Amarillo A-hole of the Week -- Max Hudson

In Hudson's recent letter to the editor, he unleashes a muddled and sarcastic attempt to restore some semblance of competence to the utterly incompetent Dubyah presidency. He implies that Bush has been unfairly blamed for problems he had no hand in creating. He then lists several instances of unfair Bush bashing, most of which are clearly ridiculous. He lists none of (and indeed may have mentally equivocated away) the bad decisions Bush made that ended in disastrous consequences for our nation. In a pattern of fallacious and vindictive misdirection, Hudson rants nastily only to indict any who would dare suggest Bush's incompetence.

I wouldn't normally nominate a Republican for mere vague misdirection, an inability to discern fantasy from reality, or the failure to provide solid research to back one's arguement as Amarillo A-hole of the week. But in Hudson's case, he not only does all three regularly, he is also employed as an educational consultant for Region 16. This is a man who has been given the task of devising ways for teachers to do their jobs more competently, and yet he cannot even devise a well supported arguement himself.

Take for example his guest column regarding the "Click it or Ticket" campaign devised by Texas law enforcement leaders to promote seat belt use. He argues in the column that "Click it or Ticket" was a means to earn state revenue and had nothing to do with safety. His flaw in logic appears when he offers up statistics related to highway deaths, stating that around half of those dying behind the wheel were wearing safety belts. While I've no doubt his numbers are accurate, he leaves out the more vital statistic showing that mandantory safety belt use has effectively reduced highway deaths overall. Is he purposefully deleting this more important statistic or being disingenuous by removing the more pertinent facts because they don't support his arguement? It's hard to say but fallacious misuse of facts does seem to be a pattern with Hudson.

For example, in a letter to the editor from Jan of 2005 titled "Sharp eye needed for pertinent perjury info" Hudson defends Tulia bad-cop Tom Coleman, implying that Coleman's only real offense was the theft of some gasoline. This letter was written (Jan 2005)nearly two years after Coleman was convicted of perjury for sending several innocent people to jail. Again was Hudson simply lazy in his research or purposefully misdirecting the truth knowing that a few locals would be duped by his vague accusations.

It is hard to know for sure in Hudson's case if he is truly dishonest, or merely blindly opportunistic in his desire to spin truth to fit his personal opinions. However, the examples I've listed, and others I found in the Globe News records, provided me ample evidence to declare Max Hudson Amarillo A-hole of the week.