Ian Eales and David Eckhardt had a special knack of getting under my skin. Despite the Siuslaw News editor ever ready to edit whatever I wrote, I sent this letter off.
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Ian Eales (March 24) would have us believe that the revolt of school children against the easy availability of guns is the product of “corrupt politicians, statists and anti-American media” brain-washing. He sees placing restrictions on gun ownership to be the relinquishment of “freedom” to gain “temporary security.”
Anybody shot at – brainwashed or not by ex-teacher liberals like me – will take common sense gun restrictions over the freedom to be riddled with bullets anytime. The school children that marched and protested March 24 are absolutely right. Presumably, Mr. Eales would prefer to have these adolescents shout: “Freedom to have people buy guns that require weak or no background checks! Vote liberals out!”
Printed March 31, 2018, in the Siuslaw News
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David Eckhardt wrote the following letter that compelled me to respond. Editor “Ed” edited it substantially without advance warning or negotiation. What resulted was a candid exchange of viewpoints between the two of us. Immediately below is Eckhardt’s letter.
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So, Siuslaw News editor … thinks we have gone the wrong direction ("We’ve Come a Long Way Since the Dixie Chicks — But In the Wrong Direction," July 18) I suppose it depends on which side of the fence you sit, but I disagree.
As a country music fan, to this day I still don’t listen to the “Dixie Chicks.” Not just because they dissed G.W., but their music generally stinks, IMO.
But let’s get to the real problem here.
It seems that we are supposed to believe anything that comes out of our government. Well, I can’t go there, and anyone paying attention should have a hard time too.
Mr. [James] Clapper [former Director of Intelligence under Obama] lied straight-up, then back tracked and no one seemed to care except me. I will never trust another word from his mouth; just because he is an intelligence official means nothing. Mr. Clinton lied on live TV and was eventually impeached for it. The Senate then failed to do its job — because of politics I suppose. If Clinton says the sky is blue, I want a second opinion.
Oh, let’s not forget Mr. Brenner who, if he hated President Trump any more, his look would burn him to the ground.
And finally, how about the past FBI head, James Comey, and his underlings. He and his underlings say they didn’t let their biases affect their work. I say they are lying straight-up and know it.
Just look at Comey’s family, all female and all Hillary fanatics. They even marched in that supposed (liberal) woman’s march. And I am to believe he didn’t have a bias and didn’t act on it?
Really?
Wow.
How about the point man [Peter] Strzok [FBI agent] and his paramour and all those emails on a government phone? If he said two true words in his testimony it was probably his name. And he said he also did not act on his bias.
So, all these folks were just good old boys and gals doing their level best to adhere to our laws and morals?
What a joke.
What we have seen since Donald Trump became president is, in no small measure, a Democratic Party which lost a supposed safe election and is now going bananas. They call themselves the resistance; I call them deranged.
Even President Obama did not receive this amount of negative coverage for all his lies and half-truths. I personally think the Dem’s have lost their party to the Socialists and are going to be pursuing their agenda in the future. This will manifest itself with single-payer medical, guaranteed income and attacks on capitalism.
Make no mistake: the socialists are as much a danger to our Republic as any Russian ever thought to be.
I hope to God I’m wrong.
David Eckhardt
Printed July 21, 2018, in the Siuslaw News
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Here was the response letter that I sent to Ed.
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“They can’t be fair! Can’t be honest! They’re biased!” now assert Trump’s defenders, attacking our federal intelligence agencies and Special Council Mueller’s investigators.
There is such a thing as being biased for the truth, for valuing honor, integrity, for being committed to the discovery of facts.
Propagandists like Sean Hannity are paid handsomely to incite, distort, erect fantasies built on tall foundations of far-fetched lies. He and Trump have much in common.
We who recognize Trump and his cabinet appointees for what they are are “deranged,” “duped” – according to local resident Trump/GOP loyalist David Eckhardt (Letter July 21). Indeed, we are angry. Furious. That the GOP works assiduously to make our country a Koch brothers’ inspired oligarchy, that it engenders dishonest elections through gerrymandering and voter disenfranchisement, that it lies continuously to ordinary folk about how it has their welfare at heart, that it vilifies, vilifies, vilifies whoever gets in its way, that it places feeding its donors everything they want at the expense of human life is horrific.
