I’m not sure how many days since Rob Port, famed columnist, political pundit and radio personality was featured on the Forum’s front page, but I’m still blind in my left eye.

Seriously, I was a little startled to see Port’s mug on the front page of the Fargo Forum, for more reasons than one. Port’s visage always makes me jump, especially the screen-filled face shot they use on the Forum webpage. His pupils are the size of half-dollars and not evenly spaced, which is disconcerting.

I also wasn’t prepared to read a minihagiography of an employee of less than two years. The professional lying scold has hit the big time now. We’ll skip my third thought.

“Now I say that when I write something that’s a fact, it’s a fact, because I check them out and am convinced that it’s fact. I also put in some opinion — and people may disagree with the conclusions that I draw — but I think that the one thing even most of my critics and maybe detractors will agree upon is that if I say something is a fact, it’s a fact.” Lots of baloney in that paragraph.
My father spent 25 years as a real journalist and never became the story until he retired. It never occurred to him that he should be. They also have real journalists, real columnists, real writers and real editors — many of them fond of punctuation and spelling — at Forum Communications, but I don’t know any of their life stories. I know that most of them like commas, though.

Port referred to Bismarck attorney and former agriculture commissioner Sarah Vogel as a retread and doddering. Both assertions were LIES. I wrote in an letter-to-the-editor, that Vogel could probably tip Port over with one hand.

So, what’s my real problem? Port gored my ox, and he just laughed it off. I found that annoying. I never become unannoyed. I didn’t even know this clown until he poked me in both eyes. Then, Port bravely blocked me from commenting on his blog, his blog’s Facebook page and his Twitter account. I’m not sure if my emails get through. I don’t think he liked being called a liar, and he had no response that wasn’t another lie, so he stuck a couple of sausage-sized finger in his ears. The BS front-page article was the last straw.

“While I have no doubt that marijuana does have some medicinal uses, those uses are pretty narrow and would only benefit a sliver of the population.” What a crock.

So I started reading his archive of gems and began following Port’s blog. Was this how the young lad operated on a regular basis? The answer was yes. He starts with a premise and then uses every deceitful rhetorical device in the book, including lying, to prove his point, or whatever he was indoctrinated to believe. Some days, I can pretty much guess who/what topic the hack is going to choose on a given day, and his take. Smearing individuals, or groups, is a noxious specialty of the weasel.

“What proponents of indiscriminate enrollment growth — people like Bresciani (NDSU President) — want is a race to the bottom.” There are two lies in that statement.

Then, I alerted the other lib#$%@ Marxist commie snowflake cucks that I knew at the time and got scolded for reading Port’s Sayanythingblog at all. I thought he should be called out for his lies. Nope, they said. He makes money with every click, I was told. And if we don’t go to the blog, he’ll go away. How did that work out? He failed up. Plus, he wasn’t surviving on click-through Amazon ads. Now, he has been normalized by the largest media organization in the state.

“So why then should we have a law forcing a graphic designer to create a pro-gay logo for a homosexual congregation in Fargo?” LIE. St. Mark’s is not a homosexual congregation; it is a Lutheran Church.
I’m not going to rehash Port’s history of professional propagandizing. Real journalists, like Jim Fuglie And C.S. Hagen already did it .

A Short (Well, Sort Of) Introduction To The Koch Brothers Influence In North Dakota

FOURTH ESTATE FOR SALE

It’s hard to be humble

“I think the folks at FCC brought me on because they recognize that I am a talented and well-connected opinion reporter with a lengthy track record of producing solid analysis and breaking news.”

“I even get them, even though I would argue that in my 13th year of writing about North Dakota politics I’m probably one of the most consequential reporters/commentators in the state.”

“(I’m) not just any blogger. (I’m) One who is widely respected around the state, and writes for a large audience”
“Who is Ron Schalow? He’s a 9/11 truther for one.” FALSE.

