THE AGONY OF DEFEAT
Re: The Washington Prowler’s Making It
Look Big Easy:
The Republicans should get along very well with Rodney
Alexander. He is obviously a man without honor. He will fit right
in with the Tom DeLay crowd.
— Bob Derry
END OF THE AFFAIR
Re: Lawrence Henry’s McGreevey
Update:
Thanks for the excellent and tightly written “Another
Perspective” by Lawrence Henry. Yet another perspective is “Hooray
for him!”
Bill Clinton showed us that having affairs with government
employees was fine, as long as you don’t lie under oath about it.
McGreevey confessing with Dari by his side was a better piece of
performance art than the Clintons’ version of the same passion
play. Since McGreevey’s affair was a same sex union upstages the
Clintons again.
I am amazed at the astuteness of McGreevey for shrewdly playing
for public sympathy and popular opinion while becoming the
quintessential Democrat politician. All of this should play
wonderful for McGreevey, placing him after Hillary at the top of
the list of Democrat presidential candidates. After McGreevey, his
wife Dari should run.
— Newt Love
Annapolis, Maryland
We’re still missing the point on McGreevey. The man is under
investigation for major felonies. He’s may be indicted by a federal
grand jury. This is one of the worst cases of political corruption
in American history…
The guv is trying to hide behind his gayness, but it’s not a
“coming-out-of-the-closet” story.
It’s a story of a governor endangering the citizens of an entire
state by appointing an unqualified person to be head of homeland
security, which person turns out to be his gay sex partner. In
addition, it’s a story of sexual harassment, by offering a
taxpayer-financed job for sex, and obstruction of justice by
offering jobs and money for silence.
If New Jersey allows this character to avoid a special election
by remaining in office until Nov. 15th, the state will need to
apologize to Tony Soprano.
— G. Ferguson
BIAS-FREE
Re: Patrick Hynes’s Book-of-the-Month:
I agree that Unfit for Command is an important book. I
hope it becomes a best-seller. But, the Book of the Month Club
(BOMC) shouldn’t be faulted for political bias.
BOMC publishes books on all political sides. E.g., they have
published Ann Coulter. They’re currently putting a big push behind
Tommy Franks’s book. They were unable to use Unfit for
Command because its publisher, Regnery, works on an unusually
rapid time schedule. BOMC didn’t know about Unfit for
Command.
— David Skurnick
Montville, New Jersey
MEDIA INSURED
Re: Lawrence Henry’s Lies, Damn
Lies, and Media Bias:
I often wonder how long the media could exist if they tried to
operate an insurance company. Their laxness with the truth would
soon bankrupt the company. Would they end age discrimination by
selling cheap policies to older people? I doubt if anyone with an
SUV could buy insurance since SUVs seem to be having the most
spectacular accidents. Would they even sell insurance to pregnant
women since they are alleged to be such bad risks? Our economic
system discards poorly operated companies that do not at least
conform nominally with reality. The government, however, if
infested with frivolous views of reality, can stay on tax payer
life support almost indefinitely, as did the Soviet Union.
— Danny L. Newton
Cookeville, Tennessee
LOCATION, LOCATION
Re: George Neumayr’s The Thin
Green Line:
The issue is not the fence. Under the circumstances most
reasonable people would agree that it a fence might be a good idea.
The question is the location of the fence. If Israel built the
fence along the 67 border three fold be no problem. However what
they are doing is building on what is clearly Palestinian property.
This is being done to enclose settlements that ought not to have
there in the first place. To pretend otherwise about the fence is
disingenuous.
— Jim Hickey
Tampa, Florida
OPEN SECRET
Re: Jacob Laksin’s The Truth
Has Set New Jersey Free:
“Whisperings surfaced”? Oh, come on. I lived in New Jersey when
McGreevey was elected, and his sexual predilections were widely
spoken of then. If his latest gambit to cover up corruption were to
make any difference in New Jersey politics, that’d be the
surprise.
— Lawrence Henry
Gov. McGreevey’s resignation speech contained words such as,
“blessed,” “virtue,” and “grace.” McGreevey was also referring to
the Catholic Church when he cited “the tradition” he was raised
with as one of the reasons that kept him, a Columbia, Georgetown,
and Harvard graduate, from coming to terms with his own
gayness.
Don’t you just hate it when politicians wrap themselves in their
faith?
— Mrs. John B. Jackson III (Janet )
MURPHY’S LAW
Re: Hunter Baker’s An Off-Keyes
McCainiac:
“Why would the Weekly Standard run this kind of trash?”
My sentiments exactly, and I read the Standard’s article before I
found Mr. Baker’s. Keyes may not stand a chance, but you simply
don’t trash a candidate who’s never in his life shaded his
principles for political gain. I almost had the feeling that that
was the reason Mr. Murphy doesn’t like him.
— William Luse
THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS
Re: Paul DeSisto et al.’s letters (“Five on One”) in Reader Mail’s
Past
Present and Kurt Schori’s letter (“Swiss Miffed”) in Reader
Mail’s Consumer
Reports:
Paul DeSisto might have gotten nasty and pointed out that Hitler
left Switzerland alone not because of its defensive capacity but
because it was a compliant tool of his war economy. Just like
Sweden, which became a rich country during WWII.
