By SUZANNE DOWNING / MUST READ AMERICA
In an editorial by the Anchorage Daily News on Saturday, the largest newspaper in Alaska sniffed and talked down its bespectacled nose to the winner-apparent of the mayoral election in Anchorage.
Although Dave Bronson has had the courtesy not to declare himself the winner prematurely, it’s evident that he has won that election and that the newspaper editorial board has lost. The writer of the ADN editorial is clearly grieving, just like the liberals on Twitter, where there is the expected wringing of hands, wailing, and gnashing of teeth.
Mind you, we are talking about a Pulitzer Prize-winning newspaper that did not have the courage to take a stand on who should be mayor of a city that represents over 38 percent of the state’s population. It remained neutral, after having endorsed Bill Evans in the April 6 election. Evans got less than 10 percent of the vote. For the runoff, the ADN played dead.
Now, ADN management has decided it better give Bronson a shot from its editorial bow: He will have to be the mayor for all of Anchorage, including those who didn’t vote for him.
Thanks, ADN, for stating the obvious. This is a slap at Bronson, rather than a handshake, from the ineffectual intellectuals.
The editorial might have been: “Congratulations, Anchorage. We have a new mayor. This city has been through a lot without even having an elected mayor for eight months, and for having a terrible disgrace of a mayor before that. Remember that Ethan guy who couldn’t keep his pants on? Let’s get behind the new mayor and help him be successful. The battle is over, so let’s move on to brighter days ahead.”
Here’s what the ADN said: “And for the past year, it has been some of Bronson’s most ardent supporters who have showed up en masse to Assembly meetings, delivering invective testimony, protesting and even burning a mask during the proceedings. As mayor, Bronson will have to balance the wishes of those supporters with those of the rest of the municipality — including the nearly 50% who supported a candidate Bronson and his supporters vilified.”
This is not the advice the newspaper gave former Mayor Ethan Berkowitz, who ran the city into ruin with the complete gutting of the downtown economy, and with the now-historic vacancy rates in Class A real estate. It’s also not likely that the editorial board would have lectured Forrest Dunbar, had he won. No, the writers would have popped the champagne and lauded Dunbar as the future of Anchorage.
Here’s what the ADN said: “It is that responsibility — to govern for all of the city, not just one’s own supporters — that makes holding the office so much more difficult than running for it. It’s possible to act as though those supporters are the only constituents who matter, and some politicians do. But the sharp ones realize that to move a city forward, that’s the wrong tack. And not just because being responsive to all residents is the right thing to do: The political reality is that Bronson will accomplish little if he isn’t willing to work with the Assembly. And the Assembly much more closely resembles the half of the municipality that voted for his opponent.”
Really. The newspaper is telling Bronson he’d better get on board the leftist agenda. He shouldn’t try to make good on his promise to voters.
The newspaper without the courage to take a stand now has shown its cards: It was always all-in for Dunbar.
The newspaper continued with its nose held high and its eyebrow raised, but we’ll summarize: Bronson has no experience. He had better lean on the experience of the extremists on the Assembly. This will be a steep learning curve for him. He should not settle scores with those who didn’t support him on the Assembly (Dunbar, Quinn-Davidson, Perez-Verdia, Peterson, Constant, Weddleton, Rivera, Zalatel, LaFrance).
What the newspaper could have said is it’s time for the Assembly members who didn’t support Bronson to drop their destructive plans for ruining Bronson before he is sworn in. They, too, need to act like leaders and not further damage the once-great city of Anchorage with their anti-business policies.
Those supporters of Bronson that the newspaper disparages? Those are business people. Showing up en masse? When was that ever a crime in America? Petitioning the “government for a redress of grievances,” as expressed in the First Amendment? How is it that the free press is now criticizing the people of the community and protecting the power of their lords?
This election was as much a referendum on the Assembly as anything else, which is why the Assembly quickly removed its mask mandate; they know that four seats are up next April, and that the citizens have been activated. They are already looking at those four assembly seats that will come up in 2022.
Meanwhile, soon-to-be Mayor Bronson will have to get used to the beatings from the ADN editorial board, which has now given a dog whistle to its writers that they can unleash the hounds of hell on Bronson and there will be nothing but support from the top. There will be no repercussions from management for unfair reporting.
The ADN had it right on one sentence of its diatribe against Bronson and those whom the newspaper finds to be his distasteful supporters, who comprise 50 percent of the Anchorage bowl: “In order for Anchorage to move forward, we’ll need a mayor and Assembly who can work with one another, regardless of ideological differences. That work should start today, because there’s plenty of ground to cover.”
