Name That Party: Chicago Alderman Sentenced to 4 Years; Sun-Times, AP Fail to Note Dem Party Affiliation

Name That Party: Chicago Alderman Sentenced to 4 Years; Sun-Times, AP Fail to Note Dem Party Affiliation

By Tom Blumer (Bio | Archive)
February 18, 2009 - 00:23 ET

Former Chicago Democratic Alderman Arenda Troutman was sentenced today to four years in prison for mail and tax fraud. In covering her sentencing, both the Chicago Sun-Times article (picture at right is cropped from that article) and Jeff Coen's Breaking News piece at the Chicago Tribune failed to mention that Troutman is a Democrat.

Now it would be easy to say, "But of course she's a Democrat; she's from Chicago." Okay, but the Sun-Times, in five other reports spread over almost two years, mentioned her party only once. What's more, the Tribune's coverage quoted Assistant U.S. Atty. Joseph Alesia saying that Troutman had been on "a five-year crime spree. .... Even by Chicago standards, it's (what she did is) no small crime." Logically, this would mean that even by Chicago Democratic Party standards, what Troutman did stood out.

Troutman's "obvious" Democratic Party affiliation also doesn't exonerate the Associated Press, whose stories go national and worldwide, And yes, there are plenty of people around the country and in the rest of the world who do not know that Democrats own Windy City politics (a little reminder every once in a while to those who do know wouldn't hurt either).

Here's most of the short unbylined AP item:

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A former Chicago alderman has been sentenced to four years in prison for taking thousands of dollars in payoffs and campaign money from developers who wanted zoning changes and other favors.

Arenda Troutman also omitted the cash she received from her taxes.

..... (U.S. District Judge Ruben) Castillo told the 17-year veteran of the Chicago City Council that he knew she wasn't a monster. But he disputed her claim that she didn't know that some of her associates were gang members.

As to the Sun-Times and Troutman, there's too much to go over in one post, but suffice it to say that if you visit the linked articles, you'll that Arenda Troutman is a real piece of work who, based on what she was convicted of doing, is clearly deserving of prison time. Here are the five previous Sun-Times articles:

August 6, 2008 -- "Former Ald. Arenda Troutman pleads guilty." Here is the one instance in the five previous reports where the Democratic Party was mentioned, as follows: "She allegedly handed the developer a flier and tickets for a fund-raiser called the 'Masquerade Ball' that her 20th Ward Regular Democratic Organization was holding and told the developer something like, 'You just bought some tickets.'"
November 9, 2007 -- "Ald.: She took it all" (Troutman apparently emptied her former office of its contents, including a desk and a computer, and left her successor with virtually nothing).
July 18, 2007 -- "Troutman pleads not guilty to bribery scheme charges"
June 13, 2007 -- "Troutman indicted on bribery charge"
April 23, 2007 -- "Troutman dad got rehab deal"

Even cutting the Sun-Times some slack because of Chicago's single-party dominance, it seems as if the paper had to work pretty hard to avoid telling readers what party Arenda Troutman belonged to.

—Tom Blumer is president of a training and development company in Mason, Ohio, and is a contributing editor to NewsBusters

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of course she's a

February 18, 2009 - 00:38 ET by TN Mom

of course she's a Democrat

Chicago Sun Times, Chicago Tribune and The AP all belong to the same lame "we will only mention the Democrat Party when we have something positive to report" club.

When speaking of any

February 18, 2009 - 00:50 ET by bigtimer

When speaking of any politician if they party isn't mentioned anywhere in report of any kind, we know it's a Democrat...and like I said earlier in another thread about this, if this situation were reversed politically and the President along with the ties he has had with all the different sleaze-ball pols and other leftists he has had years of experience with like Rezko, Wright, Ayers...why he would have already been impeached, if he had even made it that far.

Love that Chicago...more to come yet...starting about April unless the Blago soap-opera ad all the wonderful clean characters involved... gets postponed again.

Nothing like a fair and balanced media of all venues...eh?

...and these some people scream for the Fairness Doctrine.

Give me a break!

OBAMABOTS......IN ACTION

February 18, 2009 - 01:01 ET by rightwingchef

Well this is no surprize, more of Hussein's people. The very "CLUB" he came up in. With all the trash coming out of Chicago, (ie) the Whitehouse staff, it sure makes one wonder just what's running this country. These people are all thugs, and the best liars that I have ever seen in my lifetime. How this Lib even got busted is amazing in it self. Hussein has never released any of his records, no need to ask yourself why. But one must ask ones self, how is it that all the minds that be in the Government even allowed this guy to set foot in the Whitehouse with no past at all.

Of Course she is a dem

February 18, 2009 - 01:48 ET by clubchamp6

Of course she is a democrat.... she is black.

Remember we are the party of white people. < Sarc Off>

What is that flushing sound....oh yeah it is my childrens future?

