Blog reactions and this: "Some very fine people on both sides"

      Don't often follow a blog piece with reactions to a previous one. This will be an exception.
      One reason: I failed to include President Trump's "some very fine people on both sides" remark regarding the white supremacists vs. anti-protesters aftermath of Charlottesville last week.
      Please. I have never seen "fine people" among the present-day Nazis, KKK, white supremacists, alt-right.
      If you watched the behind-the-scenes VICE News video of the Friday night march in Charlottesville -- the torch-bearing, chanting and, frankly, Jew-baiting crowd -- and heard the rhetoric from David Duke and all his pathetic buddies, there is nothing and no one "fine" about it.
      Every interview we have seen with "leaders" of these groups ... and they are disgustingly racist/anti-Semitic, and darned happy about it -- and the President's statements.
      No "both sides" to it, period.   
      Sure, one side has some who could be violent, and might be ready for physical attack. The other side is totally prepared for violence. All you have to do is listen to the trash talk.      
      Cannot defend the President, and Vice-President, and our U.S. representative, Kay Granger of Fort Worth, Texas, and others who give these people an "out" or put them on an equal basis. That is an unforgivable error.
      It is, as I said previously, above politics. It is about decency and morality. (Not trying to preach; I have my faults.)
      No way to blame this on the "alt left" or the media. Too much of a throwback to Nazi Germany and the hooded, KKK night riders.
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      Now, about the reactions ...
      One is from the daughter of a man I regarded as one of the top two sportswriters ever to work in Louisiana. The other is from a superior athlete of his time. I thought both reactions were strong enough and detailed enough to share.
        John Walter "Jack" Fiser was sports editor/lead sports columnist for The Shreveport Times for a decade (1951-61); I described him in a blog a couple of years as a "erudite, brilliant writer." He was years ahead of his time, and my opinion, the only one in Louisiana in his sportswriting class was Peter Finney (in New Orleans). Ego and self-promotion were not part of their personalities.
      Fiser's columns and game stories -- especially on LSU football and the Shreveport Sports, but really on any subject he chose -- were gems, pieces of craftwork. He made a reader think; he could be critical, yes, but with a deft touch.
      Jack Fiser's column was a "must-read" in a time when The Times circulation was wide, through north and central Louisiana, into east Texas and southern Arkansas.
      Too young for the Fiser writing era, the hours I spent researching sports history of those years were made much longer because I always stopped to read, and appreciate,  what he wrote.
      Full disclosure: Mr. Fiser was sports information director at Louisiana Tech in 1966-67; I was his student assistant, my sophomore year at Tech. He moved to Baton Rouge after that year and wound up at LSU's Alumni House as a writer/researcher (my sister, as a student, worked for him there).

Mr. and Mrs. Fiser

        He was calm and soft-spoken, measured, highly intelligent, well-read, respected and respectful. In so many ways, he was like Tech legendary athletic director-football coach Joe Aillet; he and Mrs. Fiser were close friends with the Aillets. He also was very friendly with Pete Dosher -- his predecessor as Tech SID and my first mentor there -- and Mary Dosher.
      Mr. Fiser's daughter Joan, who in 1966-67 was a cute high school junior (Byrd, in Shreveport), now lives in the San Jose/Silicon Valley area, married and a mother -- and a Facebook friend.
      Here is the note she sent me after the previous blog:
      "What's been happening in our country is alarming and those of us who are appalled by it must speak out. This year I've often thought of my dad, who as you were probably aware, Nico, was politically conservative. I doubt seriously that he ever considered voting for a Democrat, but I know he would not have liked or voted for our current president because of Trump's ignorance, ineptitude, dishonesty, boastfulness and so many other qualities that Jack Fiser abhorred.
      "As a former Marine who dropped out of LSU to fight fascism (later returning to graduate), he would have been upset by the current rise of anti-Semitism and white nationalism. My father would have found Trump's admiration for Putin unthinkable.
      "What we are witnessing is shocking and, at times, frightening, and we can't remain quiet about it. Hopefully, at some point not too far in the future, we will return to the kind of society that most of us grew up in and value -- one in which people can have differing political views and values but still coexist amicably and work together. We should never make the mistake of taking our democracy and way of life for granted."
      Joan adds, "One point I wanted to make was that as far apart as Dad and I were politically on certain issues (like foreign policy), I always respected him as a principled, intelligent person. I knew that we shared very clear values about what's really important in life and how people should be treated.
      "What became obvious in the presidential campaign and since the election is that something has happened to the shared value system that so many of us took for granted. During the campaign it was acceptable to insult other candidates in a vulgar way, which would have been unthinkable before.
       "Now, some people don't seem to have a problem with neo-Nazis marching in the streets shouting, 'Jews will not replace us' or running over counter protestors. This is not the society I grew up in or want for my daughter and her future children."
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       I am not going to name the person who offered the second reaction I am sharing. But I will say that it surprised me to an extent. Here it is ...
       "[I] did not intend to go deep into the Trump issue but rather wanted to thank you for making me stop and think and reflect and do some soul-searching. When this latest Trump issue came about, I thought 'here we go again,' and then tried not to get emotionally tied to it as I have too many issues in my own life to deal with. But it wouldn't go away ... and it won't.
       "I think this is the beginning of the end for Mr. Trump -- resign or get impeached, but either way for the good of this country he must go. That is how I truly feel.
       "Your assessment of Trump and the trainwreck his presidency is 100 percent correct. I agree totally with what you said in your blog. Thank you."
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       One more personal remembrance from Joan Fiser, dating to early 1968:
        "I remember your parents, whom I met at a Tech basketball game. As you know, your mother was one of those people who touched people's lives. I still remember her face as she explained the number on her arm. That is a story I shared with hundreds of students over the years when the subject of the Holocaust came up. Hopefully that story will never be forgotten."