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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

President Obama bows to a Japanese robot, ASIMO, during a youth science event at the National Museum of Emerging Science and Innovation in Tokyo.

PRUDEN: Obama’s fishy Asian adventure

President Obama is in Asia, for those who remember him, and it hasn't been a great week for either his administration or his family. He might be tempted to stay there.

April 24, 2014
The Washington Redskins logo

PRUDEN: Putting the ‘pee’ In Portland

Portland, Ore., is a nice place to live. Nothing much happens there, and that's its charm. Oregon is perhaps the most politically correct of the 50 states, shading even Massachusetts, and Reservoir 5 of the Portland water system is a monument to the work of the weenie bureaucrat.

April 21, 2014
Russian President Vladimir Putin takes part in a televised call-in show with the nation in Moscow, Thursday, April 17, 2014. (AP Photo/RIA-Novosti, Alexei Nikolsky, Presidential Press Service)

PRUDEN: When a bored president just ‘mails it in’

Like it or not, the world is a dangerous place, and getting more so. None of the portents look good. Vladimir Putin not so subtly says, in ever louder voice, that he's in charge of events now, and the rest of the world should just get used to it.

April 17, 2014
** FILE ** Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (Associated Press)

PRUDEN: Loose-lipped politicians pay a debt to plain language

Sometimes the smartest among us should just shut up, and watch his language. Nobody gets the opportunity now, if he ever did, to take something back, to explain "context" or "clarify" what he was trying to say. It's all on somebody's tape.

April 14, 2014
FILE - In this March 15, 2013 file photo, dairy cows stand near a barn on a farm in Billings, Mo. Farmers expressed relief this week that a long fight over federal dairy subsidies had ended with an overhaul that most thought would be fair and effective in keeping farms from going under during hard times. The House approved compromise legislation Wednesday Jan. 29, 2014, and a Senate vote is expected soon. (AP Photo/The Springfield News-Leader, Nathan Papes, File)

PRUDEN: Flatulent cows and the global warming scare

Cows, like Rodney Dangerfield, don't get no respect. The White House wants to cut methane emissions from the dairy industry by 20 percent by the year 2020. The Environmental Protection Agency isn't sure how to do it, but we can be sure a new tax will come with the solution.

March 31, 2014
Chris McDaniel

PRUDEN: A test of the Republican old order

The old order changeth, and he who does not get out of the way risks getting runneth over. This applies to senators, baseball players, preachers, poachers, Volkswagen mechanics and anyone else who isn't paying attention.

March 20, 2014
** FILE ** Chris Matthew. (Photo by Frank Micelotta/Invsion/AP)

PRUDEN: Midterms favor GOP as Democrats flee Obama

Pretty soon the Republicans on the line in November will have to worry about peaking too soon. Democrats are up to their knees in a large slough of despond. All about seems only despair and dejection with no way out.

March 17, 2014
Alex Sink gets at a hug on stage from her daughter Lexi Crawford while delivering her concession speech, after being defeated by David Jolly for Florida's 13th Congressional District, at her watch party at the Hilton Carillon in St. Petersburg Tuesday evening March 11, 2014. On right is Lexi Crawford's husband Douglas Crawford.  (AP Photo/The Tampa Bay Times, Dirk Shadd)

PRUDEN: Sink sank own campaign in Florida special election

Alex Sink, who was the model for the Democratic congressional candidate of 2014, lost what was supposed to be a slam-dunk victory Tuesday in Florida. She got the slam, but not the dunk, and departs the arena leaving a valuable lesson for her party.

March 13, 2014
**FILE** German Chancellor Adolf Hitler (right) salutes a huge crowd July 31, 1938, at a sports meeting in Breslau, Germany. (Associated Press)

PRUDEN: Likening Putin to Hitler on Ukraine shows Hillary’s shaky grasp of history

Enough already with the Hitler talk. War drums and loose lips are giving the old Austrian paperhanger a bad name. Der fuehrer has held the franchise as "most evil figure in history," and now excitable politicians and pundits of little imagination are trying to take the title away by putting him in league with mere pikers.

March 6, 2014
Russian President Vladimir Putin, listens to Gen. Ivan Buvaltsev, right, as they observe a military exercise near St. Petersburg, Russia, Monday, March 3, 2014.  pro-Russian troops held all Ukrainian border posts Monday in Crimea, as well as all military facilities and a key ferry terminal, cementing their stranglehold on the strategic Ukrainian peninsula. (AP Photo/RIA-Novosti, Mikhail Klimentyev, Presidential Press Service)

PRUDEN: Playing the chicken in Kiev

America has become a paper tiger with cardboard teeth, and nobody knows this better than Vladimir Putin. Who can blame him? Some of Barack Obama's red lines are missing, and he can't remember where he put them.

March 3, 2014