Dear Editor:

We should all reject President Trump's Feb. 17th tweet that "The FAKE NEWS media (failing @nytimes, @NBCNews, @ABC, @CBS, @CNN) is not my enemy, it is the enemy of the American People!"

The free press is not the enemy of the American people. The free press is in fact the necessary watchdog for the people. Their role has been, as it should, be adversarial and critical to hold leaders feet to the fire.

While we all realize that it's not easy for someone in political office to hear criticism, I believe that virtually all office holders would agree that it's necessary to have thick skin. As former President Truman famously quipped "If you can't stand the heat get out of the kitchen." Surely some criticism will be valid and some less valid, but leaders need to endure it without broad-based attacks on the press.

Arizona Republican Senator John McCain, Armed Services Committee chairman and decorated veteran having endured an enemy prison camp for our country, said "If you want to preserve democracy as we know it, you have to have a free and, many times, adversarial press, and without it, I am afraid that we would lose so much of our individual liberties over time. That's how dictators get started."

If there is an enemy of the American people it is the attitude that the press should be disparaged if it is critical. Unfortunately President Trump's over-inflated ego cannot tolerate criticism, fair or not, but enduring that criticism is part of being president.

Most disturbingly, President Trump dismisses factual news as "fake" simply because it is critical, not because it's untrue, thus denying the objectivity of the press. Finally, with the president's propensity to invent easily disprovable facts to support himself he should be the last accuse the media of constructing "fake" facts — he does this all the time.

Jerry Topinka

Boothbay Harbor