Charley Reese
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Charley Reese (born January 29, 1937) is a syndicated columnist known for his plainspoken manner and paleoconservative views. He was associated with the Orlando Sentinel from 1971-2001, both as a writer and in various editorial capacities. King Features Syndicate distributes his column, which comes out three times each week.
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[edit] Early years
Charley Reese was born in Washington, Georgia, and was raised in Georgia, East Texas, and the Florida Panhandle. He worked summer and weekend jobs starting at age 11 and at age 13 became a janitor in a printing shop. In 1955 he started out in the newspaper business with a job as a cub reporter for Pensacola News. Later that year, he bought a one-way ticket to England, where he took a job as caption writer with Planet Newspapers Ltd. in London.
In 1957 Reese returned to America and served two years in the US Army as a tank gunner. He then went back to reporting before spending six years in advertising and public relations, even working as an advance man and speechwriter in various political campaigns from 1969 to 1971.
In 1971 Reese signed on to the Sentinel Star in Orlando as assistant metro editor, beginning his long association with the Orlando Sentinel.
[edit] Political views and affiliations
Charley Reese is a conservative, with many libertarian views, but has written explaining why he is not a libertarian [1] and has been critical of the existence of third parties.[citation needed] Nonetheless he contributes regularly to libertarian websites such as LewRockwell.com and Antiwar.com. He is currently a registered Democrat, but has been previously a Republican as well. In his Dec. 26, 2005 column he writes he was a Democrat but went Republican after JFK got in office; he thought JFK was a lousy president. After the presidency of George H. W. Bush (1989-1993), he returned to the Democratic Party.
Although he disavows the term, saying "I am a traditional conservative, not a neo- or paleo- or any of those other buglike classifications" [2], Charley Reese's views are quite similar to those expressed by paleoconservatives. He is a member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans and in the past has been a member of the League of the South.[citation needed] Defending the South's position in the Civil War is a common theme of his writings,[3] in which he frequently uses Confederate anecdotes as illustrations. His writings have repeatedly praised Robert E. Lee and vilified Abraham Lincoln. He is also a member of the National Rifle Association, and another recurring theme in his columns is a defence of American's Second Amendment rights against gun control. In recent years he has devoted many of his columns to defending a non-interventionist foreign policy. [4] Although he supported George W. Bush for President in 2000, he has been an outspoken critic of the Bush administration and an opponent of the War in Iraq. In 2004 he supported John Kerry's presidential campaign.
He writes for the Washington Report on Middle Eastern Affairs.
[edit] Quotes
"But regardless of whose fault it is, most politicians today are not human beings. You want to pry open their mouths and shout into the darkness, 'Hello! Is there a human being in there?' Buried under all that lust for office, all that fear of offending a contributor? I know there must be." ("Conservative Chronicle", 8 September 1993, p. 17)
[edit] Books
- Great Gods of the Potomac (1978)
- Common Sense for the 80's (1981)
[edit] References
Biographical pages in Great Gods of the Potomac and Common Sense for the 80's
