Colorado’s conservative talk radio world sounds thrilled to defend Mitt Romney’s comments at a GOP fundraiser, but the more you listen, and hear what they’re not saying, the more you realize that, in reality, they don’t seem to know what to say.

Take, for example, KOA’s Mike Rosen, who describes himself as a partisan Republican, addressing Romney’s comments on his show this morning:

“The thrust of what [Romney] said is absolutely on target, and I have no difficulty defending that thrust; I’ve been talking about this for years…”

“By having so many people who don’t feel any pain from the income tax, you build an army of people who simply want other people to pay taxes, and when they hear something about tax rates being increased, they say, ‘We don’t care because we don’t pay taxes anyway.'”

Rosen went on to say that it’s not all of the non-income-tax-paying “47%” who see things this way, but a large number do. That’s basically what Romney meant, he said, a large number of people but not 47%.

Unfortunately, Rosen said, Romney was “imprecise, worst case, sloppy.”

Still, even if you accept the sloppy talk, how do Rosen and his fellow Romney defenders on the radio deal with Romney’s comment that Romney’s “job is not to worry about those people.…”

The radio talkers don’t deal with that comment. They don’t defend it, even though it arguably reflects, to some degree, their attitude here in Colorado (i.e., a willingness to cut government-funded health care for children in poverty, putting their lives at risk, because their parents don’t have sufficient “skin in the game.”)

But as Rosen did this morning, the conservatives on the radio are largely ignoring much of what Romeny said at the fundraiser, including:

• 47% of Americans “believe that they are victims,”
• 47% of Americans “believe the government has a responsibility to care for them,”
• 47% of Americans “believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you-name-it. That that’s an entitlement.”
• 47% of Americans are “dependent upon government.”

So the defense of Romney on talk radio is so selective and riddled with omissions that it’s pretty funny to listen to, actually. And it makes you wonder: Do they agree with it? Are they scared to defend it? What’s up?

Tune in, if you get a chance. Or call in and ask about Romney’s comments that aren’t being aired.

In an interview with 9News Political Reporter Brandon Rittiman, GOP vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan was asked if he wants to “abolish” birth control completely.

His reply,”Oh, heaven’s no.”

But, as we know from our long and losing history with personhood amendments here in Colorado, the phrase “birth control” has multiple meanings, depending on where you come down on personhood, which would give legal rights to fertilized eggs and ban all abortion.

For Ryan, who supports personhood and believes life begins at conception, “birth control” exists, but it’s limited to specific objects and pills that do not destroy or have the ability to destroy fertilized eggs or zygotes.

Other forms of “birth control,” like some forms of the pill and IUD’s, are not considered “birth control” at all by personhood supporters, but abortifacients, which are zygote killers, chemicals that cause “abortion.”

And these would be banned, if fertilized eggs received legal protections under personhood laws.

So, in the following exchange with Rittiman, if you want understand Ryan’s real position on birth control, you have to get biological with him (as in, what about forms of birth control that threaten or kill fertilized eggs?)

Rittiman: I’ve got a few questions from viewers…Holly asked us on our Facebook page about women’s issues, which have been in the campaign dialogue. She wants to know if you’re simply opposed to public funding of things like birth control or if you want to abolish them completely?

Ryan: Oh, heaven’s no. People should be free to have birth control all they want. But what we don’t want to do is force taxpayers or groups, like religious charities, churches, and hospitals, to have to provide and pay for benefits that violates their religious teachings and conscience. Of course we believe people should have the freedom to use birth control. Nobody’s talking about that. The question is, can the federal government require churches and charities, people of religious conviction, to violate their religious liberties, which is our First Amendment in the Constitution.

(This exchange occureed a couple weeks ago on Your Show, which airs on Channel 20 in Denver.)

I’ve discussed previously reporters need to beware of the “birth-control” rhetoric of politicians who want to support personhood AND support “birth control.” Politicians can certainly have it both ways, because some forms of birth control would not be banned under personhood, but some common forms would be banned. So, it’s important for reporters to clarify what people like Paul Ryan are talking about when they use the phrase “birth control.”