Did Forum Communications not vet this joker before taking him on? Does the veracity of their writers not matter? Or is it a feature that Port has no ethical boundaries? So why? I sure don’t know. Why do grown men dive over rows of bleachers for a $4 baseball? Why does Kevin Cramer hate white pantsuits?
Port won Native American Stereotype of the Month honors for this bull$#!*

Anyway, the Forum decided to do a puff piece on Port. I’m going to guess that Port’s numbers need some boosting, which were never as big as Port likes to boast, anyway. Either he doesn’t know the difference between a visitor and a unique visitor, or he’s hoping that none of his readers do. The Forum knows. Advertisers know, and they know which demographics are consumers. Complaints about having an amatuer on staff must be piling up, too. I’ve never claimed to be Hemingway, but Port never gets better as a writer.

Port has such a lengthy history of deceit that only a fraction can be noted here, and I doubt a book would be a big seller. A few specks will have to do.

The Big Smear

In one of the most despicable, sleazy, twisted, Portlike smears I’ve ever seen, Port took offense, for some reason, at an effing letter-to-the-editor in the Grand Forks Herald by Heidi Czerwiec. I use her name because she has personally written on the mob maelstrom Port set upon her. She was the perfect target. A liberal arts college academic and a woman. Port is not unaware of the hatred the alt-right has for education, higher-ed, pointy headed professor’s, poetry, females and anyone who might use less than glowing language about guns.

“On March 21, the story was written up on the Say Anything Blog, a local right-wing outlet, which condemned Dr. Czerwiec’s “overall paranoid attitude.” At 12:47 p.m. the next day, the story — linking to the Say Anything Blog — was reported by Campus Reform, a project of the conservative Leadership Institute that counts Grover Norquist, Ralph Reed and Karl Rove among its alums. By the end of the day, Fox News had republished Campus Reform’s piece, and Tucker Carlson’s The Daily Caller had published an article, also linking to the Say Anything Blog.

At 8:50 the next morning, Glenn Beck’s The Blaze had a piece up about the controversy, as did the conservative Washington Times (which linked to Campus Reform) as well as Alex Jones’ Infowars with “Paranoid Anti-Gun Professors Calls 9-1-1 Terrified By ROTC Exercises,” where a commenter added Czerwiec’s campus email and office phone.” — Attack on Academia

Port went to the well four times, on, I repeat, an effing letter-to-the-editor, because it was a ratings winner, misleading all the way. And all of the losers circled in like vultures to enter crude comments below each post. Forum Communications has a code of conduct for commenters on their Facebook pages, but anything goes on the FCC owned Sayanythingblog. And Port has an Algonquin Roundtable of howler monkeys to guard SAB’s comment section from sanity, and try run off anyone that might disagree with the mob.
“Maybe a better strategy for UND would be to hire professors who function as adults.” The smarm oozes from Port’s fingers. The joke is on him, though. Dr. Czerwiec’s family had already chosen to follow other opportunities before the school year even started. She still has a doctorate, and a good job, while Port will always be a moron, renting from his parents.

DAPL
The state led Port around by nose during the DAPL protest. He claims that the government can’t do anything right, but he played the stenographer for the state of North Dakota and law enforcement, without fact checking what he was publishing for months. Nonwhites get the clicks. He detests Native Americans and loves oil tycoons, more than he hates government, it appears.

When a young lady nearly had her arm blown off, during spray the crowd with cold water night on the bridge, alarm bells sounded, the spin was written, and it was, “Oh my, who is the most gullible typist in North Dakota?”
“How can we get this story out? Rob Port?” Maj. Amber Balken, a public information officer with the North Dakota National Guard, said. “This is a must report.”

Cecily Fong, a public information officer with the North Dakota Department of Emergency Services, replied saying she would “get with” the blogger for wider dissemination.” — HPR
Port didn’t even know that TigerSwan was in charge, so he doesn’t know if half of what he wrote was true. The paramilitary mercenaries spied, infiltrated, instigated, screwed with the signals of electronics, concocted falsehoods and fed the truffles to Rob.

His excuse; “Was there anyone operating under the impression that this “wasn’t” happening?”
Evidently Port was operating cluelessly because he kept on buying whatever was slipped into his burrow. Or maybe he knew. Either way, no reputable newspaper operation would put up with such shenanigans.

