The more things change, the more they stay the same

Neville Bartrum, of Oamaru, notes the similarities between  comments about United States President Donald Trump and early 20th century US newspaper magnate William Randolph Hearst.

This editorial was originally published by the New York Evening Post many years ago, about William Randolph Hearst (1862-1951), a rabid newspaper magnate:

''It is not simply that we revolt at Hearst's huge vulgarity; at his front of bronze; at his shocking unfitness mentally for the office he sets out to buy. All this goes without saying.

''There has never been a case of a man of such slender intellectual equipment, absolutely without experience in office, impudently flaunting his wealth before the eyes of the people and saying, 'Make me President'. This is folly. This is to degrade public life, for there is something darker and more fearful behind.

''It is well known that this man has a record which would make it impossible for him to live through a Presidential campaign - such gutters would be dragged, such sewers would be laid open...

''It is not a question of politics, but of character. An agitator we can endure; an honest radical we can respect; a fanatic we can tolerate; but a low voluptuary trying to sting his jaded senses to fresh thrill by turning from private to public corruption is a new horror in American politics ... ''

By substituting the name Trump for Hearst it is seen that nothing has changed in American politics in the last 100 years; even the editorials being recyclable.