Posts Tagged ‘J.J. Beyrouti’
St. Petersburg Times Continues to Create False Controversies Involving Republicans
David DeCamp (St. Petersburg Times)
By Spartacus Thrace
David DeCamp, Staff Writer for the St. Petersburg Times, is trying to create the impression of controversy involving Republicans where none exists, as he has in the past.
Res Publica gives the DeCamp story on the PCHA 2 out of a possible 5 hatchets.
In a June 7, 2011 article titled “Pinellas Housing Authority land purchase could yield commission for former member,” DeCamp does not state, but strongly suggests without foundation, that members of the Pinellas County Republican Executive Committee (PCREC) engaged in illegal or unethical activity involving a proposed real estate purchase. The truth of the matter is clearly and demonstratively otherwise.
The facts are straightforward: The Pinellas County Housing Authority Board of Directors has been looking for land for a housing complex for veterans. Housing Authority Chairman Joseph Triolo asked Jay Beyrouti, a Florida licensed realtor for over a decade, if he knew of any land the Authority could purchase. Beyrouti told Housing Authority Board Executive Director Debbie Johnson about a 13-acre plot on Lake Seminole (about a mile from the Bay Pines Veterans Hospital) owned by Cornerstone Community Bank which had originally been purchased for $4.3 million and for which the bank wanted $2 million. Johnson recommended the purchase to the full Housing Authority board of directors at an open meeting on the record, and the Authority made an offer to the bank of $1.5 million. The bank refused the offer and the land was not purchased. No money — taxpayer or otherwise — changed hands and, if the deal had gone through, any rightfully-earned commission paid to Beyrouti would have been paid by the bank in accordance with standard business practices. Everything was done out in the open and on the record, and there was nothing illegal, unethical, or immoral about anything that any of the persons involved did — period. Read the rest of this entry »
Political Warfare and the Mainstream Media Hatchet Job
By Spartacus Thrace
One of the most enduring and effective weapons employed by the radical statists who comprise the mainstream media (MSM) is the political “hatchet job.” Wielded for decades with near-impunity by the MSM against conservatives, Republicans, and other political enemies, the hatchet job has been a potent force for the Left in its efforts to reduce or eliminate political debate at the national, state, and local levels. This article is a primer for conservatives and members of the New Media on what a hatchet job is and how it is employed.
Hatchet Job Defined
A hatchet job is a biased, maliciously destructive, and often cruel written or spoken critique or attack on the character or activities of a person, organization, or institution. In its most common form, a hatchet job comprises a printed attempt disparage, discredit, and ultimately destroy a targeted person’s or organization’s reputation in the eyes of the public and to deny the target public sympathy or support through the use of innuendo, inaccuracies, and misleading statements. It is also used for the inherently undemocratic purpose of intimidating and stifling political opposition or dissent.
The hatchet job is a work of pseudo-journalist art, psychological warfare, and political disinformation. Hatchet jobs are in derogation of the ethical rule that journalists should always be honest, fair and courageous in gathering, reporting and interpreting information.1 While some hatchet jobs are one-time efforts, many are part of a sustained political campaign. The smear campaign waged by the MSM against Sarah Palin is an example of the latter. Few are blatant, and most are quite subtle. Sometimes, for example, a direct accusation against the target is merely the carrier for darker and more ominous insinuations. In many more cases, however, factual errors, innuendo, and implications of wrongdoing are placed alongside, and draw plausibility from, scattered truths to create a grossly distorting effect on the reader or viewer. Read the rest of this entry »
Eye on the Prize: The PCREC Prepares for 2012
Jay Beyrouti, Chairman of the PCREC
Jay Beyrouti, Chairman of the Pinellas County Executive Committee (PCREC) is not satisfied.
He is not content that the PCREC’s fundraising efforts have been immensely successful. He is not ready to relax given that that Republicans occupy the majority of elected positions in Pinellas County, and dominate the county board of commissioners and the state legislative delegation. The fact that a Republican occupies the Governor’s mansion does not make him complacent.
