It has been said, "In a democracy, people get the leaders they deserve." 

Presidential candidate Donald Trump has garnered 24/7 news coverage by childish name calling designed to usurp the weak unlettered minds of the most bigoted in our society. In turn, 24-hour news, ever conscious of ratings, endlessly pumps his diatribe distracting the rest of the nation from the serious issues of our time. Trump feeds the media circus entertainment as outlandishly as any clown and will continue to do so as long as he receives free campaign coverage. And, it's working! Are the rest of the people at fault for bringing rise to this demagogue or has cable news allowed him a national platform unprecedented in American history? 

Gone are the days when news was dedicated to journalistic standards that kept us informed not necessarily entertained. Walter Cronkite once said, "We are not educated well enough to perform the necessary act of intelligently selecting our leaders" and that's when much of the hard-working population was educated by a responsible evening news! In today's cable news cycle, the goal has shifted to entertainment to increase ratings at any cost. Certainly this shift has provided fertile ground for a bombastic bully like Trump. Are we watching pre-World War II history repeating itself? 

If citizens continue to allow themselves to fall prey to Trump's Mussolini-style rhetoric sponsored by a soulless media, they will surely find themselves "getting the leader they deserve." 

Richard Grimaldi

Groton Long Point