Dear Editor
“The buck stops here.” “I’m from Missouri.”
That was the front and back of the large placard on President Harry S. Truman’s desk. He boasted to the nation about accountability and personal responsibility, and we Missourians loved him for it. He was our flag-bearer for those character traits, telling the nation what we were made of and what we valued.
Today, we could place a similar placard on our current president’s desk, only this one would read, “The $$$$ stops here.” Where’s that accountability and personal responsibility? In all honesty, nowhere to be found.
Nov. 22, 1963. Everyone in Perryville over the age of 10 at the time remembers that day — the assassination of John F. Kennedy. We were a nation in mourning, and we haven’t been the same since. Remember the photos? Little John in short pants saluting his murdered father, Jackie in tears behind that black veil. Many homes in Perryville had Kennedy’s picture on a wall, my grandparents included. Kennedy was idolized. His standards were held up and proudly displayed. Many still hold those standards for every president to emulate. Sadly, the only ones who do so now are Democrats or independents.
In all honesty, can any Trump supporter claim accountability? How about personal responsibility? Can any one-time Trump supporter in Perryville claim, in public, to their friends and family, to have reversed course and no longer support this soon-to-be authoritarian government and its wannabe dictator? That would take the strength of one’s convictions — in a word, integrity.
Truman’s accountability, his personal responsibility, and Kennedy’s uncompromising integrity — where is that today? It was everywhere when I was growing up in Perryville. Now I wonder how anyone who claims to possess our town’s values or their Christian values can look each other in the eye. These are not part-time values, folks. You either practice them or you don’t.
As someone who left his hometown in 1972 and lived in Alaska, Mexico, Hawaii, Idaho and now Montana, I have a credible perspective on what has happened to many of the folks back home — and when it started.
In 1996, Fox News was carried into southeast Missouri. Fox was later fined $767 million for lying to its viewers. In my day, no one in Perryville would have watched it again. PunditFact and PolitiFact estimate that about 66 to 67 percent of Fox statements reviewed were mostly false, false, or “Pants on Fire.” In Canada, Fox fails broadcasting standards of integrity. In the U.K., it never got off the ground. Integrity matters — you can’t BS the British.
But Perryville? It’s the only channel I see on nearly every television when I visit. And that explains the lack of accountability, the lack of personal responsibility, and the severely compromised integrity that once defined my hometown.
Another character asset we once prized? Intellectual honesty. Who can still muster that and step up? I want to be proud of my hometown again.
Paul Flentge, former resident & subscriber