“Communication between the various agencies attempts to paint the activists — known as water protectors — as criminals, out of state troublemakers, and sexual deviants, a theme widely reported by the state’s media, particularly on the Forum Communication Company’s right-wing editorialist Say Anything Blog, managed by Port.” — HPR
If anything remotely criminal happened within a hundred miles of Cannon Ball, the Portweasel let innuendo do the talking. He does love his innuendo. OMG! Thirty cattle are missing! Oops, never mind. They were hiding behind that elm tree.

Now, we find out that “the firms Delve and Off the Record Strategies, apparently working on contract with the National Sheriffs’ Association, worked in secret on talking points, media outreach and communications training for law enforcement dealing with Dakota Access opponents mobilized at the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation in Cannon Ball, North Dakota.”

“Pfeifle (Mark. Off the Record Strategies) agreed in his email and suggested following the press conference with outreach to friendly media outlets to amplify the message.”

“One of those outlets was the Say Anything Blog, run by Rob Port, who the next day, Oct. 6, ran a blog post featuring many of the themes found in the talking points: “Over 85 Percent of Arrested #NoDAPL Protesters Are From Outside of North Dakota.”

In his email, Pfeifle had suggested reaching out to Port, who also hosts a radio show on WDAY AM-970 and regularly wrote blog posts in support of Dakota Access during the Standing Rock standoff. When Port’s piece went online, Pfeifle wrote an email that same day to the Delve team, sheriffs’ association staff, Hushka, and others asking an association staffer to share the piece on social media.”

These are the same characters who helped G.W. Bush rationalize the Iraq war. Was Port once again clueless, or was he in cahoots?

Oil

Big oil loves Rob, and Rob loves them back. He just so happens to have the same opinions as the North Dakota Petroleum Council, which simplifies things, I imagine. There isn’t anything the oil industry can do, in or to, North Dakota that Port cannot — or is unwilling — to justify, including the death of people. There is no spill, no exploding train, no employee death, or human misery, that the Portweasel can’t excuse.

“Currently the North Dakota Industrial Commission is considering a draft field order for conditioning Bakken oil before shipment. The rules would not only set a target for stabilization (measured by vapor pressure) but would also dictate how the industry would go about hitting that target.” Conditioning isn’t stabilization. Port never understood that, but he just types away.

The Republicans cut taxes for oil barons in 2015, and Port has been lying about it ever since. “You cannot call it a tax cut when the net result is an increase in tax burdens.”

“Remember over the last few years when the enemies of oil development were hyping oil train derailments?” Nope. Because nobody was hyping anything. News outlets were reporting on the explosions, which seemed normal, since they were danger to public safety. Another thing Port doesn’t understand, so he made it up.

In 2015, the fatality rates in the Bakken were nearly seven times as high as other oil fields in the rest of America, but Port wasn’t having anything to do with those facts. “Yes, worker deaths have increased over those years, but so has oil activity.” He didn’t mention the comparison to other oil plays. Lying by omission and a lame excuse. Poor hiring, poor training, poor management, ignoring the rules, lack of proper equipment, hurry, and asking workers do dangerous things past normal procedures, are the usual culprits, when there is an excess of injuries and deaths. The workers aren’t Port’s concern.

“Left-wing activists have taken to using the term “bomb trains” and are now blaming public officials for not seeking regulatory retribution for the derailments from the oil industry.” The term “bomb trains” was coined by those in the industry, who knew what was getting poured into Bakken tanker cars, and public officials are there, supposedly, to protect the public. They’ve decided not to.

“Time to call them Obama trains,” blared Port’s headline. He links to an article that says that Obama dropped the ball on stabilization, which he did, deciding to trust North Dakota to do the right thing, which was stupid.

The Obama administration weighed national standards to control explosive gas in oil trains last year but rejected the move, deciding instead to leave new rules to North Dakota alone. — Reuters

What Port was likely too dense to figure out, or remember, was mocking me for demanding that the state do exactly what he was now faulting Obama for not doing. (The comment section below this post looks odd because I was blocked, and my gentle polite remarks were deleted)

“Schalow has accomplished is really nothing other than organizing a few of his fellow conspiracy mongers and cranks.” We’re so unorganized, I can’t even find the others.

