Dear editor:
What an odd week! It starts on Monday, June 5, with an almost-octogenarian (that's nearly 80 years old if you have an aversion to multisyllabic words) upchucking nearly every angry "gotcha!" in the limited-vocabulary arsenal of our twit-in chief and his amen chorus: snowflake, Soros-funded radical left, shadow government, deplorables, socialism, etc. ...
On Tuesday, June 6, a letter accuses Carl Ford of writing a "vacuous" letter about slavery and the Civil War. A frequent defender of all things Confederate, the writer obviously knows nothing about Mr. Ford or he might have shown a bit more respect and restraint. Or maybe not. Regressives, respect and restraint seem to be rare bedfellows these days.
Wednesday, June 7. The real cause of our tragic Civil War is further explained. "The CSA just didn't have a more efficient method of harvesting their crops at the time." In other words, they had no choice, poor Christian souls, but to trade and breed (and rape and murder) African slaves because John Deere had not yet invented the tractor.
Another regular, always fixated on Hillary Clinton, accuses her of apoplectic blither and egoistical, under-medicated paranoid behavior. Who knew this writer was such a brilliant physician? Apparently, diagnosis from afar is easy when you watch Fox News and listen to hate radio!
On June 8, perennial little brother, usually basking in the warm glow of Franklin Graham and Robert Jeffress, chides a college professor for having the audacity to suggest that Dwight Eisenhower and William Buckley were better conservatives than ketchup-is-a-vegetable Ronald Reagan or orange-as-a-pumpkin Donald Trump. Spend some time with Matthew 25, little brother. Please. ...
Friday, June 9, and another intrepid writer is still fighting the Civil War. Seems Abraham Lincoln was a neurotic backwoods lawyer and a political stooge. Anyone who thinks otherwise is an overwrought abolitionist whose mother wears army boots. "Freeman" (irony anyone?) insists he will display the Confederate flag, loud and proud, whenever he drives through our fair city. It represents who he is. Good to know. ...
The sun finally comes out on Saturday. A progressive, reasonable letter suggests MAGA madness is destroying health care in America, along with everything else we once aspired to. We are the laughing stock of the world and, at the same time, scaring the hell out of everyone. ...
Today, Sunday, June 11. The inky delirium continues. A bizarre letter tries to connect the dots between the immediate aftermath of the Civil War and Trump's recent efforts to throw the FBI and CIA under a proverbial bus. Huzzah, huzzah, the hair-sprayed president is magically vindicated! And there's yet another letter about Hillary Clinton and our dearly departed black man in the people's White House. Seems some folks just can't get over the fact that comrade Donald lost the popular vote. Bigly. ...
John Ragland
Hot Springs
P.S. I once met R.G. Lee, and Jim Davidson is no R.G. Lee. The greatest sermon ever is Harry Emerson Fosdick's 1933 "The Unknown Soldier." You can read it here: http://levantium.com/the-unknown-soldier.
Editorial on 06/18/2017