MEDIA WATCHATE!! THE SAN ANTONIO CURRENT GIVES IT UP TO SENATE WANNABE MIKAL WATTS AND YOU CALL THIS AN ALTERNATIVE PAPER?

Well, its official.

Back in the day, alternative newspapers were really that. Now of course it's sex ads and restaurant reviews and the publisher is livin large. Ok, I'll swallow that if you give me the news I can't find in the mainstream.

Here in San Antonio, we got the Editor of the San Antonio Current, Elaine Wolff, using her position to promote (D) Mikal Watts and his Senatorial campaign, whose claim to fame is that he's a very rich trial lawyer and anti-U.S. Senator John Cornyn (R).

Have I mentioned that Rick Noriega (D), a Texas legislator who served in Iraq is also considering entering the race? Have I mentioned that he's not rich?
http://halfempth.blogspot.com/2007/07/watts-v-noriega-in-blogosphere.html

(My disclosure: I'm no fan of war heroes, they tend to be conflicted about taking on the status quo, fearful of being called Mexicans instead of Hispanic and sent back to la madre patria. )

Back in the day, the alternatives would be all over the left-of-center Noriega, investigating, debating, making his nalgitas toast nice and brown on the political comal.

Here in San Antonio, Elaine Wolff disclosed in print this week that her husband, Michael Westheimer, has contributed to the Watts campaign. Hmmmm.
On the Current's new website, it went like this:
http://www.sacurrent.com/chismelibre/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=24

What she didn't disclose in the printed version of the San Antonio Current is that her husband is a District 1 Zoning Commissioner and she sure didn't disclose that he gave a whopping $2300 on June 8, 2007. www.campaignmoney.com

This isn't hamburger-money folks. On the Current's website, Wolff discloses her husband's full name, who he is, and that she's independent of him.

But she doesn't disclose how much dinero he gave to Watts.

Personally, even if Wolff swears on the Bible she hasn't done it with her husband in a year, I smell some stinky, sticky, journalism.

If I can't trust the alternative to give me the other side, what then?

As the editor, Wolff is still in charge of writing the political stories. This week she interviewed - you guessed it - Watts. But her husband's contribution was over two months ago.

I don't know if this is related, but Dave Maass, her political writer - has resigned after less than a year at the Current. My sources say he challenged Wolff's veiled attacks on Noriega and her pimpy attempts at supporting el huevo-faced Watts. I still can't figure out what that man stands for, what his platform is.

And Keli Dailey, a black editor and Berkeley grad from San Antonio's eastside who was Maass' boss, (I like the way that sounds) got escorted out last month from the Current offices.

None of this was disclosed either.

photo credit: stephen.macek.faculty.noctrl.edu/.../photo1.jpg

Mary Alice, wife of Henry Cisneros, finds her voice in San Antonio as women battle for Free Speech in the Streets

She's a delicate bird of a woman, petite and beautifully apparelled. I know her husband, and she looks up to her supremely intelligent, charismatic, but scared of the status-quo husband. I suspect that she became a San Antonio councilwoman as a result of his lanky shadow. No matter. Yesterday, la Mary Alice stood up to the Man along with Councilwoman Lourdes Galvan and voted on the side of the Constitution and women's rights as one of two women on the San Antonio City Council who recognizes that anti-war or anti-immigrant protestors should be able to march on the streets without having to pay thousands of dollars for the privilege. While the city-wide Fiesta! bacchanal takes over the streets for weeks. With a vote of 9-2, the San Antonio City Council overwhelmingly voted to pass a new "Parade" Ordinance yesterday despite the organized protest of free speech advocates - mostly women - who believe that the City Council is violating the First Amendment of its citiz...

A battered woman from San Antonio loses her reporting job

Gina Galaviz , 43, KSAT-TV's I-love-the-police reporter, "has been fired" from the television station , according to the San Antonio Express-News, and I'm quoting verbatim here from Jeanne Jakle's byline, "after she was charged with assault following a fight with her boyfriend," Ronald Aguillen, 46. Ok, so we in San Antonio know about the time in 2004 when Gina filed charges against another boyfriend, the former SWAT cop, who was a councilman at-the-time, Ron Segovia . There were allegations of an apple being thrown at her nalgas, which humiliated her, and that he also pointed a gun at her. It was not the first time, she told me. Tough-guy Segovia got off - I think he had three attorneys representing him if I remember correctly, and in this city, like too many, the cops are in bed with the grand jury - they need and depend on each other, and this grand jury decided there "wasn't enough evidence to pursue a criminal case against him." Seg...

Today is Tuesday, May 3rd, and so much has happened. A brain tumor. More yoga and walking. A little less combat. Weight dropping. Spirit rising. Back in the city, where I belong. Looking for good photos to give you, organizing my crazy files. And a new President! So much to say, more than beating up on him -- that will only take us so far. Time to hit the streets, challenge the fears that he represents. Don't be afraid, no tengan miedo. If I survived a massive brain tumor -- big as a grapefruit -- we can survive and transcend this. More tomorrow. One day a week from now on.

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