Thomas M. Finch – 2/15/17

 


This page was last updated on March 1, 2017.


Does Trump want a crisis to boost his ratings?; Thomas M. Finch; Beaver County Times; February 15, 2017.

The BCT has published at least 46 letters from Mr. Finch (TMF) since December 2004.  At least 31 of these letters were anti-Bush and/or anti-Republican and they never disappoint.  Here is one example.  You can find the remaining Finch letters I critiqued in the critique archives.  As usual, this letter is little more than a string of leftist talking points.  I wish he could get a regular column in the BCT.  I also wish he could get at least five minutes per day on a local radio and/or TV station.  The most recent letter I reviewed was “Trump wants the truth to be whatever he says it is.”

Below is a detailed critique of the subject letter.


“After 9/11, President George W. Bush saw his previously abysmal approval ratings soar to 90 percent while the country came together with an outpouring of patriotism in response to the terrorism.  ‘W’s incompetence is now legendary.”

[RWC] According to Gallup, President George W. Bush’s (GWB) approval rating for Sep. 7-10, 2001, was 51%.  GWB’s rating jumped to 86% and 90% in the first two polls after 9/11.

Among the post-World War II presidents, BHO’s 47.9% average rating was worse than all but three.  Those three were Presidents Ford (47.2%), Carter (45.5%), and Truman (45.4%).  BHO came in just behind President Nixon (49.0%).  GWB’s rating was 49.4%.

If GWB’s pre-9/11 51% rating was “abysmal,” what does that say about BHO’s 47.9%?

“Considering what’s transpiring in this country now, I wouldn’t put it past Donald Trump and his Nazi puppet-master Steve Bannon, to covertly want America to be attacked, just so he can throw off the constraints on his arbitrary abuses of power. Other than killing people he has no empathy for (with luck it will occur in a blue state), it’s all gravy for Trump.  He gets to see his poll approval ratings jump, gets to blame the ‘so-called’ judges who dared not to give him his way, then he gets to crow to America, ‘See? We need my fascist iron-fisted rule, to benefit America. Only I tell the truth!’”

[RWC] This is at least the third TMF letter in which he evoked Hitler and/or Nazis in general. Here’s what I wrote about that tactic in a previous review.

I don’t recall TMF being concerned about “‘so-called’ judges” when, during his 2010 state-of-the-union speech, President Obama (BHO) bashed the Supreme Court for a ruling BHO didn’t like.  To make it worse, BHO lied about the ruling.

“This will all be perfectly acceptable to the GOP Congress, whose phony pretensions of disapproval are already being ignored.

“By now, it’s beating a dead horse to lament the idiocy of Trump’s picks for administrative duties and his cabinet; you’d have to be deluded to consider any of them ‘good.’ Democrats are powerless to stop any of these transgressions, but every day it becomes more apparent that Trump conflates his own personal interest with that of national interests. And he is surrounded by like-minded thinkers. No dissent allowed.”

[RWC] I hate to burst TMF’s balloon, but all presidents enlist “like-minded thinkers” to one degree or another.  Does TMF think BHO surrounded himself with people who didn’t share BHO’s vision of government?

“Regardless of what happens next, we cannot afford another post-9/11 ‘suspension of doubt’ pertaining to our president’s competency.”

[RWC] Blah, blah, blah. 


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