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Wesley Pruden

Wesley Pruden

wpruden@washingtontimes.com

Wesley Pruden would have wanted to spend his final hours at his keyboard, deftly deflating the pompous, entitled and arrogant of the political establishment, and he came awfully close. The venerable Washington Times editor, columnist and journalism institution was found dead July 17, 2019, at his home, after putting in a full day at the newsroom on New York Avenue in Northeast D.C., where he had worked since 1982, four months after the newspaper's founding. He was 83.
His remarkable career began 67 years ago as a teenage copy boy in Arkansas, making him among the few old-school newsmen whose sharp political acumen, elegant writing style, and keen sense of the absurd allowed him to remain as relevant in the digital age as he was in the days when the rumpled shirts of reporters were splattered with ink.
To read his obituary, please CLICK HERE

Articles by Wesley Pruden

Martin Luther King Jr. (Associated Press) ** FILE **

WESLEY PRUDEN: Remembering Martin Luther King

Transforming a man of flesh and blood — warts, moles, scars and all — into a man of cold marble enables lesser men to think they can make of him what they want. The real man disappears under the sculptor's chisel. There are marble men all over Washington, their humanity buried under the patina of the years we cannot truly understand.

January 18, 2016
U.S. sailors in the custody of Iranian naval forces. (Associated Press) ** FILE **

WESLEY PRUDEN: Befuddled Obama without a clue

Every president is entitled to the confidence of the nation that he means well. That includes Barack Obama, even when he retreats to his other home in a universe far, far away. He just doesn't understand what's going on here on Planet Earth, where the rest of us live. Meaning well is not enough.

January 14, 2016
"While I was proud of our candidates and the way they handled tonight's debate, the performance by the CNBC moderators was extremely disappointing and did a disservice to their network, our candidates, and voters," RNC Chairman Reince Priebus said in a statement. (Associated Press)

WESLEY PRUDEN: The evolution of the Grand Old Party

The Republican elites who only weeks ago played a game of "can you top this?" to see who could come up with the meanest put-downs of Donald Trump, are one by one quitting that game. It's time to hedge bets. Nobody any longer promises to retire to Timbuktu if the Donald is the nominee.

January 11, 2016
Clinton/Clinton 2016? Hillary Clinton admits she has mulled the possibility of including husband Bill Clinton on a presidential ticket. (Associated Press)

WESLEY PRUDEN: Clintons’ past catches up to them

Compassionate conservatives, should in the fading spirit of the season just past, spare a tear or two for Bonnie and Clod. They look out on the world of cash and celebrity they created for themselves, and the thrill is gone. The past is gaining on them and the future suddenly doesn't look a lot better.

January 7, 2016
Justice Antonin Scalia. (Associated Press) ** FILE **

WESLEY PRUDEN: Antonin Scalia angry for all good reasons

Antonin Scalia is a Supreme Court justice for grown-ups. This irritates the child-like who think the law and the courts are places to take their wish lists, dreams of a summer night and cherished fantasies. Justice Scalia is their Scrooge for all seasons.

January 4, 2016
Democratic presidential front-runner Hillary Clinton may have an asset or liability in her husband, former President Bill Clinton. (Associated Press)

WESLEY PRUDEN: Hillary and Bill back on the campaign trail

Ol' Bubba is the gift that keeps on giving. Just when he thought it was safe to hit the road again, Hillary reminds a new generation of voters why wise and prudent men lock up their wives and daughters when Bubba's in the neighborhood.

December 31, 2015
Winston Churchill (Associated Press)

WESLEY PRUDEN: Surviving the season of the sophomores

The year 2015 will be remembered as the season of the sophomores. With their new learning, sophomores can correct all error, make all rough places plain, and fix everything that isn't working right.

December 21, 2015
Jeh Johnson (Associated Press)

WESLEY PRUDEN: Obama’s deadly dereliction of duty at the top

Franklin D. Roosevelt told a frightened nation on the eve of World War II that "we have nothing to fear but fear itself," and it was a message everyone understood. Fear paralyzes even the strong. The United States had a war to win, and paralysis doesn't win wars.

December 17, 2015
President Obama mostly watched as the Islamic State, defeated by U.S. forces in 2009, reassembled the old al Qaeda in Iraq leadership apparatus across the border amid the turmoil of the Syrian civil war. (Associated Press)

WESLEY PRUDEN: President Obama lets a tragedy go to waste

Barack Obama can't help being who he is. He knows the words but he doesn't hear the music of America. Some of us hear it, and some of us don't. Mr. Obama doesn't want to be a wartime leader -- Washington at Valley Forge, Lincoln at Fort Sumter, Roosevelt at Pearl Harbor -- but there he is, like it or not. Everyone, friend and foe, knows he doesn't like it, and that makes him a leader who can't lead.

December 7, 2015
Robert E. Lee. (Associated Press)

WESLEY PRUDEN: The showboating student, hard at work

There is much to do for the student with awakened conscience. Scrubbing out the moral stains on America, to make the grove of academe the bright spot of the fruited plain, is a job bigger than anyone first imagined.

November 30, 2015
George H. W. Bush   Associated Press photo

WESLEY PRUDEN: Obama weak, confused and ‘unable to grasp’

Many bad things happen when a leader is weak, confused and forever in search of a credible reason to do nothing. For all his softness on Islam, Barack Obama has little insight into the men who send out mobs to cry "death to America." He can't imagine that men can listen to the call to evening Muslim prayer, which so captivated him as a boy growing up in Indonesia -- "the prettiest sound on Earth" -- and be inspired to dream of bringing down death on America.

November 26, 2015
Former President George W. Bush speaks at the George W. Bush Institute at Southern Methodist University in Dallas on Feb. 19, 2014. (Associated Press) **FILE**

WESLEY PRUDEN: How Obama cooks the terrorism numbers

Barack Obama has given an eloquent testimony to a Christian faith, but his sympathies are always with Islam. He insisted from Asia that "99.9 percent of Muslims worldwide reject terrorism," and that's good news, if true. But it clearly is not.

November 23, 2015
Alfred E. Neuman. (Associated Press)

WESLEY PRUDEN: Paris outrage recede

A president in trouble can always try to change the subject, and often succeeds. It's one of the most coveted perks of office, and Barack Obama knows it well.

November 19, 2015
French President Francois Hollande. (Associated Press)

WESLEY PRUDEN: Obama’s Islamic State failure

Everyone agrees that someone must lead the West against radical Islam, but who? Once upon a time, when crisis and fear of the unknown was abroad in the land, everyone looked to the president of the United States, confident that he would take charge and call down the lightning that won two world wars.

November 16, 2015