Letters to the Editor
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Published Letters: 156 Editor's Choice: 10
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Let's not be too eager to start counting chickens
[Read the article: What you missed while watching "Rescue Me"]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I'm not smart or well-informed enough to make a prediction but I'm feeling reckless today and want to riff on an earlier poster's hope that someday being a Republican will be a social embarrassment.
I'll go farther and predict that within seven years, the Republican Party as we know it will cease to exist.
Be careful about saying things like that. That's pretty much what Tom DeLay and his supporters were saying about Texas Democrats (and what Rove's ambition was for Democrats nationally). But that sort of arrogant overreaching is largely what did them in.
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Agree with webcelt
[Read the article: Values voters rake the GOP over the coals]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]webcelt:
I had pretty much the same reaction to that story that you did. There's certainly more to it than was related in that narrative. No way did any nuns directly rescue an aborted fetus. Perhaps they persuaded (badgered?) the mother not to go through with a planned abortion and put up the baby for adoption. Perhaps, as you said, it was an abandoned baby. (Abandoned, perhaps, because of severe birth defects.) There are any number of possibilities, but there is definitely more to it than was told. (Isn't there always?)
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@ Baffled Canuck
[Read the article: All in a day's work]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]With the Democrats holding such a small majority in both houses, this looks like a recipe for nothing being done to change the situation in Iraq or Afghanistan :(
Unfortunately, that's about the size of it, since it appears that the Republicans are more interested in scoring points against the Democrats than they are in trying to do something for the country. The system wasn't intended to be efficient in the first place; 18th-century Americans distrusted a centralized government, and they therefore put a number of roadblocks in the way of getting things done, with the idea that only measures that had solid support throughout the country would be able to clear all the roadblocks. The system runs aground, though, when extreme partisanship trumps statesmanship.
The writers of the Constitution also assumed that Congress as an institution would work to preserve its prerogatives against encroachment from an overreaching executive. It hasn't worked that way in the last 6 years; Congress has been only too willing to yield up power to the president. That was especially true when Republicans were in charge of both houses, but the Democrats have done little more to push back against executive power grabs. That needs to change.
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@AKA Smith
[Read the article: This Modern World]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Yes! That was exactly the same reaction I had to that interview by Terri Gross -- Sparky has captured it exactly. "It's so obvious now that this guy has been full of bullshit all along." I wanted to throw something at the radio while I was listening to it.
I hope there's a special circle of hell reserved for Mr. Kissy-face.
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Google makes a keen observation...
[Read the article: Report: Bush said he'd invade Iraq no matter what]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Bush said, "Cuanto más me atacan los europeos tanto más fuerte soy en los Estados Unidos," which Google translated as, "The more they attack the European as much to me the more hard I am in the United States."
LOL!! I sort of like the psycho-sexual innuendo of the last part of Google's translation. I suspect that may not be far from the truth.
My high school Spanish is several decades removed from the present, but my take on that statement is along the lines of "The more the Europeans attack me, the stronger I am in the United States." In other words, Bush was saying that criticism of him in Europe had the effect of rallying US citizens in his defense, and in support of his cause.
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@Elephantman
[Read the article: Don't accuse them of being "fair and balanced"]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]"Democracy Now!" is not produced by NPR. Some NPR affiliate stations may carry it (it is also broadcast by Pacifica, community and college stations, public access TV, satellite television, Free Speech TV and others), but it is produced independently and funded entirely by contributions from listeners, viewers, and foundations. They do not accept contributions from governments.
Tavis Smiley left NPR in 2004, though he does have a late-night talk show on PBS and a weekly show on the PRI radio network.
Juan Williams is also a contributor to Fox News, and was quick to rush to the defense of Bill O'Reilly over the Sylvia's kerfuffle. Not to mention that he is the only person at NPR that Bush will consent to be interviewed by. (Anyone who has heard his interviews on NPR will not be surprised by that. He's the king of the softball question.) Williams is hardly leftist; he's definitely right of center. See http://mediamatters.org/columns/200710020005
Cokie Roberts is also hardly a leftist. Sure, her family is identified with the Democratic party, but they're Louisiana Democrats, and hardly from the left wing of the party. Cokie herself appears to be center, or even center right. See, for example http://mediamatters.org/items/200608060002 where she predicts disaster for the Democratic party if Connecticut Democrats choose Lamont over Lieberman in the primary. (No, the only disaster was DLC Democrats not strongly backing Lamont in the general election.)
Of course, I realize that to you guys anybody to the left of Darth Vader is a flaming liberal...
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What's the emoticon for rolling one's eyes?
[Read the article: Hot enough for you?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Fox News says it's "vital" for the ice cap to melt because that's the way to make the Arctic's oil reserves more accessible for human use.
Oh, right -- so we can pump even more greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere...
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Doesn't that mean the terrorists win?
[Read the article: Beware the Google]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]So members of Congress should take their marching orders from bin Laden rather than from the people who elected them? Wouldn't that mean that bin Laden has won the war?
And what happened to the George Bush who no so long ago said that bin Laden was of no importance at all, that he never thought about him?