As to which forms of birth control threaten fertilized eggs and which would do not, I interviewed Nanette Santoro, MD, chair of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, at the University of Colorado about this back in 2010, and, the way I interpreted her comments, a number of types of birth control, including forms of the pill will, or have the potential to, destroy fertilized eggs. And if you believe that killing a fertilized egg amounts to murder, then you wouldn’t want to risk it and, I’d say, it would be illegal to do so. It would be like playing Russian roulette.

I asked Santoro if the science had changed since my 2010 interview, and she said, through a spokesperson, that it had not.

So, unless scientists tell us differently down the road, reporters will be left to sort out the linguistic gymnastics they see from personhood supporters who apparently don’t like to say they are against common forms of birth control.

In his speech to yesterday’s “Values Voter Summit,” organized by the conservative Family Research Council, Republican vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan continued his pattern of delivering outright falsehoods in his speechifying.

At one point, Ryan said:

“Now, apparently, the Obama-Biden ticket stands for an absolute, unqualified right to abortion — at any time, under any circumstance and even at taxpayer expense.”

It’s obvious that reporters should set the record straight here, but Associated Press chose not to, reporting Ryan’s comments this way:

[Ryan] also delivered a blistering critique of President Barack Obama’s position on abortion, saying the president stands for an “absolute, unqualified right to abortion.”

In its report, National Public Radio reported Ryan’s full comment about abortion, and corrected it:

That is not the president’s position on abortion rights. The Obama campaign responded that Ryan’s speech contained “over-the-top, dishonest attacks.”

Obama clearly supports a women’s right to choose, with restrictions, as codified under Roe vs. Wade.

To say that Obama supports abortion “under any circumstance and even at taxpayer expense” is so far from the truth, so completely disconnected to the facts, that you wonder why more national reporters didn’t call Ryan out on it, especially given that women are a focus of both campaigns.

On KNUS’ morning talk-radio show Thursday, Steve Kelley played an audio clip of Obama criticizing Romney’s response to the Libya attack, saying Romney has a “tendency to shoot first and aim later.”

Steve Kelley, the host of the show, had Mitt Romney’s son Josh on the phone, and, it’s only natural to try to personalize things a bit. Plus, they say international relations isn’t so different than what goes on within families, on the playground, between neighbors, or what have you.

So Kelley asked Josh Romney if his father shot first and aimed later, when it came to disciplining Josh!

It was a fair question to ask a grown man stumping for his father, but Josh dodged it rather ominously, saying “We don’t talk about that much.”

“He was tough but fair,” Josh told Kelley, after some awkward banter.

I’m not saying Mitt shouldn’t have spanked his kids, or Obama shouldn’t have spanked Sasha and Malia, if he did. (I never spanked my kids, but I’m a deeply wimpy progressive weenie.)

But you’d think Josh would have laid it out on the table. I mean, seriously, did Mitt belt his kids?

Why don’t the Romneys talk about this much? What’s the big deal? I wish Kelley would have finished the conversation.

Kelley: Shoot first and aim later. Critical of your dad. Hey when your dad disciplined you, and how did he discipline you, did dad shoot first and aim later with you?

Josh Romney: My dad was very good with discipline. They really allowed us to understand and reap the benefits of making bad decisions on our own.

Kelley: Did he spank ya? Come on, Josh.

Josh Romney: We don’t talk about that much but he, ah, was tough. Tough but fair, we’ll say that.

Kelley: I remember one time my brother and I were playing with bullets. And you know, my dad heard about it. That’s the only time, first, last, that I received the belt. Can you relate at all to that, Josh?

Josh Romney [laughing]: The dreaded belt. The dreaded belt.

Kelley: Ah, that tells me right there. The dreaded belt.

Josh Romney: I’m joking. He was tough but fair. You know, tough but fair.

Listen to the audio here:
On KNUS radio 9-13, Josh Romney is asked whether Mitt Romney spanked him

Big swaths of the conservative talk-radio world are seething with anger against Muslims this morning, getting away with saying stuff that could easily get them fired if they said it about any other major religion.

But one conservative talk-radio host in Colorado Springs sees the mob mentality in a group of Americans here at home: Obama supporters.

