Moyers, DuPuis and perseverance

In addition to all of my intellectually and morally superior kinfolk and friends who live there, I've always figured that Bill Moyers offers good proof that good things can come out of Texas --- even the Baptist church (he was ordained in 1954). Plus he has consistently been taken to task by those on the right for his perceived attacks on conservatives and Republicans. My kind of guy.

So I was interested in his take on the National Rifle Association, expressed here in a five-minute clip, in the aftermath of the Aurora shootings. "Enabler of death," he calls the organization. "Paranoid, delusional, venomous."

There have been several calls this week to reinstitute restrictions on assault rifles and other weapons of mass destruction. Not likely to happen, of course, thanks to the lies and distortions of the NRA and like-minded admirers and their enablers, including politicians intent on re-election or election (including the incumbent president).

Few, including Moyers I suspect, want to wrestle guns, as the NRA contends, out of the hands of sportspeople, hobbyists and those with some apparent need to self-protect. But assault rifles, Glocks, 6,000 rounds of ammunition?

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The other encouraging thing about Moyers is that he's still going strong at age 78 --- and that's a positive thing whether one agrees with his politics or not.

Another grand old road warrior, Ruth DePuis, died over the weekend in Mason City at age 93.

I met Ruth more than 30 years ago when she was director of community relations at North Iowa Area Community College and was making the rounds of newspapers and other media in North Iowa looking for feedback on those news releases her office mailed out (no e-mail then) every week.

After retirement, she became a free-lance writer --- not because she exactly needed the money but because she needed to be doing. Her countless articles appeared in newspapers I worked for plus such then-influential publications as The Des Moines Register, Minneapolis Star Tribune and, on lighter topics, The Iowan Magazine.

And she was still reporting and writing as 90 approached. Way to go!