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A CONSERVATIVE ARIZONA newspaper is facing death threats and losing subscriptions after breaking with tradition by endorsing Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump for US president.
The Phoenix-based Arizona Republic, the state’s largest newspaper, announced in an editorial on Tuesday that it is backing a Democrat for the first time since it was founded in 1890 on the grounds that Trump is neither conservative nor qualified to be president.
The paper’s editorial board said that while Clinton did not lack flaws, she was also the “superior choice” by far.
The backlash began shortly after it published the endorsement, with outraged readers sending a deluge of angry emails and canceling subscriptions, said Phil Boas, who runs the paper’s editorial page.
“We got a lot of angry callers and we’ve had quite a few cancellations,” he said, adding that the editors had expected blowback and did not regret its decision.
The paper also received some threatening phone calls and a death threat, he said without elaborating.
USA Today set another precedent on Thursday, when its editorial board took a side in a presidential race for the first time in its 34-year history, although without issuing a straight endorsement.
Publishing scathing criticism of Trump, the national paper urged readers to oppose a candidate it said is “dangerous” and “unfit for the presidency.”
It went on to call him “erratic,” “ill-equipped,” “reckless,” someone with a “checkered” business past, and a “serial liar.”
Meanwhile, a member of the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal – the most prominent Republican news outlet in America and owned by the right-leaning Rupert Murdoch – has also backed Clinton.
Pulitzer Prize-winner Dorothy Rabinowitz wrote, this morning:
Her election alone is what stands between the American nation and the reign of the most unstable, proudly uninformed, psychologically unfit president ever to enter the White House.
Dangerous
Despite the threats against the Arizona Republic, its editorial board feels “very good” about endorsing Clinton, Boas said.
“We know that it’s the responsible decision and choice to endorse Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump,” he said, adding that he did not believe regular readers were surprised, given the numerous scathing editorials about Trump previously published.
“About a year ago, we began writing very strong editorials about Trump because of his behavior on the stump, which to us seemed authoritarian,” Boas said.
We started raising the alarm about him… cautioning that what this man is saying is dangerous.
The Arizona Republic joins a growing list of conservative-leaning US newspapers to back the Democratic candidate during this year’s divisive presidential campaign.
A handful of others – including the Detroit News – have opted to back Libertarian Gary Johnson.
The Cincinnati Enquirer, an Ohio paper that has supported Republicans for almost a century, said last week that it was backing Clinton because “Trump is a clear and present danger to our country.”
The Dallas Morning News – based in the Republican-dominated state of Texas – broke a 75-year streak earlier this month by backing Clinton, describing her as the “only serious candidate.”
Both papers have also faced backlashes over their decision, with readers canceling subscriptions.
In denial
Boas, who describes himself as a lifelong Republican, said his paper’s decision to back a Democrat for the presidency was an easy decision given Trump’s policy proposals and behaviour.
“We would be shocked and horrified if our own kids, our own teenagers, behaved like him,” he said, adding that he understood Republicans’ mind-set but felt “a lot of them are in denial.”
I think a lot of them know that this guy violates their values.
“They are making compromises as they so dislike Hillary Clinton… and it’s time for Republicans and conservatives to wake up.”
The New York Times, a newspaper that has traditionally backed Democratic candidates, endorsed Clinton – and gave a scathing assessment of Trump as the worst presidential candidate put forward in modern history.
In the editorial, the New York Times said:
In any normal election year, we’d compare the two presidential candidates side by side on the issues. But this is not a normal election year. A comparison like that would be an empty exercise in a race where one candidate — our choice, Hillary Clinton — has a record of service and a raft of pragmatic ideas, and the other, Donald Trump, discloses nothing concrete about himself or his plans while promising the moon and offering the stars on layaway.
The editorial also aimed at persuading those who are hesitant to back Clinton to do so, stressing her intellect, experience and courage.
Meanwhile, Trump has accused Hillary Clinton is making “nasty” ads about him.