Now we have law-breaker Trump: greedy, egotistical, dishonest, dictatorial, cruel, ignorant, stupid. His base loves him. GOP office-holders abide him. Thomas Friedman, in his latest column, (https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/17/opinion/trump-putin-republicans.html) puts it accurately: “… what makes Trump even more powerful and problematic is that this president with no shame is combined with a party with no spine and a major network with no integrity.”
We live in perilous times. Mr. Eckhardt, you are so wrong. We are headed definitely in the worst direction.
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The letter having my name under it in the July 25 Siuslaw News was substantially different from what I had submitted. I had much to tell Editor Ed.
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I am displeased with what you did with my letter, printed in today’s newspaper. Attached is a comparison of what I wrote and what you printed. You made quite a few changes, most – in my opinion – counterproductive to what I wanted expressed.
I stated in my letter that “we” are furious. You softened my discontent almost to the point that I appear to be a milquetoast afraid to challenge the very people I wish to criticize. You have me writing “in my opinion” “seems to be,” and “what could prove to be.” I wrote a forceful letter. I intended it to be forceful. I wrote: “Now we have law-breaker Trump: greedy, egotistical, dishonest, dictatorial, cruel, ignorant, stupid.” I wanted all of those adjectives included. I could have added other adjectives like “immoral.” You replaced all of them with three nouns. Trump is far worse a human being than what you have me stating. You hare softened considerably what I wanted to declare without my permission.
Second, your altering of my sentence structure in one glaring instance reflects poorly on my ability to write correctly complex sentences. I refer to the long sentence that begins with these words: “That the GOP works …” I used five noun clauses in a series as the subjects of the sentence, which concludes with the two-word predicate “is horrific.” It is a grammatically constructed sentence. You changed it and omitted “that it” in front of “engenders dishonest elections through gerrymandering and voter disenfranchisement” to make the entire sentence ungrammatical. Because my name is underneath your edited version of my letter, that mistake reflects on me, retired English teacher, not you.
Because you felt that you had to soften the tone of my criticism, you made changes that both weakened the force of my criticism and the style and tightness of my expression. I am embarrassed to have my name under what you printed. Why cannot you just let people – save for using obscenities – write what they feel and think?
I am being hard on you. I know that your intentions are good. I do believe that your editing goes too far.
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Ed answered.
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Hi Harold,
I appreciate you taking the time to write, and for communicating your displeasure. Naturally, I’m sorry you felt the revisions clouded or softened your points. While I certainly encourage letter writers to share their perspectives, I am also adamant that our Opinion page not become an extension of Facebook, wherein name calling and emotionally-charged accusations ("...according to local resident Trump/GOP loyalist David Eckhardt…” "Now we have law-breaker Trump: greedy, egotistical, dishonest, dictatorial, cruel, ignorant, stupid…”) become an accepted part of the conversation. The same for presenting opinion as fact (“...the GOP works assiduously to make our country a Koch brothers’ inspired oligarchy…”)
Don’t get me wrong, Harold. Personally, I agree with every assessment made in your letter. But as editor, my main objective is to facilitate conversation and, hopefully, the sharing of opinion and perspectives in a way that moves conversation forward — no easy feat in today’s highly volatile dialogue.
Again, my apologies. In the future, if I have any concerns, I will send you my suggestions ahead of time and explain why. I will not print anything until we can agree on the final draft. I value your input and perspective, Harold, and want to make sure you continue to be a part of this important conversation within our community.
If you have any other questions or concerns, please feel free to call, email or stop by my office any time; my door is always open.
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My answer.
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Thank you, … [Ed] for your polite response.
I name-called Trump because he deserves it. How can you make a point about name-calling and blatant falsehood made by the far right and the President and his backers and the dishonesty of GOP practices and policy without being direct in your remarks? I do not want to qualify my remarks. I take your point that you don’t want letter upon letter to be nothing more than name-calling. Mine wasn’t. Eckhardt’s and Eales’s letters are also somewhat more than that. That’s fine, as far as I am concerned. What a letter writer affixes his name to should be what he has written– stupid, inaccurate, insightful; whatever it may be. He should be judged and responded to based on what he actually writes. I believe that most readers recognize that what a critical letter writer offers is opinion, something to think about. Perhaps rebut. If somebody wants to challenge my assertion about the Koch brothers’ intentions, I could certainly give factual evidence to support my viewpoint. My letter’s intention was to rebut the Right’s assertion that having a viewpoint contrary to what the Right wants people to believe disqualifies certain individuals as investigators of the President. A secondary viewpoint was to remind people that the GOP, particularly in recent years, has been consistently dishonest in its pronouncements and policy. I don’t make that assertion lightly. Not providing specifics (that would make my letter too long) does not make the statement false. I could write such a letter (sticking strictly to that subject). I have written such letters in the distant past. That I wanted to make broader points should not prohibit me from making generalizations that readers should ponder.