We can agree on that much: Leaders need to work together for the common good. But politics is about ideology and elections have consequences. We’ve seen those consequences for the past six years. Anchorage is ready for a new direction.
Suzanne Downing writes for Must Read Alaska, Must Read America, and NewsMax.
Yeah, it’s great Bronson won because maybe there is a fighting chance at not becoming Portland now. But with so many hard-Left Assembly members, it’s not going to be easy to fix things for the better, it’ll probably remain the same. The worst Assembly member, Constant in downtown, isn’t going anywhere but maybe it’s possible to vote out the others. Including Dunbar.
Their noses are held high because they can’t stand the stink of what they’re wallowing in… and these people are preparing to receive a federal “infrastructure” grant? These grants are a bribe from the lefties to their mouth organs. Johnny Binckley where are you? Reign in your tyrannical communist kid!
The ADN is a liberal rag.
Liberalcrats don’t think they should represent or serve all the people, only those who voted for them.
Berkowitz and the illegal temp mayor did not serve all of Anchorage. The assembly doesn’t.
It reminds me of partners I have had who say they love me like I am and then set about trying to change me to something they really love.
Change is not always bad but behaviour modification is.
Racists masquerading as liberal anti racists think minorities don’t have enough smarts to get an ID to vote.
Anti White is not the same as anti racism. Defining any thing by color is wrong. Critical Race Theory is what the Nazis used, it is not new. Politicizing a pandemic was the lowest form of governance I have ever seen.
Spending money earmarked for pandemic relief to bypass voters wishes. Those who live by the pandemic will die by the pandemic. The fat lady is about to sing.
So they basically don’t want Bronson to do what the lib candidate would have done once elected?
That’s why the left is so ridiculous. They deem it acceptable to behave a certain way, but don’t you dare reciprocate that behavior on them.
The current city council only cared about their liberal agenda and their liberal voters. Now ADN wantS Bronson to not forget about liberal voters? Screw them. Retaliate and get rid of the entire council. DRAIN THE SWAMP. They’re doing it to conservatives every and any chance they get. Going after anyone who won’t align with their freakish ideology and make false accusations of racism and hatred.
Sore losers. Embarrassing.
The moment these people lose an election they swivel from “elections have consequences” to “you represent ME.”
I’ll make a guess, no one at socialist ADN voted for Bronson. The assembly is completely out of control, they are destroying businesses and the education system. Bronson is beholden to his voters, not a socialist anti-American assembly.
Jack, anytime someone equates Critical Race Theory with the Nazi genocidal Final Solution, agreed upon on January 20, 1942, in secret at the notorious Wannsee Conference — I know the next four years’ worth of Assembly meetings are going to be — shall we say, entertaining (?!) at a minimum.
Who really cares, their subscribers decrease every day. It’s nothing but a 10page rag, with few advertisers anyway. Some day soon they will a online joke
Bronson can lead the way Anchorage needs to be led. Anchorage residents aren’t beholden to please any Assembly member or any other city leaders. Residents are beholden to themselves; they continue working, paying their taxes, and staying off any kind of welfare. Hahaha
Besides if he just rolls over at the city leaders’ whims, he’ll be no different than Dunbar.
The Anchorage editorial board needs to learn how to accept change, especially when its for the good.
May I make a suggestion? Anchorage city leaders go to Thursday night Celebrate Recovery-Freedom, from your hurts, hsbits, and HANGUPS 7-9pm at New Hope Church across from Chugach Optional school in Christopher Constant district.
This city’s leaders and managers need the recovery help more than they realize. Y’all are cuckoo. You make lousy employers!
Oh this is just like the time ADN reported fair coverage on last year’s community engagement with the Assembly and lectured that far-left body to represent the entire city and not just their empurpled L48 patrons….
Except that’s not what happened at all. ADN is a left-wing megaphone with zero journalistic integrity and no capacity to acknowledge or represent the “other half” of Anchorage voters. No one voted for them and we won’t miss them when they’re gone.
Now the rest of the assembly must go!!
The assembly didn’t learn a damn thing after seeing the election results. The Communists never do. They’re never willing to bend, so they must be broken. It’s time for the voters of Anchorage to continue to take the city back and rid themselves of the infestation currently inhabiting the council. Their insignificant mouthpiece, ADN, also needs to learn that their days are numbered. The rag has turned itself into a town crier that nobody pays attention to. They are so gone and the good part of it is they won’t even see it coming.
Many of us who voted for Bronson are not, “Bronson Supporters”. We did not vote FOR Bronson, we voted AGAINST Dunbar and the Anchorage Assembly.
