John Minck of California is one of many who wrote to thank us for telling the truth about the danger of Donald Trump, but he took the extra step of sending this tongue-in-cheek certificate.

Maybe there’s some hope for this wobbly republic yet.

That’s my takeaway from the overwhelming response to a column I wrote last week about why we will continue reporting as fact the threat Donald Trump presents to our democracy.

Overwhelming hardly covers it. In a normal week, this column is emailed to more than 200,000 people and published on our website, cleveland.com, where a few thousand to maybe 15,000 people read it. In response, I usually receive a few dozen to more than 100 emails.

This column went everywhere. I could see countless people forwarding the emailed version all over the place. The website version was viewed 300,000 times. And people republished it on social media repeatedly. The buzz about it caught the attention of Nicolle Wallace on MSNBC, who spoke to me about it Tuesday, and CNN’s Kasie Hunt, who interviewed me early Monday. The team on MSNBC’s Morning Joe also discussed it, reading much of it aloud.

I’ve received more than 2,700 emails and counting, with more than 90 percent offering thanks and kudos. They’ve come from across the globe – New Zealand, Croatia, Ireland, Spain – and from most of the 50 states. One writer after another after another championed our newsroom as a model for all. It’s quite humbling.

I’ve not experienced anything like this, and I want to understand what made this piece resonate as it did. Some told me they had tears in their eyes as they wrote, so grateful were they that someone said what we did. They told me they have ached for the media – the watchdog in our government – to stop treating Jan. 6 as something you can interpret in different ways.  Hundreds of people , many not in Ohio, paid for subscriptions to our website just to show support for our stance.

I have a couple or preliminary thoughts on why people shared this so widely, but I also realized early on that I’m not going to figure it out anytime soon. Rushing to enlightenment is futile. I’m in a riptide, and rather than struggle to understand it, I should let it roll. When the rush stops, I can head back to solid ground.

Based on the comments I’ve read so far (I’ll be reading the responses for at least another week, and you can find a sampling of excerpts here.) two points of the columns struck chords.

One was my reference to all those soldiers who died in combat in World War II – more than 291,000 – fighting the kind of regime Donald Trump wants to create on our soil. The sacrifice of those soldiers resonates. These were people who fought under the U.S. flag in foreign lands to guarantee that liberty prevailed over tyranny. So many of them were killed before they could know love, or raise children, or frolic with grandkids. Such selflessness.

I heard from many veterans on that theme, people who said Trump was the antithesis of why they joined the armed forces. I heard from the proud sons and daughters, grandsons and granddaughters of people who fought Adolf Hitler’s forces in Germany. They said they’re heartsick that the country their forebears fought for is so close to becoming what they fought against.

A few wrote to say that comparisons to 1930s Germany and Hitler are overwrought, but a lot more said such comparisons are directly on point and should be emphasized. They encouraged the media to remind Americans of how Hitler rose to power because of the many German leaders who enabled him. They compared those German leaders to the many members of Congress today who enable Trump by lying to voters --  portraying Jan. 6 as a trifling protest and denying it was an effort to destroy our democracy.

The other theme is about the United States itself. This country has always been a novel idea, where the power to govern emanates from the people, not a monarchy, dictatorship or the false democracy we see in Russia. It is imperfect and always will be, needing perpetual effort to protect and refine it.

But the people who wrote me know the United States is, at its heart, a good idea, one worth preserving.

And they know a former president tried to end it and wants to get back into office to complete the mission. That love of country pours forth from the notes people sent. So, when someone in my position put into simple words the thoughts they’ve been feeling, they were joyous, and they wanted me to know it. The column gave them hope that more of us care about saving this union than would tear it down.

I’m sure there’s more to why this piece touched people, but like I said, I need some time to consider it.

Thank you to everyone who wrote with so many kind words. I don’t feel I deserve them, but I’m glad that the column offered people hope. Thanks, too, to Kasie Hunt and Nicolle Wallace. They’re beloved figures, clearly, and their huge audiences carried the column far. Before my segment with her, Wallace moderated a conversation about Jan. 6 that made clear what happened that day. We need more people in the media like her. She’s a truth-teller.

Allow me to end with an amusing anecdote. I did the interview with Wallace in a corner of my living room where a framed vintage liquor advertisement hangs on the wall, depicting Ella Fitzgerald and Henry Mancini. My daughter gave me the ad, knowing I’m a big fan of Ella Fitzgerald. (You might recall our recently departed golden retriever’s name was Ella.)

Anyway, I heard from a guy who spotted that ad on my wall and told me he once was a drummer for Ella Fitzgerald and performed with her in Cleveland. And, he told me that Mancini’s 100th birthday on April 16 is being celebrated by the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Our entertainment staff has been working on a preview, so I got them in touch with the drumer, to recount his stories of Mancini.

Small world.

Thanks again to all who wrote.

I'm at cquinn@cleveland.com

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