By Mark Ambrogi
Tony Katz displayed the game plan for how his radio show works.
Katz, the conservative host of Indy’s Morning News from 6 to 10 a.m. on 93.1 FM WIBC, connected news stories from a week in April to show what he sees as progressives’ embrace of cause over content. Katz gave his takes of the news to Constitutional Patriots meeting at Carmel’s Central Christian Church on April 28.
Katz’s first example was how Sen. Ted Cruz, a conservative Texan, met with real estate Ian Reisner and his business and romantic partner Mati Weiderpass, owners of the Out NYC Hotel. Cruz is vocal about being against gay marriage.
Katz said reportedly the only thing the owners of Out NYC Hotel and Cruz agreed that more should be done to support Israel.
However, Katz pointed out many called on social media for a boycott of the Out NYC Hotel and Broadway/Equity Fights AIDS canceled its annual fundraiser there.
“We are always told we need to be open-minded,” Katz said. “We are always told that we need to be more accepting.”
Katz said 10,000 people signed up the Facebook page to boycott Out NYC.
“So because two gay men met with Ted Cruz they were ostracized from the gay community,” Katz said. “The story is we are told about this tolerance and here we are staring it in the face. It starts this unique conversation of cause over content.”
Katz said the backlash was so strong Reisner said how sorry he was for meeting with Cruz, calling it a terrible mistake.
“They bullied him into an apology,” Katz said. “They bullied him into compliance. They were bullied on who they are and what is acceptable for who they are.”
Then Katz connected that story to Bruce Jenner, who discussed his gender transition with Diane Sawyer. Katz said the Twitter universe showed an outpouring of love to Jenner during the interview.
“Ellen DeGeneres, Rob Lowe, name your celebrity, were talking about how brave (Jenner is),” Katz said. “Then he said I’m a Republican. I can not begin to use the type of language that was used on Bruce Jenner. Cause over content.
“The content is that Bruce Jenner did the thing that every progressive talks about, went with their feelings and shared them with the world. Except when he shared his feelings with the world that (their) world didn’t find acceptable. Then he was every four-letter word they could think of. He was terrible. He was despicable. One tweet said ‘my mother was with you right until you said you were a Republican, now you can blanking die.’”
Another example of Katz’s version of cause of content was actors walked off a play about the Ferguson, Mo., incident by conservative filmmaker Phelim McAleer because they didn’t like the content.
Katz said McAleer’s play comes directly from the grand jury testimony in the probe of police officer Darren Wilson’s shooting of teenager Michael Brown. Wilson was not indicted.
Katz sees himself as a watchdog of hypocrisy.
“I believe part of fixing it is saying ‘hey I noticed that,’” Katz said.