“If  Barack Obama is defeated, I fully expect for there to be riots in American cities,” KVOR talk-radio host Richard Randall said Saturday on the Jeff Crank Show, substituting for regular host Jeff Crank. “I fully expect it.”

As for Randall’s side of the political fence:

“If [Obama] is re-elected, you’re not going to see riots, but you’re going to see people who are very close to their rights and hang on to them closely… I’m not big on armed revolution.  I hope, in our country, there is never, ever again any form of government that would  require the American public to do what many of us are prepared to do, and that is, we own guns—

I own guns. People ask me, ‘why do you  own guns?’  Because they’re cool, and  I like them, Um, they’re fun to shoot.  And I own them primarily for protection.  My number one job as a parent is to keep my family safe and that is one of the mechanisms for doing it.  […] I hope I never have to use those weapons.  And some of them are military,  you know.  […]  I don’t hope that we ever have to have armed conflict.  But it’s going to be dicey, no matter who wins this election.

I would hate to be in Chicago or Detroit, some of those areas when President Barak Obama is defeated, because I think there has been this mentality that they are entitled to him to be president.  And somehow if he’s not, it would have been rigged against him, or something.

So Obama is an entitlement? And his loss of will bring riots? Like bread riots?

Maybe Randall has said the word “entitlement” so many times, so mindlessly, that he can’t keep it in his mouth. Now would be a good time for him to do so, because how much more disrespectful can you get?

Well, ask a Muslim who listened to many a conservative talk show this morning.

Mitt Romney’s son, Craig Romney, was in town Tuesday to meet “with some Latino leaders in the Republican Party, talking about Hispanic support and small business,” as reported by CBS4.

Romney has a “daunting task,” Channel 4 told us, to “pick up votes from the Hispanic community which, in most polls, is vastly in favor of President Obama.”

You wonder whether Craig Romney is up for the job, because, even though he speaks Spanish, he “admits he’s not much of a policy expert.”

“The youngest Romney says it’s his job to hear from voters and take their concerns back to his father,” Jeff Todd reported for Channel 4.

Channel 4 should have asked Craig Romney why his ability to speak Spanish qualifies him to be his father’s “kind-of ambassador,” even though he has little policy expertise. (And it does make you wonder about the criteria his father would use in appointing real ambassadors, if Romney is elected prez.)

But, anyway, Channel 4 did the right thing journalistically and reported the thoughts of someone in the crowd, effectively bypassing the messenger pigeon and finding someone to articulate a concern directly to papa Romney.

Channel 4 reported:

“We talked to a Latino community member at today’s event, and he said he has been contacted by the Romney camp to try to drum up support, but he said what he wants to hear first is true solutions from the candidate about real issues, like true comprehensive immigration reform.”

You can’t blame this guy for wanting to hear directly from the candidate, since the Spanish-speaking ambassador doesn’t know policy.

Media outlets can fill the void by questioning Romney on immigration next time he swings by Colorado.

Meanwhile, to answer the gentleman who spoke to CBS4, the most impartial observer could not call Romney’s immigration position “comprehensive.”

Nicely summarized here, it’s rooted in border enforcement, opposition to the Dream Act, and in a concept known as “self deportation,” which Romney has described as:

Romney: “The answer is self-deportation, which is people decide they can do better by going home because they can’t find work here because they don’t have legal documentation to allow them to work here.”

One Spanish-language outlet in town, KBNO radio, has been trying to get an interview with Romney, during which comprehensive immigration reform would certainly be discussed.

But unlike Obama, who was interviewed by KBNO’s Fernando Sergio, Romney has yet to appear on the show, despite Colorado GOP chair Ryan Call’s pledge to do his best to land him for Sergio.

With Romney in hiding, at least partially, CBS4 made the right move in covering his son, who, did I mention, speaks Spanish.

by Michael Lund

Ryan Call appeared on an ABC interview Wednesday from the Republican National Convention in Tampa, commenting on Colorado’s status as a swing state in this November’s general election, and highlighting Hispanic, women, and young voters’ key role in deciding who gets the nine electoral votes at stake.

Call acknowledges that candidate Mitt Romney needs to do “appreciably better among Latinos” than McCain in 2008 in order to win Colorado. He said:

“We are making significant strides within those members of our community. The issues of entrepreneurship, about creating opportunities for education, and especially as it relates to the current status of the economy and jobs, that’s the contrast that Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan bring to the table versus the failed record of Barak Obama.”

