Nov 30^th

On Nov 21^st I did a piece pointing out some problems with a column by Mona Charen. The Record Eagle subsequently published that column and I decided that Charen’s reportorial sins were grievous enough that they should be exposed, so I wrote a letter to the Record Eagle doing exactly that. The letter was critical of the paper’s selection of Charen as a columnist so as expected it appeared today, Monday, a low circulation day.

Here is the letter so that you may judge for yourself:

Mona Charen has a curious column in the Nov. 24^th Record Eagle. In it she tells us that, “Bush’s errors were recognized and corrected before he left office.” How did he correct errors that left over 4 thousand Americans dead and resulted in more than 10 thousand amputees? Then there was the little matter of paying for the war with borrowed money, just less that two trillion dollars’ worth. (Borrow and spend is now a conservative value?)

Charen continues with an extended denunciation of Iraq Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and how the Obama administration had praised him lavishly in spite of his many shortcomings. A two minute internet search would have shown Charen that Maliki is not the Prime Minister of Iraq, hasn’t been the Prime Minister of Iraq since August of last year and stepped down at the insistence of the American government.

Surely the Record Eagle can find other more competent conservative columnists to present to their readers. On the other hand…maybe not!

Henry E. Klugh

There are enough local right wingers hereabouts so that someone will surely write in support of Charen, “Klugh has taken her remarks out of context” or something similar. The paper’s policy prohibits me from responding to such remarks for two months so if anyone wonders why I’m silent about such blowback, that’s why.

Now to Trump’s latest convulsion: The poor soul had expected that the 100 black Ministers organization that was scheduled to meet with him was going to endorse him. In fact he had announced that indorsement in advance of his meeting. When push came to shove this organization claimed that they did not plan to endorse him but rather just listen to what he had to say…so Trump cancelled that meeting. Then he promoted another meeting with black clergy who were willing to come, not all did. For those who showed up Trump claimed the results were “amazing, just amazing.” Trump repeated Bernie Sanders misleading statistic on unemployment among Black youth which Trump claims is 51 percent. It is bad but not that bad; that figure counts both unemployed and underemployed part-time workers who would prefer full time jobs. Trump’s focusing on that statistic got enthusiastic support from those black pastors who attended the event at Trump Tower. Does anyone doubt that Donald Trump, the ultimate salesman, could convince a black audience that he  would be as helpful as possible even if his followers were photographed beating a “Black Lives Matter” spokesman senseless while he, Trump, said that maybe he deserved it?