The liberals need to understand this. These so-called “Bronson Supporters” want and need a government that serves those who work hard, pay taxes, and desire a safe and clean city.
The city has become a cesspool and the Assembly has been catering to the fringe, those who do not “pull the wagon”. The former mayor and Assembly cater to those who “ride the wagon”.
Anchorage taxpayers want accountability.
Well stated Suzanne.
Surely Mr. Bronson needs not schooling from the purulent ADN/WP especially on the issues of truth, honesty and ethics.
Now it’s time to ‘clean house’ in the Anchorage assembly. A mighty ‘deep clean’ at that.
I have literally wiped my a$$ with the adn and news miner when I lived in my dry cabin.
No ADN, Mayor Bronson got elected to represent the population that works hard, pays taxes, obeys the law, creates jobs and acts responsibly.
Mayor Bronson, get a snapshot today of all Municipal employees and their classifications. Get rid of every executive employee and every “non- rep” who try’s to slink back into union ranks to hide and undermine. Ignore the hue and cry of “institutional knowledge” which got us here in the first place. Contact Art Chance to work on your transition and set up new sheriff policies . Transformative policies that will drive these left wing loons nuts. Art would make a great chief of staff but he won’t do it. If you can get him to work with your transition team and listen to him you will not regret it. He is the master sergeant of responsible government. Don’t read ADN, it’s irrelevant to what you want to accomplishment.
The left pushes and makes inroads, and all the right seems to muster is “holding the line”. I believe Bronson can do better… it’s time to push back, hard. We’re so stinking liberal it nearly killed this city. It’s way past time to push that back and restore “tough independent Alaskan” thinking.
We don’t need WaDC holding our hand telling us how to run our state. We don’t need massive social programs and hotels full of homeless. We need the law enforced. There’s a new Sheriff in town and he has earned the right to clean this place up.
Go get ’em, Bronson! We have your back.
And while I’m at it…. WELL DONE SUZANNE!!!!!!
One voice in the liberal maelstrom, standing on your principles and pushing back. We can learn a lot by following your example.
Good to know that ADN has been elected to set the policies. Someone remind them that they are in the news reporting business Not government policing. Oh wait, they will be more than likely receiving their government payroll cheque here soon, so maybe I’m mistaken.
Advice to every politician out there.
Giving your enemy/opponent what they want does not make them your friend.
With respect, Madam Editor, the ADN’s editorial has a point.
Some Assembly members may perceive Mr. Bronson as the untamed 800-pound gorilla who, with an army of Deplorables, threatens the stranglehold Anchorage’s education industry, public-sector unions, and some Assembly members have on the city.
.
Mr. Dunbar’s team might have figured out more than a few union members voted for Mr. Bronson despite vigorous incentives not to vote for Mr.Bronson.
.
That’s problematic for the cabal who operate Anchorage, are they facing rebellion in the ranks?
.
What if “working with the Assembly” were taken to mean:
.
commissioning an outside forensic audit of city finances and management practices, identify funded positions versus filled positions; return “slush funds” to taxpayers, terminate executive employees and consultants hired during the Berkowitz administration;
.
vetoing upcoming sales-tax ordinances;
.
repealing alcohol, taxes, fuel taxes, plastic-bag bans;
.
proposing payment-in-lieu-of-taxes for non-profit organizations;
.
restructuring building-code permit and building-code enforcement processes to make them less expensive, less adversarial, less vulnerable to habitual, spurious complaints;
.
defunding and removing municipal code enforcers, lobbyists, executive employees, and consultants hired since the Berkowitz administration;
.
verifying at least annually that city voter rolls are accurate, create checks and deterrents against fake ballots, postal fraud, unmonitored drop boxes, nursing-home resident coercion, ballot harvesting, voter impersonation, voter bribery;
.
repealing mail-in voting, removing Dominion mail-in vote machinery, restoring traditional polling-place balloting, and meaningful vote-count observation
.
withdrawing Anchorage from the Alaska Municipal League, withdrawing Anchorage’s share of money from the $600M+ Alaska Municipal League Investment Pool, returning it to taxpayers;
.
divesting the Municipality from buying or administering housing for homeless, restore and sell city property occupied by homeless camps;
.
rebating property taxes paid for in-school services which school-district officials did not provide during China flu hysteria;
.
creating post-Eaglexit vision for Anchorage, what will be changed to persuade other groups not to secede, what will be changed to lessen the risk of another 1980’s-style exodus;
.
vetoing budgets which “rubber stamp” school-district and public-employee union demands;
.
vetoing acts which undermine Anchorage Police Department arrest and enforcement processes;
.
refusing to attend, directing executive-branch employees not to attend, Assembly meetings conducted in violation of Alaska’s Open Meetings Act (AS 44.62.310-.312);
.
strictly enforcing private-property rights, protecting public property from occupation by bums or rioters.