A believer in the Republican message of smaller government, lower taxes, and more individual freedom, Beyrouti points to the facts that registered Democrats outnumber registered Republicans by about 19,000 in Pinellas County, and that the county is home to 150,000 registered Independents. Beyrouti thinks the vast majority of the adult inhabitants of Pinellas County are conservative in their political and social views, that the Republican message resonates with a lot of people who are not members of any party as well as many who are members of the Democratic Party, and that the radicalization of the Democratic Party is a source of ongoing concern for these people. He thinks this is so because, as a longstanding businessman in the community, he deals with such people on a daily basis, and he knows that many of them are ripe to be brought over to the Republican fold with the right approach.
Beyrouti’s goal is the defeat of President Barack Obama and Senator Bill Nelson in the 2012 elections. He points out that Obama carried Pinellas County by 30,000 votes in 2008, and he does not want to see that repeated in 2012. To accomplish this, he has begun a new Republican voter registration initiative, and has placed responsibility for its implementation squarely on the hundreds of precinct officers, club presidents, and other activists who make up the soul of the PCREC. Read the rest of this entry »
Pinellas Republicans: Work Hard, Think Deep, and Plan Long
Logo of the Pinellas County Republican Executive Committee (PCREC)
(March 14, 2011) If one wants to see and feel just how much grassroots energy and strength is being generated by the Republican Party these days, one of the best places to go is to a monthly meeting of one of their county executive committees.
The county executive committee is the lowest level of formal organization in the Republican Party, and it is at this level that the future stars of that party are born and nurtured. One such committee worth watching is the Pinellas County Republican Executive Committee (PCREC), which has emerged as a political powerhouse in what traditionally has been one of the biggest swing districts in the State of Florida. Led by its chairman, Jay J. Beyrouti, the unofficial motto of the committee seems to be “Work Hard, Think Deep, Plan Long.” Read the rest of this entry »
The PCREC: Fired Up and Ready To Go
COMMENTARY
By Spartacus Thrace
A little over a year ago, the radical Lefties in the media and the Democratic Party declared the Republican Party roadkill in the wake of Marxist Barack Obama’s 52.92% to 45.66% victory over an erratic and clueless RINO named John McCain. Even before the election, media whores and political hacks were writing the GOP’s obituary, declaring that the Republican Party was a dead party walking, doomed to permanent irrelevancy, awaiting political execution at the hands of the voters on election day. One such hack, a former advisor to President Bill Clinton who also worked on the Hillary Clinton campaign named Sid Blumenthal even had a book published in early 2008, and wrote a follow-up commentary published in the Leftist media, smugly titled “The Strange Death of Republican America and 40 More Years: How the Democrats Will Rule the Next Generation.” As recently as May 2009, the Leftists in the media were gleefully publishing articles with headlines such as “Republicans in Distress: Is the Party Over?” and otherwise amusing themselves by mocking Republicans. But then, to paraphrase the President’s radical close friend and spiritual guide Rev. Jeremiah Wright, the chickens that are the grim reality of what it means to be ruled by Obama and his fellow statists came home to roost. No longer demoralized, the Republicans are returning to their conservative roots and spoiling for the fight against the statists. Read the rest of this entry »
St. Pete Times Takes Swing at Pinellas GOP, Hits Self
By Spartacus Thrace
David DeCamp (St. Petersburg Times)
Res Publica rates the DeCamp article with one and one-half hatchets.
David DeCamp, Staff Writer for the St. Petersburg Times, appears to be trying to create the impression of trouble within the local Republican Party organization where none exists. Worse, he and his newspaper are taking directions from a Democrat blogger with an extensive criminal past and an anti-Republican agenda — and they aren’t informing their readers of this.
In today’s print edition of the Times, page B1, above the fold, appears the headline, “Pinellas GOP spending rises,” below which is the ominous subtitle, “The local chief says the party is running perfectly, but donations are down.” The electronic version available on the internet is titled, “Pinellas Republican spending rises with new chairman as donations drop.” The first sentence of the article written by DeCamp reads, “Tampa Bay area political parties are scaling back in these tough times — Except the Pinellas County Republican Party.” What follows is an article that suggests – but does not directly assert – that there is something wrong with the way in which Pinellas County Republican Executive Committee (PCREC) Chairman J.J. Beyrouti is running things. Read the rest of this entry »
