Recent letters tell me I'm not alone in sometimes being irritated by the unjustified hubris of political zealots who write to your paper to rant about the current government and tell us what they would do instead.
But I'm pretty sanguine about this because, even when they accidentally stumble on something worth saying, they ruin it by calling the objects of their ire silly names. Currently chief among these is Cy Roberts, who seems to think his arguments are somehow strengthened by calling the Prime Minister "Gormless Gordon". Name-calling isn't a rational argument; it's the politics of the playground.
It's time to point out to Mr Roberts that, while he may think he's so much cleverer than those he tries to mock, he's just a chap who writes to a local paper – he never made it to Prime Minister and not just because he's "too honest".
The other feature of the letters from Mr Roberts and his ilk is continually to assert that everything they write is based on fact. Mr Roberts told us recently that "the £200 billion that the government has thrown into the UK's banking system has been used largely to fund shareholder's dividends and executives bonuses". I suspect he made that claim because he's got his millions muddled up with his billions and that he doesn't understand the need for banks to recapitalise after writing off the huge number of inexcusable bad debts they had incurred.
But, as he's a stickler for basing his assertions on facts, if he's got facts to support this claim would he please tell us, chapter and verse, with accompanying numbers, what they are? – David Norman, Longhope.