The Oval Office Spectacle Wasn’t Great TV

Your March 1 editorial “

Putin Wins an Oval Office Spectacle” led to some personal reflection. As a Cuban-born, naturalized American citizen, I clearly remember the pride I felt as a teenager watching on live television the 1969 Apollo moon landing. “We beat the Russians,” my teenage self thought. How can it be that nearly 56 years later I can go from harboring deep pride—from watching Armstrong walking on the moon to hearing Reagan’s truthful words regarding Russian tyranny—to deep shame, as I watched the president and vice president bully an ally? Donald Trump says the showing was “great television.” He’s wrong. The lunar landing was great TV and the Friday press-conference blowup, a win for Vladimir Putin’s Russia.

Clara Martinez Haynes