Letters to the Editor
MAV in Florida
Published Letters: 309 Editor's Choice: 22
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Bush helping at a house fire? LMAO!
[Read the article: Peggy Noonan is a serious "grown-up"]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Come ON Peggy, you're trying to project a common-man he-man response onto teh former cheerleader who, told that the United States was under attack, sat and pouted, holding a children's book as it letting go of it would totally cut him loose from anything. A year or two ago a reporter looked up some of the kids who were in that classroom and asked them what they thought of Mr. Average Brush-Clearing Guy. Their answers included such insights as "I thought he was going to cry" and "I thouight he had to go to the bathroom."
I've got news for ya, Peggy: Bush HAD his chance to help out at a disaster involving a burning building...in fact, several very large burning buildings. He did not have a clue what to do next, other than be ushered away to The Hole at Offut Air Force Base in Nebraska.
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Thanks, El Cid, I'm just amazed nobody else said it yet....
[Read the article: Peggy Noonan is a serious "grown-up"]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Although I did get a chortle out of another poster's descriving Bush trying to "help" at a fire.
The whole macho-man image of Bush is as phony as that of the Village People. Here's a guy who, asked by reporters about his relationship with "Kenny Boy" Lay, responded by running out of the room. And how can we forget that time in China when he tried the same he-man answer of running away, but was stymied by a locked door!
I spent a few years in the news racket and learned that on political stories at least, "conventional wisom" by editors overrules what reporters out on their beats see - they're told to go out and get this story, and if they come back and say "That's not what's happening, it's all different!" they're told they are showing "a bad attitude." So I can see some reporter coming back to a newsroom after realizing that Bush shows himself to be an Ivy League wanker, and being told by the cloistered editors "No, he's a real authentic he-man! Write it that way!"
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@ Jim White, re: the truck balls
[Read the article: Peggy Noonan is a serious "grown-up"]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Y'know, I have thought about buying some of those things and mailing them to some of our Congressional representatives, hoping it will help. Or maybe a plastic spinal column from the Anatomical Supply Company.
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"I respect the arguments of those who disagree but they ought to have the courage of their convictions and move out of a country whose safety results from the effecting of these policies they find so abhorent."
[Read the article: Who would Antonin Scalia torture?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]In other words, it's OK in America to speak out against torture (or chattel slavery, or child labor, or lynching, or other abhorrent policies) as long as you immediately pack your bags and move out of the country.
Considering the amount of invective and verbal abuse thrown at people who dissent, I'd have to say that the ones who don't speak up, and who go along with the sentiments of the mob favoring torture, are the ones being "sissy." The people who speak out in the past seven years have shown a lot of courage.
Jeeze, I'm way off my original topic: I was actually going to weigh in as the guy who is willing to support capital punishment for a limited range of crimes, such as murder by a prisoner who is al;ready serving life. But the chest-thumping "kill `em all, it's easy!" sentiments that come from some people make me look like some kind of hippie!
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"those who object to letting the military do it's job ought to leave" -- SaltyPappy
[Read the article: Who would Antonin Scalia torture?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Does that include military veterans such as myself who tried our damndest to make sure the troops had enough discipline that they did not abuse prisoners? Those who knew that the duty of a soldier is to sometimes call out his superiors when they are the ones who break the regs? Those who believed in an Army that stood for freedom, and not one that tolerated mindless brutality?
By the way, speaking of lefties, did you know that Bill Mauldin and Douglas MacArthur were members of the American Cibvil Liberties Union? I guess they should have left the country too, huh?
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Getting back to capital punishment, which was where we started.....
[Read the article: Who would Antonin Scalia torture?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I'll concede that execution is not a deterrent -- I remember an old fellow who had witnessed 116 executions in the Florida electric chair who told me "Everybody knows it's not a deterrent!" But I would argue that it can be justified in the case of a prisoner already sentenced to life, or one who escapes from a maximum-security institution, who then commits muredr. The dilemma of a life prisoner who murders another inmate over, say, who gets the last bread roll is that if you cannot execute this person, he has effectively gotten away with murder. Other murders may be abhorrent, but it's just too messy to try to mete out maximum punsihement to everybody who mitght deserve it. A few years back I got dismiessed from jury duty when an overreaching prosecutor asked if I thought every murder should be punished by execution. I pointed out the state has hundreds of murders a year, and at that point I was out of there.
Mention of innocent people being convicted: maybe the bigest problem is not the existence of capital punishment (and certainly now what method is used), it's the existence of an arcane legal system built of a patchwork of old traditions, pomposity, stupid precedents and tangled customs, all designed to facilitate an elite debating society for a priveleged few lawyers rather than a rational search for the truth for the public good. Getting rid of the "winner take all" speechifying contrests that now substitute for justice would probably be a much better step. But do we think the Supreme Court, and legislatures that are packed with lawyers, would ever let THAT see the light of day?