Cuebacca,
Yes, I read your entire post.

And thank you for taking the time to write it.
I have to disagree on your claim of a lack of ad hominem style posts. Pretty much the direction of this thread is "EW is a poopyhead! Give him bad rep!" You don't get much more ad hominem-y than that.
Granted, a portion of the folks piling on with the red rep for EW are doing it because they don't like his business practices, at least as far as his transaction with Charlie went. (One must ponder, however, how EW would have gotten as much green rep as he had if his transaction with Charlie was the norm for him.)
But - there are two, count'em, two people posting here who have a dog in this hunt - Charlie and EW. Nobody else. Not you, not me.
As far as the transaction in question, I do agree - it didn't go well. I'm not arguing that in the least bit. EW goofed. He took way too long to get the cue to Charlie; and he delivered shafts that were not built as requested. B
ut to his credit, he's tried to make somewhat good on it - even offering a whole new cue, on his dime - which, as several posters have giddily pointed out (i.e posting about EW's private financial/legal issues), is pretty thin. But that offer was refused by Charlie (as is his right), but lots of other people have dogpiled in as well - again, people with no dog in the hunt.
And I have to think to myself - a FREE CUE. That's a freakin' DEAL! Especially considering Charlie himself has posted several times, that the cue he (eventually) received from EW "hits great" despite the length issues.
And all this distress over a piece of wood? All this noise, all this emotion, hate, bile? C'mon, people.
How many threads have we had on this forum about "what's wrong with pool" and "why isn't pool more mainstream" etc.? THIS thread is why.