Greensboro News & Record editorial writer Steven Doyle–who replaced the laid-off Doug Clark–started off his regular Wednesday columns all nice and flowery–introducing himself as a humble farm boy and regaling us with the story of how he “flipped” for Greensboro–literally–in a car accident that left him hanging from his seatbelt.

Needless to say I was hoping for the best–not that I expected Doyle to keep dishing out humble old shoe yarns. Yet somehow I din’t expect him to be such a nasty partisan liberal, either. Last week he teed off on Sean Hannity once again lamenting the demise of the Fairness Doctrine “that opened broadcast’s basket of writhing ideology.”

This week’s column starts out well enough– a tribute to James Shaw Jr., the hero who took down the psycho who killed four people in a Nashville Waffle House before he do more damage.

Shaw is indeed a hero and worthy of accolade. But then Doyle drops the shoe:

Eschewing the limelight though Shaw may be, the silence from President Trump, a man who values star turns and big performances, is curious. Why wouldn’t an authentic American hero be praised for saving lives and avoiding a deeper scar for America’s gun-riddled psyche? Didn’t Shaw prevent another Dylann Roof without the religious overtures?

I fear the answer to that lies in those old Western movies that I loved.

The heroes in those days had two things in common: They wore white hats over white skin.

James Shaw Jr. did not.

What a cheap shot. Earth to Mr. Doyle—you’re the one inserting race into Mr. Shaw’s heroic act, so you’re the one coming off as small and petty. I guess you don’t see that, any more than you see why nobody wants to read your newspaper anymore.