government doing something that was relatively efficient for a change. YMMV.
And I don’t think it’s unfair to ask Kromko to identify the waste in in city government when he says it’s not big deal to trim $23 million from the general fund.
Maybe I should have just asked: “Mr. Kromko, your campaign has the momentum of a runaway freight train. To what do you attribute your overwhelming popularity?”
Hey, commenters: I encourage you to take a few minutes and read up on this blog’s comments policy. Some comments here have crossed the line of personal attacks and have strayed too far from the topic at hand, and have therefore been deleted. Thanks for keeping comments on topic and keeping things moderately civil.
Ha ha ha! Well… All I can say is this. He looked like a deer caught in the headlights. When a campaign is so disastrously designed and poorly planned and unsupported as Prop 200, it seems almost cruel to put it out of its misery. The guy was completely unable to condense his message into a succinct one minute sound bite. And the message is somewhat subtle. And the guy was clearly unable to express the subtleties and defenses I’d hoped he would put forward in his own defense, even though I think 200 is ludicrous.
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The defense for the Water Bill aspect is this 30 second clip (that he should have memorized by now, Criminy! Even the 15 year old kid sitting at a table in Reid Park advocating for some silly neighborhood issue knows how to condense his message into a soundbite nowadays): I am glad you asked that, Jim, the Trash Fee was passed with the understanding that it would be applied to trash pickup, it is cynical of the City Council to attach the fee to the water bill thereby forcing Tucsonans to pay or have their water cut off. If you fail to pay a parking ticket do we cut off your electricity? If you fail to pay your cable bill do we kick your kids out of school? No, of course not. I think the City Council thought they could sneak this past the citizens of Tucson without their realizing it. If it is more efficient to “package” the trash fee with the Water Bill, then why not combine all municipal fees into one omnibus bill? (You initiated the slippery slope, now slide on it!)
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On the matter of “$10 million… just tell me where the City can cut 10 million…” I would reply, were I in his shoes, “It’s not my responsibility to figure out how to balance the City’s Budget. If the city wants to pass a 23 million dollar tax, they should go to the people and pass the tax, not pull a cynical back-room deal threatening to cut off trash pickup, attaching a fee to a completely unrelated service, and then crying, ‘Ohh, ohh, we need the money for Police, we need the money for the Fire Dept.’ when they get their hand caught in the cookie jar.”
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Now, of course that’s just my off the cuff first draft notion of a reply for a position I don’t particularly support… but…
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The guy gave the impression that Prop 200 was written on the back of a napkin on a dare. He didn’t think of any of the contingencies or counters. It was so poorly planned. And all of his counters required in-depth knowledge of subtle aspects of water management… Why the Hell is something like this even under consideration by the electorate? It seems to me like Raytheon going to the electorate and asking about how to configure circuit boards on a rocket or something. Isn’t this a technical matter for hydrological engineers to work on?
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Anyways, there’s more than enough to kill 200 on without backing the guy into a rhetorical corner and mounting him like a German Shepherd. My concerns are merely those of civility and polite rhetoric in public debate. I just felt that watching Kromko was like watching a cow in a PETA video. When someone is so disastrously disorganized, you can’t help but pity them.
— Some comments here have crossed the line of personal attacks and have strayed too far from the topic at hand, and have therefore been deleted.
holy wobbling wattle batman?
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is the weekly really banning wattle discussion?
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i agree that this is your sandbox but if this forum is to have any purpose how do you honestly justify calling someone a dick and a coward and so on (as you did with me) but if so one dares much as mention the copious wattles on weekly staff as i have done (i really am curious about this topic) then the topic is off limits?
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for the record more people need to be proud of their wattles.
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wattle pride! wattle power! wattles are here get used to them.
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if you feel the need to edit away this post then may the wattle be with you, but for the record do you see any humor in this wattle battle babble?
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just a bit?
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and perhaps you folks are just a wee bit sensitive. comeout of weekly world central and rub elbows with us common folks.
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you know this wattle ban will be a topic of discussion at THE BAR tonight.
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but at the same time i’ll try and respect the wattle ban around hereif that is what it takes to keep the peace.
I will say, in your defense J.N., that you showed remarkable restraint in not “cockpunching” the distinguished gentleman. I yield the balance of my time.
Sprawn: You’re way better at answering these questions than John K. was! I like your style.
Anyone else want to take a crack at 30-second responses?