The question that immediately springs to mind is, “Is the GOP making ‘significant strides’ among Hispanic voters?”

And if, as I suspected, he might be wrong, why didn’t the journalists interviewing call him on the inaccuracy?

My analysis of polling among Hispanics suggests that Call might be a little overly optimistic. While McCain garnered 31 percent of the Latino vote in 2008 (Obama came in with 67 percent), a Gallup poll from June 24, 2012 shows Romney with only 25 percent of the registered Hispanic vote (Obama with 66 percent) – a drop of 6 points from four years ago. That’s a drop of 6 percent, hardly “significant strides”. In an even more recent survey from NBC/Wall Street Journal/Telemundo (August 22, 2012), 65 percent of Latino voters plan to back Obama compared to 25 percent for Romney. That’s not good news for Call or Romney, no matter how you try and spin it.

If ABC News didn’t know that polling data contradicted Ryan Call’s contention, they could have asked him to substantiate his claim.

If they had, Call would have had a hard time reconciling his efforts to attract Hispanics with the polling data available to him and everyone else with access to Google.

Back in April of this year, in an article from The Denver Post, Call acknowledged the uphill battle, saying, “We will work to do much better.” He qualified this by saying that, typically, the GOP party ‘s real efforts to recruit Hispanic voters come later in the election cycle.

So now, with 65 days left until the election, I’m wondering about a couple of things. First, how “late in the cycle” is too late in the cycle for the GOP’s Latino surge to materialize and show substantive results in the measure everyone’s watching, namely, the polls.

Second, where has the GOP gone wrong? What does the polling data suggest about each party’s successes and failures in securing Hispanic support and votes, especially here in Colorado?

Maybe I can shed a little light for ABC News journalists covering the RNC convention and reporters everywhere.

In the past six months, Colorado’s GOP chairman Ryan Call has appeared on Spanish-language radio, Solomon Martinez and Pauline Olvera from Colorado Hispanic Republicans have made their pitches on the talk radio circuit, and celebrity Hispanic politicians from both sides have been paraded and promoted in front of cheering partisans at public events, most notably and recently at the GOP convention. The GOP has deployed Latino outreach directors in many states and implemented social media strategies.

In those efforts, the generalized GOP message has been coordinated and consistent: Hispanic voters are actually Republicans who are not yet enlightened enough to know it (see Susana Martinez’s speech to the GOP convention), jobs and the economy are the basket in which to place all your eggs, and that the Republican platform promoting values such as faith, family, freedom and free market is all that is needed to convert traditionally Democratic Hispanics and recruit them to the big tent of the GOP.

Call, in his ABC interview from the convention, offered only a slightly enhanced version of that message, by acknowledging “opportunities for education” as part of the GOP pitch to Hispanic voters.

Hispanic voters have consistently rated jobs and the economy as the most important issue affecting their decision as voters in this election, over other issues such as education and immigration.

But the spiel on the campaign trail doesn’t get much more nuanced than calls for unchaining the private sector and reducing the regulatory burden. Apparently, that generalized message hasn’t paid off.

In addition to the overriding jobs issue, education is clearly an issue Hispanics care about, but the Republicans haven’t been able to capitalize. Besides being co-opted on many K-12 policy innovations involving accountability, choice, and charters, the Colorado GOP has acquired an obstructionist image in their handling of policies which directly engage sectors of the Hispanic community.

One example of “education policy as political opportunity” was the ASSET tuition bill in Colorado (as well as the previous five similar bills presented to legislatures over the past decade, which would have made college more affordable for undocumented students who qualify).

Call told FOX31 Denver last April that he was “disappointed” that House Republicans killed the bill in committee. I’d be disapointed, too, considering the opportunity it presented for engaging the Hispanic community. And remember, this was a measure that had broad support. Seven newspapers, seven school boards, six chambers of commerce, ten organizations that represent k-12, eight institutions of higher education, five local governments, twelve faith based organizations and tens of thousands of individuals and organizations endorsed ASSET.

