Last week my 98 year old mother had her letter published in the local paper, this week it was my turn. (My first LTE was published in 1972 a week after the Watergate break-in, in which I pointed out that “the secretary would disavow any knowledge of the team’s activities.” Nailed it. Had a lot published since then, I don’t even clip them out any more.)
This week’s effort:
Like a kid playing with a new toy, Mr. Trump is considering a symbolic pardon to the late Muhammad Ali, who was convicted of refusing to answer the draft in 1967 based on his religious beliefs. Apparently Mr. Trump is ignorant of the fact that the conviction was reversed by a unanimous Supreme Court decision on the grounds it violated Mr. Ali’s First Amendment rights.
Ali was the Colin Kaepernick of his own era, a prominent black athlete whose career was damaged by his public opposition to injustice. In Ali’s time the issue was young black men being drafted and used as cannon fodder in Vietnam. Today Mr. Kaepernick kneels in opposition to the number of unarmed black men being shot by police.
Mr. Trump reveres Ali and despises Kaepernick, but does not realize that they both send the same message.