.
In other words, with an 800-pound gorilla and his army of Deplorables in the same room, most Assembly members may feel justifiably anxious about their difficult transition from ruling to representing Anchorage residents.
.
So “working with the Assembly” could actually work quite well, yes?
Go Bronson
Yes those people who attended the assembly meetings, were telling you what they wanted and needed. You would not Listen to the people. Then there was an election. Now we hope you will Listen to the people.
ADN is a clueless rag, ignore them!
I’m sure Bronson will build a fence around Loussac Library, and have it patrolled by National Guard troops, who will be fed poorly and made to sleep on the floor.
Before too long some of those assembly seats will be up for election.
Ding Dong! Ding Dong!
Anchorage is essentially a no go zone, the mass mask neurosis ended any desire to travel there. All best for normal people stuck there, but it’s same as Seattle or Portland, avoid it at all costs .
Assuming that the aphorism, “there’s no such thing as bad publicity,” is correct, why mention that lame rag? Have you or your readers a need to identify the obvious? Anybody with an IQ over room temperature already knows what that fish-wrapper is going to say.
Regarding the ADN: what a sad, pathetic, hypocritical, arrogant POS of a so-called “newspaper”. Their journalistic integrity is right up there with their objectivity — in other words, totally lacking. This is the putative purveyor of news that banned me permanently for their comments section for daring to question the efficacy of mass public mask wearing — and told me so directly in no uncertain terms. That, right there, is your so-called “liberal tolerance”.
Meanwhile, the homeless have trashed the Sullivan Arena … which will need considerable and expensive repairs before it can be used for it’s original purpose.
Bible says no work, no eat … no work, no roof over head … truly handicapped and retired excepted.
I won’t count my chickens just yet, though I am happy with the results as they stand. It feels good to live in a city that occasionally gets it right…for the time being anyway. My wife and I left California back in 2016 because we were tired of being minnows in a vast body of water filled with sharks. It was nice to be apart of the winning team(conservative governor, voted for Trump, etc.) for once and not have to listen to condescending politicians preach about how their decisions were for my own good.
My prayer is that if Bronson does indeed become the next Mayor(as it is looking) he enacts some tough on crime proposals and enacts reforms for the APD to expedite interstate transfers coming in. No reason for a seasoned cop to have to go through the academy again and start at the bottom.
Who actually controls the Commie Left-wing agenda of the ADN? Is it Ryan Binkley? His dad, Johne Binkley? My impression, from living in Alaska nearly 75 years, and having been a good friend of Capt. Jim Binkley (Ryan’s grandfather), it seems highly strange that they would be that hell-bent as Left-wing extremists. Capt. Jim was an accomplished businessman and conservative Republican. He served in the legislature in the 60’s. The grandson seems to want to destroy the common sense legacy of his grandfather. Just bizarre!
Thank you, Ms. Downing. And “thank you” to the many commenters who have poked the ADN editors with the sharp stick of ridicule. All of you have made my day.
Agree with Nancy. It all starts with the philosophy of the owners. Since when did the Binkleys become radical Lefties and Commies? You either serve your readers with courtesy and conservative common sense, or you destroy your readership with lies, cover-ups and propoganda. If the Binkleys are trying to intentionally do the latter, they’re off to a good start.
Craig Medred came up with what I believe is the best analysis of why the ADN remains Alaska’s Pravda. I don’t know anything much about the son’s politics but when I was with the State and Johnne Binckley was in the Legislature, he was the bete noir of the unions and the left and I doubt he has much changed.
The reality as Craig described it is that the ADN has no other pl;ace to go. I’ve been in Alaska now almost 50 years and the ADN has never been anything but a leftist rag. The ADN will never get a moderate/conservative readership. I gave it a shot for a couple of months after it changed hands and cancelled my subscription. If I wanted to read the NYT and WaPo, I’d take my communist propaganda straight. The only audience the ADN has left is waiting rooms and the lefties that love the fever swamp of the ADN’s Letters and Comments. There is little truly local business left in Anchorage and the ad buyer for some Lower 48 corporation first doesn’t care about Alaska issues and second, probably shares the same point of view as the ADN’s lefties. Fundamentally all the ADN can do is try to maintain the readership it has. If it turned right, it wouldn’t pick up any conservative readers and it would lose its lefties.
Does anyone know how much PPP the ADN received?…….otherwise known as government bailout money for rich people.
Comments are closed.