Then, earlier this summer, when media attention was piqued around Metropolitan State University of Denver’s decision to institute a new tuition rate for undocumented students, Republicans missed another opportunity. Instead of engaging Hispanics by debating merits and implications of the bill, Colorado Republican legislators challenged the move by Metro’s Board of Regents, and called on Governor Hickenlooper to block the measure. They grumbled about collusion among Democrats, perhaps justifiably so, but in doing so lost the opportunity portray themselves as proactive problem solvers and representatives of the broader Hispanic community.

Immigration, another issue rated as less important than jobs and the economy to Hispanic voters in polling has proven to be similar lesson in lost opportunity for Republicans. Obama’s executive order of Deferred Action for the deportation of qualified minor children of undocumented immigrants engaged the media and boldly addressed an issue undeniably important to Hispanics. It’s not that all in the Hispanic community universally agree with Obama’s mandate, but it was an acknowledgement and a proactive action to a problem which has long demanded bipartisan solutions.

The Deferred Action mandate could turn out to be a liability to Democrats and a net loss in their electability standings, but it was a vehicle for Obama (and Democrats by proxy) to gain visibility in the Hispanic community and affirm their presence, participation, and importance in America. Lawmakers who are viewed as obstructionists, along with their supporters, were the losers in this window of opportunity, at least in the short term.

Hispanics’ view of the GOP as obstructionists might also extend to the GOP’s response to another issue important to Hispanic Voters – Healthcare.

Add in the selection of Ryan for Romney’s vice-presidential running mate, and you might be able to make a case charging the GOP with playing to their base of extremists at the expense drawing Hispanic votes. Ryan has voted against the DREAM act and is hostile to other issues Hispanics care about. Another lost opportunity.

So, with all this behind him, Ryan Call goes on ABC is able to say with a straight face that the GOP is making significant progress convincing Democratic Hispanics that they’re actually Republicans. And he’s not asked to justify it? He’s not asked to explain why his lack of success reflects the lost opportunities?

When Channel 4’s Shaun Boyd sits down to fact check a political ad, for her station’s “Reality Check” feature, the first thing she does is ask for documentation from the people that produced it.

“Sometimes they send it before the ad starts running,” Boyd told me. “They drown me with information.”

Boyd sits at her desk sifting through the documents and doing other research.

So while most TV reporters spend their time shooting footage and writing stories, she says, with Reality Check, she spends most of her time as a researcher.

“Some days it’s brain damage,” says Boyd. “But my hope is I give people information they use to make informed decisions.”

She gets criticism from all sides. “It’s amazing they’re looking at the same piece,” she says.

Most often the criticism is directed at the final portion of her analysis, which is called the “Bottom Line”

Here’s Boyd’s “Bottom Line” for two anti-Romney  ads:

Bottom Line: This ad is trying to channel our resentment over high oil prices to Mitt Romney.  But if Romney is a tool for Big Oil, this ad fails to make the case.

Bottom Line: “The ad says women, a key voting bloc, should be troubled by Mitt Romney’s position on abortion.  And they should, because it’s changed so many times. Mitt Romney brought this one on himself.”

You can see why these conclusions could piss off people. It’s not as if all fact-checking isn’t interpretive to some degree, especially when stuff like “What You Need to Know” is added, but the “Bottom Line” makes the interpretation more obvious.

“The ‘bottom line’ [segment] is, here’s what’s really happening,” says Boyd. “It could be, ‘here’s why they’re doing this.’ It could be, ‘here’s the take-away.’”

Boyd says the “bottom-line” comment is what separates CBS4’s “Reality Check” from the other stations’ ad-checks. So despite the blowback from the campaigns, she says it’s worth it.

Reality Check airs on CBS4 during the 6 p.m. broadcast because, Boyd told me, they “require people to think” and “viewers at 10 p.m. are sometimes tired and don’t want to think more.”

So far this year, Channel 4 has analyzed more political ads than any other station in Denver (all are doing it), but as the election approaches, she predicts she’ll spend more time on the campaign trail and less behind her desk.

“People start to tune out the political ads toward the end,” says Boyd, who’s been doing Reality Check since 2010 and has been at Channel 4 for 15 years. “By the time we get into September, Reality Check becomes less effective. It’s something we’ve learned.”