Hey Sprawn, your reaction was similar to mine: Nintzel was pressing Kromko on practical matters of X, Y, Z and Form 225 Slash 11-13B, when Kromko was obviously interested in big-picture, philosophical concerns about Why We Shouldn’t Have to Do This and That Because It’s Wrong of Them to Expect Us to Do That or This. Of course Nintzel is just doing his job trying to bring Kromko down to earth, even if he looks like a Mean-Clown Sniper shooting at a ramshackle zeppelin-like contraption manned by a Dotty Old Monocled Desert Iconoclast floating over the saguaros.
As for the subject of adding the trash bill to the water bill, I think it would make sense thematically if more people were using their pipelines for garbage disposal. But otherwise it does seem strange to combine the two. Nintzel’s argument that “it saves postage!” is kind of a weird back-door way to defend something after the fact, though now that he mentions it, a million bucks is a million bucks. (In city budget terms, a million bucks is a negligible amount….just jack up the cost of garbage removal $4 per year and you pretty well cover the difference in postage.) Given current trends, in 2-3 more years the majority of people will be using online bill-pay methods anyway and postage will no longer really factor in.
and so based on this blog:
racially inflamitory headlines and columns about hispanics = ok.
commenting on the wattles of weekly staff = violent response.
how bout dem apples?
==Can you explain to me why you do not consider Ernesto Portillo Jr. to be Hispanic?==
I have better things to do on Friday nights than watch the show regularly. You suggested we watch one episode, I watched it, and it was a collection of talking, aging, graying Anglo heads. When was the last time you suggested we watch a show where Portillo was one of the panelists discussing an issue that does not have a Hispanic angle? And that’s the whole point: Hispanics are invited to talk about border fences, but not about topics lacking an obvious Hispanic angle.
Ross: You’re still having comprehension problems. Ernesto is invited to be on the Roundtable–do try to listen here–EVERY WEEK. That he sometimes chooses to do something else is his decision, not KUAT’s.
I do appreciate the fact that you’ve finally admitted you don’t watch the show, so you’re basically talking out your ass with your “critique.” That’s a breakthrough for you! Congrats!
Hey, if you can answer a couple more questions: You seem preoccupied with the idea that old people have less to contribute than young people. At what age should people be fired from their jobs? Have you seen “Logan’s Run” too many times?
myself, i like az illustrated and the chance to absorb stories not normally seen/heard in mainstream media (i often find buckmaster and crew are much more “alternative” and progressive than the weekly. and nintzel’s job on az illustrated does shine. i wish more of those interviews/questions he heads found their way into print).
but that said the ethnic diveristy in tucson media, in particular at the decision making/editorial level, is lacking.
eventually a change is gonna come.
>
Ross, if that is the point (which I feel like you’re propping up after other arguments were knocked down), it took you a long way to finally say that this was your point. Why wasn’t this said way earlier?
Marlow: Full fluid diversity takes time, and in a meritocracy it also takes money, confidence, understanding of the playing field and hard work.
Understanding of the playing field, you might be wondering?
Yes – I believe that many whites, through their parents, inherit an understanding of corporate business, but most young ethnic minorities do not have that inheritance because of a current lack of presence in the higher echelons of corporate America, so they need to learn the playing field firsthand.
You can teach your kid not to overspend, how to be financially stable, or how to manage a team of office jockeys — but if you don’t know how to do that yourself then the kid will need to learn how on their own or through another major figure in their lives. It’s not too difficult to learn if one has confidence in doing so, but it still is a disadvantage.
So, the rise of ethnic minorities takes time and generations.
Before you say, bu bu bu Bill Richardson is Hispanic! — his daddy was a high-level banker. http://www.richardsonforpresident.com/about_bill?id=0004
And, both of Barack Obama’s parents were college-educated members of society, which at that time put them among the top fifth percentile of Americans with regard to highest level of education achieved.
With time, in theory larger percentages of ethnic minorities will go to college, achieve high-level positions and the gap will close. In time.
— With time, in theory larger percentages of ethnic minorities will go to college, achieve high-level positions and the gap will close. In time.
i agree it takes time but i’m not usre there is much diveristy in a publication in this day and age when every top position is held by a white male as in the case of the weekly (if i am wrong please let me know).
i’ve seen students on campus at pima and ua and in tusd and there is great diversity.
i some of them take journalism courses.
if so why are there few to none minority journalists at the weekly?
how many interns of color have there ever been?
by comparison, if you watch the intro to az illustrated where they show the reporters you’ll see there is extensive diversity.
i’m not saying the weekly excluding minorities on purpose but it does seem odd the publication’s staff does not reflect the diversity of the community it covers.