Sad day for America today

club, You have got that

February 18, 2009 - 07:32 ET by msh1973

club,

You have got that right. I worry about the kind of life my kids and their kids will have...the loss of freedom. I have been very sad.

My dad, who is 80, had lunch with some of his high school buddies this past week; he told me the first thing they all said was, "What the h**l hasn't happened to our Country". Sad indeed.

I wonder what ...

February 18, 2009 - 02:06 ET by legacyrepublican

church she went to or should I not even ask for fear of not being wright on the issue? <sarc on!!!>

Not only do they omit the demo's party.....

February 18, 2009 - 04:13 ET by old cro

they try to make the dems look good when reporting criminal behavior. I put together a file in about 15 minutes showing the blatant hypocrisy the MSM displays by searching two recent Republican scandals. Every one, and I mean every one, mentions the party within the first two paragraphs of the story. I will save it for later when jer , or some other idiot tries to explain that NB is paranoid and that there is really no bias. While copying a Salon article on Larry Craig from 2007, I was redirected to a recent article on Roland Burris. See for yourself; the contrast is striking.

.......................................................
Salon

Monday, Aug. 27, 2007 17:45 EST
The U.S. senator and the bathroom stall

Sen. Larry Craig, the senior Republican from Idaho, pleaded guilty this month to charges of misdemeanor disorderly conduct after a police officer witnessed him engaging in lewd behavior in an airport restroom, reports Roll Call, a Capitol Hill newspaper.
......................................
Salon

Tuesday, Feb. 17, 2009 20:15 EST
Democrat: Burris "in deep shit"

A month ago, when Roland Burris managed to maneuver his way into the Senate over the objections of the body's Democratic leadership, he looked like someone with real political skill. The past couple days, though, have provided an entirely different picture of Illinois' junior senator, as Burris has badly fumbled the disclosure of embarrassing information that now has him facing a criminal investigation and calls to resign.

In January, when he testified before a panel of the Illinois House that was, at the time, considering the impeachment of then-Gov. Rod Blagojevich, Burris said he'd had little contact with aides to the governor, and hadn't been asked for any campaign donations. But in an affidavit filed recently and revealed over the weekend, Burris acknowledged that he'd had conversations with several of Blagojevich's confidants, including his brother Robert, and that Robert Blagojevich asked him about raising money.

Culture of Corruption?

February 18, 2009 - 08:43 ET by unkeeaf

Just think about how little corruption actually occurred during the Bush Administration. Compare that to the number of Democrats who have found themselves in some sort of legal bind over the last 12 months. I don't have an exact count, but this woman must be at least the 15th Democrat to find themselves in serious legal trouble in the last year. By comparison, I can't think of one Republican who has found themselves in this type of bind during that time.

Of course, since the public relations firm known as the mainstream media doesn't identify them as Democrats, the typical unengaged citizen is clueless to the party affiliation of these scoundrels.

MSM = PR firm for the Democrat Party

Makes no difference.

February 18, 2009 - 09:19 ET by Blogger Guy00001

It doesn't matter any more. Whenever the media leave out significant facts about a lawbreaker, I immediately know exactly what they left out. It's just as if they actually said it.

Tom: Despite such

February 18, 2009 - 09:45 ET by QueenMum

Tom: Despite such omissions, do you see a trend toward exposing the political corruption in Chicago to the rest of America, even from the liberal newspapers? Has the election of Obama turned a spotlight on Chicago that the Dems in D.C., in their zeal for power, hadn't considered? Unintended consequences?

Edited to add: Whoa. Gotta wonder if John Kass packs heat.

Civilization is the progress toward a society of privacy. The savage's whole existence is public, ruled by the laws of the tribe. Civilization is the process of setting man free from men. - Ayn Rand

Whoa indeed

February 18, 2009 - 10:50 ET by Tom Blumer

There's a post in that.

TIF Abuses in Chicago

February 18, 2009 - 10:35 ET by dmambrose

To be fair, chicago's aldermanic elections are non-partisan so she would not defined as a democrat's. To be even more fair, all the alderman in Chicago are part of the Democrats party. What she got is small potatoes verses the TIF abuse that the mayor and aldermen are doing. They channel over 1/2 billion dollars property taxes to pet contracts that are being developed by contractors that "pay and play" to get the contacts awarded to them. In the northside by Wrigley Field, people in the ward have got so sick of this that they have started a law suit against the city. Their website is fixwilsonyard.com and they are suing because the low income housing is costing, get this, nearly a half of million dollars for each 2 bedroom unit. It's shocking to me that this is happening.

It an attempt to silence the bloggers who are try to expose this problem, the developer for the city has subpoenas google and two other websites for the identities of all the anonyomous bloggers.

See the story at www.uptownupdate.com