Leonard Pitts, The Miami Herald

February 1, 2009

Leonard Pitts
The Miami Herald
One Herald Plaza
Miami, Florida 33132-1693

RE: “Why Politics Has Become So Destructive” –
Your achy breaky lachrymose comments about mean spirited guys, all of whom are Republicans, all of whom are mind numbed robots of Rush Limbaugh, saying nasty things about President Bambi and how that will hinder the recovery of the economy, increase Global Warming/Cooling, encourage teenage obesity, and continue the cycle of free men saying things freely.

Mr. Pitts,

Hillary Clinton was hired by the largest law firm in Little Rock when her husband was elected Attorney General of Arkansas.
Hillary Clinton was made a partner in the largest law firm in Little Rock when her husband was elected Governor of Arkansas.
Coincidence?

Michelle Obama was given a $4,000 a week raise – that‘s a bit more than $200,000 a year – when her husband was elected to the United States Senate.
Her husband arranged for her employer to get a $1,000,000 earmark.
Michele Obama left her job. The position will not be refilled.
Coincidence?

P.G. Wodehouse wrote that coincidences occur all the time like when you “find a trout in the milk”.

Have I “ravaged” anybody?

It’s been 6 days since an ice storm ravished Kentucky. Where the Hell is FEMA? Do you think it would be OK for a White singer to say that Barack Obama doesn’t like White people? If he were to say that would it be OK because that’s what a Black singer said about a White President?

You say that ravaging Obama because Bush was ravaged is wrong. Further, you say that such “childishness…becomes an intellectual strait jacket”.

I hate to disillusion you but since the election of 1800 that has been the American way. Ravaging, evil cartoons, vile rumors, half truths, and out and out lies have been the norm for elections in this country. H. Rap Brown, a 60s civil rights leader, said in a different context, it was as “American as apple pie”.



Free speech is meant to be sharp edged, rough edged, mean spirited, biting, nasty, not always 100% accurate, vituperative and ongoing.

We have a First Amendment that permits taxpayer subsidization of a play – Corpus Cristi – that says Jesus Christ was crucified because of a lovers’ quarrel. It seems that Jesus Christ and Judas Iscariot, homosexual lovers, had a spat. You know how they are. Things got out of hand and Jesus winds up nailed to a cross. “Free men speak with free tongues” is still a good thing, isn’t it?

Having gone through the whore house of Chicago politics, and if the official bio is to be believed, emerged as a virgin President B. Hussein Obama can stand a few sharp elbows.

I recall Mayor Daley the First, father of Mayor Daley the Second, leaning over a rostrum and interrupting a Mike Royko question with the charming rejoinder, “If you don’t like it you can kiss my ass”.

I think it was somebody from Chicago who said “politics ain’t beanbag”.

By the by, “I’ll ravage your guy because you ravaged my guy” predates your column by almost 25 centuries

The DWEMs [Dead White European Males] cobbled together something called the Trivium. 2/3rds of it - Logic and Rhetoric – sometimes overlap. The Romans identified mutual ravaging as tu qouque Poor Logic but effective Rhetoric.


PS – You mention “trillion dollar surpluses” as if they were real. If there were why did the national debt never ever go down by one dollar during the glorious Clinton years? You and your recently converted fellow ravagers, modern American Liberals all, say it far too often for it to be invincible ignorance. I haven’t ruled out the possibility that you are just a horse’s ass. You aren’t, are you? I like to think that deep down you know that Davis-Bacon is the most anti-ColoredNegroBlack legislation passed in the 20th century that is still on the books. “Those words mean exactly what I want them to mean”, said Alice.