Letters to the Editor
Published Letters: 96 Editor's Choice: 3
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It's not JUST his stance on the war
[Read the article: The war Lieberman didn't want]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Liberal or not -- most of us are repelled by the way Lieberman fawned on Bush, kissed up to him, cavilled and did everything but roll on his back like a little puppydog and pee all over himself in submission. Disgraceful, disgusting continuing display of a total lack of self-respect traded for being near the warm fire of power. He COULDN'T oppose the war because that would take standing up and showing some backbone. he's like that oild Saturday Night Live character -- Mr. Luebner, who was born without a spine. The real shame is his bio claims he was Freedom Riding for voting rights when younger. Oh -- and what's the business about being an orthodox Jew when he shaves? Feh.
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Colbert was Rude? And A Bully?
[Read the article: Cohen: Colbert was rude, and his defenders are dangerous]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Cohen also called him a bully -- as if a lone comic who is seen on basic cable standing 10 feet from the commander-in-chief (a noteworthy bully himself) -- a man who gives disparaging nicknames to people the better to belittle them -- a classic playground bullying tactic -- as if Mr Colbert was bullying Bush by delineating some of the fine points that have resulted in thousands and thousands and thousands dead and maimed and psychologically destroyed while -- my how coincidentally! -- friends of Bush and Bush's dad -- get obscenely rich from those same events.
Upton Sinclair had something to say about people like Rich Cohen:
"It is difficult to get a man to understand something
when his salary depends upon his not understanding it."
Is it (and should it be) such a surprise to a national columnist that there's a tremendous amount of anger out here about Bush and his doings. And did Mr Cohen overlook the fact that tremendous anger drove Nixon from office in disgrace (many of whose cronies were the same ones here again, a political reality written more by William Burroughs (Nova Express) than Alex de Toqueville.
Perhaps this time around, our anger will prompt us to regain some respect in the world by turning the whole pack over to the world court to be tried for crimes against humanity.
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Partial B.S Abortion
[Read the article: Partial-B.S. abortion ban]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]You're right there, pointing out that the "are you still beating your wife" type label was invented to demonize the late term abortion procodures -- BUT -- it's an uphill battle to change the use of the term "CONSERVATIVE" to what it really is -- "Right Wing Theocrats" --
Barry Goldwater was conservative and he thought it was contrary to everything America stands for to object to any woman's right to choose her own reproductive status ... "conservative" meaning "We do not ineterfere with people's lives unless they interfere with interstate commerce."
So please -- "CONSERVATIVE" means you can smoke, drink, read, watch, and control your own body (and those of others who say it's ok) any way you want to, whether I like that or would want to do that for my own life. Anti-Choice, Anti-drug, anti-porn, etc are all RELIGIOUS DICTATORSHIP -- the product of the Descendants of the Cromwellians the English were smart enough to throw the hell out of their country, and who ended up on our Mid-Atlantic shores.
Of course, John Wilmot, the Odious Earl of Rochester put the issue this way: "Any person who would call things by their rightful name will surely be hanged."
Or Voltaire: "It is dangerous t obe right when the government is wrong."
But my favorite was fromCharles Bukowski who said: "Wars, politics, causes -- for thousands of years we've ended up with a sack of shit -- it's time we learned to think."
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Nancy Pelosi will get it done
[Read the article: Curtains for Pelosi?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]It doesn't make sense for the GOP to eschew Nancy Pelosi
Seems to me, a Speaker of the House who not only has no night sweats about gays, but actually regards Gay men and women as -- gasp! -- human beings, Americans, citizens, actual people -- well, given what we've been learning about the overly-macho Republican men, seems to me, they'd want someone like Ms Nancy running things ...
UNLESS ...
depending on how many (if not all) are closeted self-hating men who -- straight or gay or just asexual greedheads who get their chubbies from a balance sheet -- are in serious denial about their anxieties and fears about their own sexuality -- the fact that Ms Pelosi is (along with Ms Boxer, Ms Lee, and even Ms Di-Di) a GYNO-AMERICAN might be what they find so offensive.
The fact is San Francisco is not a particularly "liberal" city ... it is, more or less, what it always has been, a conservative city which accepts all varieties of human beings as being equally valid.
(Conservative as in "Let's make sure the sewers are working, the potholes filled in, and then you live your life and I'll live mine without any interference from such scum as politicians tend to be.")
As to her getting the job done -- talking to someone who is not a particular fan of Nancy Pelosi per se, I pointed out that, in a bar fight, if I had my choice, I would take Nancy Pelosi and Barbara Boxer over Bush and Rumsfeld, even Bush and the extra-terrestrial Cheney -- any time.
Ms Pelosi is tough enough to stand up and play give-and-take with what they believe to be right, unlike craven hidey-hole cowards like Bush and Cheney and Rove who issue "no disagreement tolerated" edicts from "undisclosed locations."