Yes, in the future we can negotiate what I would like to express in print. I won’t like it. To avoid the aggravation, I probably won’t write. But who knows? Eckhardt and Eales boil the blood.
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I emailed several friends this message.
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I am especially peeved at the editor of the Siuslaw News for the neutered letter that he printed in today’s (July 25) edition of the Siuslaw News because it has my name under it. The paper used to have editors that allowed you to write what you thought. … {Ed] wants everything muted, everything polite. I am not the person that today’s letter reflects. Such editorial oversight censors forthright viewpoint. I doubt that I will write another letter to this newspaper.
If you are curious, attached are my actual letter, the letter of complaint I sent to … [Ed], and a comparison of what I wrote and what he changed.
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Here are several responses.
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Rand Dawson -- Harold....Congratulations for having joined the multitude of former LTE writers who now write with an understanding that maybe...maybe...with luck....their main intros and punch lines will survive in recognizable form....
Please do not let this defer you from further expressing your rage, opinion and insight. We need it all -- more than ever..... We highly value it.....
Jenny Velinty -- Remember you are in the ‘city of Florence’ – a ‘’where IS that ?’’ kind of town to most people despite all the ‘Visioning’ and ‘Motion” the GOP Mayor likes to broadcast. He makes me sea-sick.
Loved your letter to … [Ed]. A good Golden Rule reminder is always right.
Your LTE is more NY Times level and … [Ed] is our local gossip manager.
I was just telling someone who does not get the local SNOOZ about Eckhardt and how his son was killed crossing 101 with his bike. He yelled at ODOT and must be pleased that 5 safety crossings are getting built a decade after his son died.
He continues to boast his hard right views and gets them printed. I wonder if … {Ed] ‘edits’ his LTE’s. I think … [Ed] dotes on Eales, Eckhardt and Cable.
I strongly recommend cooling off at City Lights watching a colorful re-mastering of the BEATLES Yellow Submarine escaping from the blue meanies. It’s simplistic, BP lowering jolly-ness.
Igor Kusznirczuk -- This town is full of weak spineless jellyfish. I would be very pissed if I were you. He is stupid to manipulate letters. I thought there was freedom of speech.
Wende Jarman -- I believe in your outstanding attributes as a great published writer! Shame on … [Ed]!
Rand Dawson -- Harold...i read your original materials showing what he changed....before i replied...
This is how … [Ed] has worked over the last 2 years....Some of my op/eds on healthcare have gone 10+ 'editing' sessions....as he peels away verbage according to his own style schematic....
I finally sat long enough to realize...i had to work thru it....and i do....but with little enthusiasm and less frequency.....and i send him footnoted info to buttress some statements, etc.....
Which, if one considers we (you) are writing op/eds or LTEs....is absurd....But, alas, he owns the inkwell....
And like I say....stamp your foot and thump the table....and still hang in there....God help us if 'our side' slinks away....
Rand Dawson -- Harold....your followups were essential..
Its what he needs to hear....repeatedly...since this is his style to such an extent that many others I talk to have thrown their pencils away....which we simply cannot afford to do.....
he even takes my satire or irony and changes it....which guts the final sentence....and this is for an op/ed.....
Ron Preisler -- Harold,
I agree your letter was certainly better grammatically. … [Ed] must have spent a great deal of time on the changes, so what was published captured at least 90 % of your intent.
We as a town have changed. I have been at Rotary where I heard some of our conservative members trying to get business owners to pull their advertising because some of his articles didn’t reflect what they wanted to hear, even though it was the truth.
I would not want to be in his shoes.
Thank you for speaking out.
Hugh Schneider -- Isn't amazing just how much temerity is exercised by print editors. I can readily understand your ire; had you wanted to say what … [Ed] had written, I suspect you would have asked him to write the letter ....
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