Logan…. You’re an Elder!
finally after 3 years in AZ….i can start to comprehend the strange dynamics here in the tucson desert community..it’s in the water. kudos for humor..former dc migrant.. good info links. cheers. btw..your traffic situation is rivaling the mixing bowl on the 95 DC corridor. boos
Everyone living in Tucson should be concerned about our rapid growth, lack of conservation and our dwindling regional water supplies. A change is going to come and we should start doing something about it now.
As much as we would love to save our city by ourselves we have to realize that this is more than just a regional issue, this is a national issue. If Lake Mead goes dry or if the snow-pack in the Rockies continues to disappear earlier each year, then it doesn’t matter how many water connections we have here in Tucson. The simple fact that we are competing with other cities in Arizona and 3 other states, for a shrinking amount CO river water should tell us a little bit about how effective any Tucson water plan will really be.
We can conserve all we want, stop all new pumping, install grey water systems and rain harvesting systems. We can get rid of our golf courses, lakes, car washes and we can start buying water rights from farmers in neighboring counties. All of this will only delay the inevitable. The drought doesn’t care how in harmony with nature we are, once the snow melts in the Rockies and the evaporating water in our reservoirs disappears there wont be anymore water to conserve.
Another poster mentioned that the “Natives” were living in harmony with the desert and that that is how they survived. Well “harmony” didn’t save the Anasazi from eating each other and dieing en masse, 50 years of drought took them out, and we are only in our 10th year or something like that.
So even with harmonic environmental interaction, we are still at the mercy of the rain gods. So let’s take out our moccasins and dance a little rain jig, that’s our only hope.
Nintzel,
The loaded questions you assaulted Kromko with would have been better suited for a mayoral candidate, but they did serve the purpose of making him look like a fool. The man had only 30 seconds to respond to a question that even the Mayor wouldn’t have been able to answer without help from an aid. If I was a supporter of Kromko I would be livid but as a fan of political entertainment, I thoroughly enjoyed it. I hope you continue to take people to task, as it is great entertainment. The elected officials in this town especially need people like you to keep them honest, so don’t take it easy on Walkup, the other council members, nor the people running against them.
-Mike
i agree it takes time but i’m not usre there is much diveristy in a publication in this day and age when every top position is held by a white male as in the case of the weekly (if i am wrong please let me know).
i’ve seen students on campus at pima and ua and in tusd and there is great diversity.
i some of them take journalism courses.
if so why are there few to none minority journalists at the weekly?
In short, you didn’t read my post. This stuff takes time. There might be great journalism students at the UA — whoopity doo — how many of these untrained 20-year-olds would you make your editor or publisher? It takes time to rise through the ranks.
Regarding minorities.
In short, are you talking ethnic minority, or an overall classified minority?
I’m not going to get into a big list, but I will say that while these top positions do not change quickly, Messr. Boegle has been the openly gay ed-in-chief since at least 2002.
“Dat dem Nintzel” has been staff writer for almost 20 years — do you want him removed from this top position simply because he’s a heterosexual white male? High-level job movement takes time.
The Weekly has had gays, women, Greek-Americans, Armenian-Americans, and Jews on editorial staff. I don’t know if Greek-American or Armenian-American actually count as minorities, but some ppl go as far as to regard these nationalities as such because they are not Western European.
Basically KMFU — what are you expecting? What would you do?
— In short, you didn’t read my post. This stuff takes time.
no iph, i did read it, but “it takes time” is way too vague for me.
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how much time do you think it will take before we see a competent person of color take a ranking position at the tucson weekly?
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i distinctly remember whites only bathrooms in the south and people telling me “son that’s just the way it is. these things take time.”
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if people kept buying into that line we’d still have whites only bathrooms to this day.
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so my question is “how much time” do we need?
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the weekly has been around for what 30 plus years and not a single person of color has held a top position there and quite possibly there hasn’t been a single staff reporter of color.
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the answer that “well there are none out there yet” is weak and frankly unbelievable.
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as is claiming jews and gays and armenians and greeks should be counted as a “diverse” work force.
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its nice an all but its a dodge. we live in the age of gwen effile (spelling).
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the civil rights movement is roughly 50 years old.
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the time is now.
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— “Dat dem Nintzel” has been staff writer for almost 20 years — do you want him removed from this top position simply because he’s a heterosexual white male?
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actually i think his 20 years at the same pub. could be a sign he needs to leave the cozy tucson nest and get out into the world.
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contentment as a big fish in a little pond splashing often breeds close mindedness to new ideas. there is a big world out there.