“NGL’s make the oil more volatile, which makes it much easier to ignite. The NGL vapor will expand away from the toppled cars along the ground, which causes a much larger burning area. Stabilized oil does burn, but it DOESN’T “EXPLODE”. We as a country have been transporting stabilized oil by train every day since 1960, how many of these type of accidents do you remember? Without the NGL’s there is no reason to rebuild all the rail transport cars or change what we are doing.” — Myron Goforth; president of Dew Point Control LLC., Sugar Land, Texas

Port doesn’t like to mention it’s only Bakken oil trains that have exploded, (because Bakken crude is not stabilized) how many have blown up, or how many people have died. He doesn’t get upset because they detonate, but because news media notices the 300 foot fireballs and tells everyone.

“… activists have taken to mapping the “blast zones” around railroad tracks, and claim that 25 million Americans live in them.” Because it’s true, and you would think the government would show such concern. We have signs for everything else.

And Rob is just so darn proud of anything flaring. “And when (Amy) Dalrymlpe(sp) does get around to mentioning declines in gas flaring, she puts it in the context of an industry spokesman exaggerating a bit.

Isn’t a 24 percent reduction in the volume of gas flared over the last two years news? It seems like news to me.”

Burgum

Doug Burgum played Port like a jukebox throughout his campaign for governor. Burgum would invite him into his office, and Port glowed. He asked Port for advice, and Port’s ego grew even larger. Then, Burgum would do something that Port didn’t like, such as wearing a cowboy hat (beats me), and there would be three days of debate on whether the future governor was an actual cowboy. It was fun to watch the Minot High trained Port give advice to a guy that knows Bill Gates, and thousands of actual smart people.

It’s the Wind Dude

“Over the last couple of weeks, we North Dakotans, forced to celebrate the anniversary of our nation’s independence through a smoky haze blown down from Canadian wildfires, were left appreciating our state’s normally pristine air quality. That’s because it disappeared on us, at least temporarily.

After decades of coal development and a more recent uptick in oil-related industrial activity in western North Dakota — including more flaring of natural gas than anybody is happy about — it took the tragic wildfires our northern neighbors are grappling with to foul our air.”

Identity politics Port-style

According to Port, unless the political candidate is snow white, male and straight, identity politics are at play.

“And while I detest identity politics, there’s no questioning that it is a factor in how people cast their ballots. Having a woman on the ticket is going to increase Burgum’s appeal among a pretty large demographic of voters. People should vote based on things like gender or skin color, but they do.”

“Per Nowtazki’s(sp) article, Democrats acknowledge having put at least some effort into recruiting Native American candidates, and we’ll in November how that works for them politically. Identity politics are an ugly reality in American politics, but a reality none-the-less.”

“Finally, identity politics do matter. Many on the right are convinced that Rep. Oversen only got her appointment because she is young and female. “

“Particularly hilarious is state Rep. Kyle(sp) Oversen — titular chairwoman for the North Dakota Democrats and a not-yet-graduated law student — lecturing Senator John Hoeven over his call for Obama to refrain from nominating a candidate to replace Scalia.”

He has a particular animus for Kylie Oversen, second only to his hostility towards Senator Heitkamp.

He doesn’t like college students

This is standard language for the alt-right, and Port is probably extra angry because he couldn’t hack the college thing. He often cherry picks an anecdote that fits his narrative, then ascribes whatever irks him to a whole group.

“If this generation of college-aged toddlers want to shirk their responsibilities to pay for their debts and tolerate diverse opinions, then perhaps we should acknowledge that they are, in fact, children and treat them as such..”

“This is the social media generation, after all, which gets its news from smirking comedians and internet memes.”

“Millions upon millions of American students attend university as a way to prolong the high school experience and postpone adulthood.”

Coming in Port Whine, Part 2

Pipelines, science denial, hate crime denial, discrimination denial, Kevin Cramer, Heidi Heitkamp, Trump, e-cigarettes, Trumpcare, Bresciani, NDSU football, Michelle Obama, and more …