— John Schuh
Lake Dallas, Texas
Kurt Schori’s letter weenie, eurotrash letter was pretty well
trounced by the previous responses you published. One point however
sticks in my craw. He lectures us to read our Constitution and
ponder its words, specifically “the pursuit of happiness.” That
would be in the Declaration of Independence, Mr. Schori.
As a citizen of a small, unimportant country Mr. Schori should
acquaint himself with the political documents of large, important
countries that he is attempting to enlighten.
Presumably if Switzerland spent less time accommodating our
swindlers and thieves through their banking system and warmly
receiving our billionaire fugitives such as Marc Rich (a funder of
those terrorists Mr. Schori claims the Swiss are so assiduously
fighting with us), we would be able to stop pointless exercises
like freeing fifty million Afghans and Iraqis and join the Swiss in
important work like beefing up power grids in Outer
Kajerkistan.
As a descendent of sensible Swiss Italians let me apologize on
behalf of my land of ancestry to all American Spectator
readers for this knothead. He must be a descendent of the dimwitted
son my family told to go visit Aunt Sofie in the next village over
while they all high-tailed it for the trip to America.
— Brian Bonneau
Goodness, I do wish my fellow readers wouldn’t get so riled up
about Swiss Guy’s rap.
Look, Old Europe is best thought of as a giant theme park, kind
of like Disneyland. One would not snap at Goofy in Orlando, so
why not just sit back and have a chuckle at the Swiss Guy and the
other entertainers in Euroland ? I can still remember when
“buffoon” was not an insult, and “fool” was what stand-up comedians
used to be called.
Enjoy, my dear fellows, enjoy ! Toss some coins in the poor
devil’s virtual styrofoam cup — after all, he has his niche to
fill and we have ours.
— Paul Kotik
Plantation, Florida
Well, it appears that the two sides of the Atlantic truly do have
their differences. Schori does make a couple of notable points, but
has missed more often than hit. True, Europe does some admirable
nation-building on a small scale and should be commended. However,
it’s important to remember that pacifism only works on other
pacifists. Ironically, sometimes the only way to ensure peace is to
make war by ensuring that those nation states that refuse to
integrate into the world that operates under the rule of law is to
remove whatever obstacle presently prevents that integration. In
Iraq’s case, it was Saddam Hussein. Anyone who thinks the only
reason to take him down is because of WMD is truly a fool; Iraq’s
integration into the larger world (whether as a pure democracy or
not) will do more to transform the Middle East than anything in
modern history. It was most assuredly NOT a case of crying wolf,
but a logical, long-term strategy. Those that want to get smart on
the subject should read the book “The Pentagon’s New Map: War and
Peace in the 21st Century” by Dr. Thomas P.M. Barnett. I personally
don’t hold a grudge against Old Europe for not jumping into the
fray….I expected nothing less. They didn’t help because, if you
look at their combat-ready deployable forces, they have very little
capacity to do so. They can integrate the small scale Ivory Coasts
and Haitis into the larger world; the U.S. will tackle the Iraqs
and Afghanistans; fair enough?
Ah, yes, the World Wars… Russia, Britain, et al. fought
gallantly in that war but there is no disputing the fact that the
U.S entry into these conflicts (both WW I & II) turned the tide
and sealed the outcome. If you’re skeptical, read of Sir Winston
Churchill’s reaction to learning that the U.S. had entered the war.
The U.S. was not concerned with the Nazis landing on its
shores…it was concerned with the Nazi ideology engulfing a third
of the world, which would of course drastically affect our own and
the entire world’s prosperity. And, let’s not be too Euro-centric
here…the Japanese were quite a hegemonistic power in Asia and the
battle for the Pacific was at least as fierce as that for Europe,
if not more so. The U.S. fought major campaigns in both theaters
and played significant roles in securing victory in each. How many
European nations can make the same claim? Outside of the Brits, not
many.
As for the economic comparison, one should look at two of the
supposedly “great” economic powers in Europe for that answer.
France and Germany are both finally waking up to fact that a
35-hour work week and 2 months of vacation aren’t going to cut it
in a competitive world economy. Ireland is an excellent example of
a country that finally got into the economic fast lane, and they
did it by shunning the continental European ways and adopting the
economic model of the U.S. They are far outperforming their
continental cousins, and it’s not by accident. So much for the
“wasteful economy” theory. My favorite suggestion, though, is that
I can somehow earn another week of vacation by talking to my
neighbor…that’s priceless! No, we don’t have to “make the world
think we are (fill in the blank).” The world already knows it,
judging by the 6 million-plus immigrants coming into this country
each year. Yes, coming IN, not going OUT. I believe they are, as
you emphatically state, in the pursuit of happiness.
— Robert LeFevers
Williamsburg, Virginia
A CHRISTMAS STORY
Re: Thomas Lipscomb’s John Kerry’s
Bodyguard of Lies:
I served in an artillery unit in the Central Highlands of
Vietnam (1st Bn, 92nd Artillery) from May 1970 to April 1971. My
memories of that time range from vivid to murky (probably a
combination of age and psychology). However, I kept no daily
journal and took no 8mm movies of my and my units’ activities. What
doesn’t square with me about John Kerry’s war tales is how someone
who so thoroughly documented his time in-country could so
thoroughly and erroneously misstate the self-described “seminal”
event in his experience, the “Christmas in Cambodia” episode.
— Ralph Roberts
Laurel, Maryland