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i often wonder how would jim would fare do in say nyc or la or some place like that? would it broaden his world view? would it improve his journalism skills?
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certainly. sometimes i can’t help but wonder if nintzel isn’t on cruise control.
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often times the “good ol’ boy” reporters who know only one town (not to mention a single pub) bring way to much baggage to the story.
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for my money give me someone who has traveled around a bit, been exposed to fresh ideas and seen the way pubs work in other markets.
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i had hoped jimmy would bring a fresh perspective to the weekly but in the last few years i get the feeling he worries more about paying his mortage than journalism.
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so i’ve got my hopes now riding on mari.
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but you never know.
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from what i’ve seen tucson has a way of wearing journalists down.
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need proof? just look at how many weekly employees stated bot was objective journalism (oh man did i bring up bot again? sorry about that.)
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but what do i know? i’m just a turnip exterminator (rtetired) who lives in a plane that can never land because it ran out of gas long ago.
I want full credit for starting the practice of one period paragraphs.
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I am talking about this.
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I started that.
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ME!
— I want full credit for starting the practice of one period paragraphs.
you
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get
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full
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credit
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This policy, of course, was implemented during the Nixon Administration. “Modified limited affirmative action” means you do not actually need to have Hispanic representation on public television shows; you simply need to show that you invited one.
I win! I hope they erase these… It’s more embarrassing than usual for me.
— I win! I hope they erase these… It’s more embarrassing than usual for me.
most will not admidt it, but every checks out the size of the turd they leave behind in the bowl. pride and animal nature is a curious thing.
Ross: Perhaps Ernesto can crash his car into yours and then you can ask the judge to sentence him to be on the Roundtable every week. I’m sure if he knew how much he was letting you down (even though you don’t watch the show), he would feel just terrible that he sometimes cannot be there.
You know what’s really pathetic about your continued inability to admit that you’re wrong about KUAT-TV having Hispanic representation, even though the number of Hispanic reporters is equal to the number of Anglo males? It’s that KUAT is probably the only station that even tries to cover local politics. Bill Buckmaster invites every candidate on the show, even the kooky ones, for debates every year. And the station dedicates 90 minutes a week to local bilingual programming.
The reward? Dopes like you whining about racial breakdowns based on one episode because you’re so much smarter and more insightful and sensitive than the rest of us.
Hey, but what do I know? I’m over 40 and I’m an Anglo, so my opinion doesn’t matter in your world, anyway.
JN – don’t look at the replies in your next post… it might turn your hair grey!
It is a shame that there are still people who think that diversity is merely a measure of peoples skin tones. Where one was raised, culture, economic status, age, religion, life experiences, etc. have all been shown to be better measures of diversity.
When you need a job done right, higher the most qualified person, regardless of race.
Jim,
Why dont you get a DNA test so that you can map out your geneology? Maybe you have some Spanish blood in you.
I mention this because appearances are decieving. How can race be a measure of anything when we are all mixed to some degree?
-Mike
Ross,
I agree with you about the lack of true hispanic representation, the only hispanics on KUAT are Americans of Mexican decent!! Que Extrano! lol KUAT needs to include some other groups of hispanics; Chileans, some Colombianos, hey maybe even Philipinos and some western Africans, they were colonized by the Spanish and speak the same language. Do all of the non-Spanish Europeans who immigrated to Mexico and then to the US count as Hispanic?
The Spanish mixed with native peoples all over the world passing on their language and religion. Being hispanic is a pretty vague term, just as vague as describing someone as black or as white. Do you list your race on your Resume under experience?
==the only Hispanics on KUAT are Americans of Mexican descent!!==
Not counting Paniagua, born in Colombia and educated in Florida. Then there’s a Texan who came here to attend the UofA. I guess it’s been only about ten generations that Hispanics have populated Tucson — in another ten, maybe we will see some home-grown talent.
Thanks for doing the research on that Ross, I guess you didnt pick up on the sarcasm.
Speaking of Jim Nintzel’s geneology, I was watching “Spiderman 3” the other day, and after seeing Jim Ninztel on “Arizona Illustrated,” it occured to me that Nintzel’s eyes and mouth are similar to Tobey Maguire’s. Sort of comic-book round eyes, with the corners of one side of his mouth on the verge of curling up into what could either be a sincere smile or a smirk, you’re not sure which.
So Nintzel is sort of like Tucson’s version of Spiderman. And I don’t trust Spiderman — he’s full of stick-um.
With great power comes great responsibility.