Most of Clinton’s commercials about Trump, though, merely include clips of him speaking. Her campaign seems to have concluded that Trump is his own worst enemy.
During Monday’s debate, Trump told Clinton he’s noticed “the very nasty commercials that you do on me in so many different ways, which I don’t do on you.”
The Associated Press reviewed Clinton’s 32 different general election ads that have aired on broadcast television and national cable and found 24 that show or mention Trump.
The majority of those feature raw footage of him rather than others opining on his words and actions.
- © AFP, 2016 with reporting from AP and Darragh Peter Murphy.
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but but but Poots took legal advice …… god save us
@Jim Buckley Barrett: Did you hear who he took that advice from? I’m not even kidding here, Jamie effing Bryson. The loyalist headbanger. .
@Pete Gilmartin: the Poundshop Lawyer, mar a deir Colum Eastwood. The absolute catastrophe that is the leadership of far-right Unionism, is like an elixer of youth for me today, its like drinking pure happiness. Can’t wait for this Assembly election now.
@Pete Gilmartin: Are you serious? Bryson hasn’t even passed the bar.
@Pete Gilmartin: Had to go and Google that… Seems you were kidding, Poots got his legal advice from John Larkin the former Attorney General in the North.
@FiannaFáilness FineGaelness: Yep, but Bryson claimed in a radio interview he gave it. Anything to try to make himself relevant.
@Isa: That’s it, he’d say mass…
@FiannaFáilness FineGaelness: No Kidding – Bryson is claiming in todays Belfast Telegraph that he had been advising Poots and the DUP with all the legal implications of the Protocol for months.
Poots said yesterday that he also received legal opinion from John Larkin but didnt clarify what that opinion was and which opinion he eventually went on before acting. Mind you, I dont think the DUP was ever in the business of taking advice from anyone.
@Angela McCarthy: that’s a scurrilous remark ! DUP take advice from Doctor No.
@FiannaFáilness FineGaelness: Bryson never passed a bar in his life, especially when Edwin in buying.
If this judicial review shows that Edwin Poots broke the law then he should suffer the consequences of his actions.
@Joe Johnson: while I agree in principle, he can say it was based on legal advice and legal advice often differs, even though what he was trying to do was a wrecking tactic, it’s probably not criminal. In any case, he hasn’t managed to be selected by his party to run in the now consequent election, so his punishment will be to live on in ignominy as one of the most incompetent politicians in the history of Ireland or Britain. And probably the World.
Playing bigoted politics to get what you what to the detriment of workers across the whole island should not be allowed happen, he somehow needs to be sanctioned
You couldn’t write what’s happening in the UK at present. Brexit is a disaster and will have long lasting negative ramifications. Throw in the DUP and Borris and the asylum starts rocking to ABBA….
There’s no one driving the red bus these days, they’re all partying down the back.
@Kevin Conway: I quote Professor Anton Muscatelli principal and vice chancellor at the University of Glasgow from 2018.
“the most unhinged example of national self-sabotage in living memory.”
I think the legal opinion that Poots received must have been given to him at an Orange Lodge, or in a pub.
@Angela McCarthy: The News Letter says he got it from John Larkin the former Attorney General in the North.
@FiannaFáilness FineGaelness: Jamie Bryson is claiming credit for it on Twitter
@James Beattie: Forgive me for not believing Mr. Bryson.
Here it is for all unionist supporters to see, the UK government does care about Northern Ireland or even consider it as part of the union. Serious questions need to be asked by the people of NI, and in particular the six counties, if they see themselves as been part of the UK moving forward, with the likes of the DUP.
@Michael: I presume you meant to say – ” does not care” in which case I agree with you 100%
@David Abbott: yes.
@David Abbott: correct.
Well that’s embarrassing…
That’ll poots him in his place
Better call Saul…..
Pussin Poots
The Befast High Court did’nt give two hoots for Edwin Poots.
have your say