Boyd will not repeat an analysis of an ad that makes a claim that she’s already addressed in a previous Reality Check. As the election nears, she expects to see fewer and fewer ads containing new allegations, meaning she’ll focus her political reporting elsewhere.

“I try to apply a Reality-Check veneer to every story I do,” She told me, “rather than reporting that this candidate said this and this candidate said that.”

“The vast majority of people, their eyes glaze over when a political story comes on,” Boyd says. “My challenge is to make it matter to them.”

Conservative talk-radio hosts are fairly unified in their condemnation of GOP Senate candidate Todd Akin’s statement that the female body has a natural ability to identify and repel the sperm of rapists.

But they’ve been a bit more iffy on the question of how serious it was for Akin, who’s vowing not to drop out of the Missouri Senate race, to distinguish between “legitimate” rape from other kinds.

“If you’re a guy, and you throw the word ‘legitimate’ in front of rape, you’re in trouble,” KLZ radio host Jason Worley told listeners Monday. “You’re already in trouble. If that was all he did, he could actually come back, and he honestly could, and say, what I meant was ‘actual’ rape cases, like when there was a crime committed…He may have been able to come back from it.”

KOA’s Mike Rosen also sort of defended Akin:

“He had a very ill-phrased remark, put his foot in the mouth, talking about whether abortion should be allowed in cases, as he put it, of ‘legitimate’ rape. What he meant to say was in the case of very clear forcible rape. In any event, this is an area into which he should not have gone.”

These radio wordsmiths have developed new categories of rape. For Worley, it’s “actual” rape cases, presumably versus the fake kind.

For Rosen, it’s “very clear forcible” rape cases.

By adding the adverb “very clear,” Rosen is one-upping Rep. Mike Coffman, Rep. Cory Gardner, Rep. Doug Lamborn, and Rep. Scott Tipton, who all voted to redefine the definition of rape so that federal funding would only be available for “forcible” rape, not other kinds.

For Rosen, it looks like only the “very forcible” kind of rape counts?

I didn’t get a chance to listen to all our favorite radio hosts, but one can only imagine all the other categories of rape that they might come up with.

Please send me any and all new rape categories that you hear from conservative radio hosts. I’m working on a comprehensive list that I want to share with the talk-radio crowd, to see if I can get them on the same page, like they are so often when it comes to President Obama.

You might think it would take a miracle to find a serious presidential ticket that supports personhood laws, which would ban some forms of birth control, as well as all abortion, even after rape or incest.

That doesn’t sound like a super popular position for a presidential candidate to have, now that we are exactly 62 years beyond the year 1950.

But, it turns out, Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan are both apparently for personhood.

Paul Ryan obviously supports it, since he co-sponsored federal personhood legislation just last year. His bill grants “all the legal and constitutional attributes and privileges” to fertilized eggs (or “zygotes”). It also grants authority to the states to pass personhood.

Romney is also apparently a supporter of personhood, but he has said he’s against a federal personhood law, like the one Ryan co-sponsored.

Instead, Romney favors personhood efforts at the state level. Presumably this would include Colorado’s personhood initiative, but he hasn’t been asked about it.

Romney has flipped around a bit on the issue, but as recently as October, Romney told Fox News’ Mike Huckabee that he “absolutely” would have signed an amendment to the Massachusetts constitution codifying his belief that life begins when a sperm enters egg.

Later, Romney’s spokespeople reinforced this, telling Politico’s Ben Smith that Romney supports “efforts to ensure recognition that life begins at conception” and that “these matters should be left up to states to decide.”

Ryan would almost undoubtedly support efforts to enact personhood at the state level, given his history on the issue, and given that the federal legislation he co-sponsored paves the way for it.

So how will Romney and Ryan work out their differences on personhood?

Will Romney bend a little bit and accept the federal approach to personhood, as well as the state path?

Or will Ryan adopt Romney’s position, give up his efforts to pass personhood at the federal level, and focus on the states, like Colorado?

That’s something reporters should seek clarification on, as the campaign moves forward.

(Note: For a more detailed explanation of state versus federal personhood, please read this previous blog post of mine. For a list of other co-sponsors of federal personhood bills, click here.)