From the editor: The publisher and the politician

Finally. A witch hunt exposed, captured on the front page of newspapers all across the country and blaring from TV screens. Yes, corrupt law enforcement staff exist, backed up by a law-breaking judge willing to bend the law to punish those nipping at their heels. Cronyism run amok, on steroids!

Kurt Batdorf’s story, below, sums up the unprecedented-in-our-time attack on a Kansas newspaper, the Marion County Record, gone after for doing its job. Small town cronies tried to out-muscle the 69-year-old publisher and his 98-year-old mother, the co-owner. It was thuggish, more fitting for Russia and those who admire Russia than for a country whose First Amendment to its Constitution enshrines freedom of the press. That’s the United States, where the federal Privacy Protection Act of 1980 protects the flow of information to journalists, barring law enforcement, including local agencies, from searching for or seizing reporters’ product or documentary materials.

Evidence abounds here. Reporters watched their own office being raided. They made videotapes. This will be prosecuted.

Evidence exists of wrongdoing by justice officials claiming to uphold the law. Evidence exists of misuse of the justice system. And investigation into these actions will hold lawbreakers to account, if they broke the law. That is the American system of justice.

Contrast that with the accusations of former President Donald Trump and his constant drumbeat since the Mueller investigation started in May 2017. Fast forward to November 2020 or get current with the three federal indictments since spring and now the fourth criminal case in a Georgia county court.

Trump and his lawyers have plenty of documents – millions and millions of pages – they can claim as false evidence and say prosecutors and law enforcement officials are hounding them. To date, going all the way back to over 60 court cases claiming the 2020 election was stolen, they have not had a state or federal judge agree with any significant evidence they have brought forth.

Witch hunts are either true or false. Law and justice officials either have integrity or are corrupt. The press either does its job or it doesn’t. In each case, the proof is in the pudding – or in the actions of officials and staffs. Trump excels at presenting his case in the so-called court of public opinion. But there are neither judges nor jurors there that can exonerate him.

True patriots have the example of our Founding Fathers, who made a case against King George III as a tyrant. In the Declaration of Independence the king was called out for “a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these States. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world.”

Eric Meyer, the publisher of the Marion County Record, has plenty of facts that a witch hunt was executed against him. The Marion police chief will get his day in court to defend himself.

Trump has been defending himself for decades in various courts of law. His record is not good. Now he has four more chances to prove himself innocent. Let him present his facts before a candid world. If there are witches out there, they need to be exposed.

Note: The Marion County Record has a circulation of 4,000 and serves a county of about 11,000 people. It is a much better investigative newspaper than the present La Conner Weekly News, which has not pursued in-depth government records or closely examined actions or decisions of local staff or elected officials. — Ken Stern