Gary Hopwood – 11/21/08

This page was last updated on November 22, 2008.

Four years too late on flag protest; Gary Hopwood; Beaver County Times; November 21, 2008.

Below is a detailed critique of the subject letter.

“I normally don’t let letters to the editor or news articles bother me, but I am appalled at the amount of hate and negativity toward our newly elected president and the voters who elected him.”

[RWC] As I’ve written previously, where were all these tolerant people who popped up after Mr. Obama’s election when we endured non-stop personal attacks and smears of President Bush for the last eight years?

“I was one of those voters and am proud of it.

“I feel that anyone who wants to fly the American flag upside down to show the distress this country is in should have started flying it that way at least four years ago, if not more, because Barack Obama isn’t the one who put us where we are today.”

[RWC] Neither did President Bush. It was, however, the policies championed by Mr. Obama’s party that did.

“As far as the comments about voters electing someone to the office of president who we know nothing about, so what? Eight years ago, and again four years ago, we elected someone we knew a lot about and that sure has worked out well.”

[RWC] “So what?” Does Mr. Hopwood actually believe there’s nothing wrong with “electing someone to the office of president who we know nothing about?”

“I am close to John McCain’s age and have never seen this country as deep in the dump tank as I am seeing now.”

[RWC] Where was Mr. Hopwood during the Jimmy Carter years?

“If you are a true American who truly cares about the United States, then it’s time to get behind the newly elected president, just as I would have gotten behind McCain if he had been elected.”

[RWC] I might believe Mr. Hopwood had he written a similar letter to protest the name-calling and personal attacks on President Bush for the past eight years. Alas, I found no such letter and Mr. Hopwood didn’t claim to write one.

Finally, I got a kick out of the “If you are a true American who truly cares about the United States, then it’s time to get behind the newly elected president” comment. In Mr. Hopwood’s opinion, dissent is apparently un-American. That sure wasn’t the left’s position when it came to attacking President Bush. Regardless of how vile the comment, lefties told us how patriotic that “dissent” was, even when it provided aid and comfort to the enemy.