The St. Louis Chess Club on the Beeb
Sunday, May 8, 2016 at 11:49PM
Dennis Monokroussos in Rex Sinquefield, St. Louis Chess Club

Here, with a hat tip to Marc Beishon. The part about the St. Louis Chess Club begins around 16:48 and is a decent piece, aside from a few comments that make Rex Sinquefield seem a shadowy political figure with questionable motives. (Called by some a "tyrannosaurus rex"..."he pushes a radical free market agenda.")

The comments about Sinquefield's political preferences are entirely irrelevant to the club and to his philanthropy, and while he may be the biggest donor in Missouri individuals like George Soros have give far more money to left-wing causes. (Not to mention other primarily left-wing donors like Tom Steyer, Warren Buffett, Michael Bloomberg and many more.) As Sinquefield's donations aren't to groups like the Ku Klux Klan, but to ordinary conservative policies and candidates well within the range of mainstream political options in the United States, it's hard to see how this is relevant to the story. It's likely that some of the chess organizations on the East coast are supported by people and have board members who have given money to causes conservatives would find objectionable. So what? If the lefties don't insinuate their politics into the chess organization, there's no reason why conservatives or reporters doing stories on those organizations should do so either. The same should go when the story is about someone who happens to be a conservative in the U.S. - but often doesn't.

Unnecessary political jibes aside, the piece does a nice job of giving those who haven't visited the St. Louis club and its environs a sense of the place and its atmosphere.

Article originally appeared on The Chess Mind (http://www.thechessmind.net/).
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