The American Spectator

Reader Mail

(Page 6 of 13)

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I don't know whether I am directing this letter to you, the editor, or to Mr. Michaelsen the author of today's piece. As a long time resident of Ohio, I have been living in Alabama only since April '05.

Having attended Air Force pilot training in Selma, Alabama and Bainbridge, Georgia, I acquired an affinity for the people, the red earth , the religiosity and the just plain class of the area. I wasn't in Selma for the famous bridge crossing, but while there did not run into one of their pointy hooded types. Some reading this will say: AHA -- he missed the evil.

I write this because of the insulting title given to it. OLD SCHOOL-OLD SOUTH. Though the piece doesn't quite live up to the headline, it does a job that is unfair to the reality. The political reality down here is turned on its head. Going back to the cracks that began in the "Solid South" a few decades ago, the reality of a Republican South is pretty much total. Democrats have gone the way of the Dodo. There just ain't many! Siegelman WAS, in fact, a Democrat. He conducted himself like one (notwithstanding current national D coining of that catchy Repubs are crooks phraseology). And his conduct had no basis in OLD SOUTH conduct but was just plain ole political corruption, and by a Democrat at that. Nowhere in the 50 states does anyone or any party have a corner on corruption. I give you, for example, New Jersey. Now THERE'S corruption. And once again by the Democrats.

To be fair, I should also point out some recent problems in the state of my birth-Ohio. If you want stigmatize an area (OLD SOUTH) or State (ALABAMA), you could start your tsk-tsking with Ohio. Having two of the worst U.S. Senators -- DeWine-the-dweeb and Voinovich-the crier -- which upon coupling with Taft the tax lover, the case is made. No room is left for the country club types there, to be pointing southward. And especially not Alabama with Jeff Sessions as one of their Senators -- now there's a Senator to be proud of! And while the northern elitist points south for his bigotry targets, he might again, look to the buckeye state to sort of level things. I served two four-year terms in a medium sized county as Prosecuting Attorney, having grown up there after my parents moved from Cincinnati. We had the quaint ongoing novelty of having a higher up in the Ku Klux Klan who caused considerable heartburn to the sheriff with his rallies and cross burnings. You can still see the remnants on his farm on the south side of I-71 as you cruise from Cincinnati to Columbus.

p>I cannot end this piece without relating an ongoing illustration of a political race that currently rages here in Alabama. George Wallace Jr. is running for Lt. Gov. on the Republican ticket, he is in a runoff and the underdog in the race, after being buried under a torrent of money by a former lobbyist that caught the eye of the Republican establishment. They are attacking Wallace for being a former democrat and too liberal. Kind of like the Republican establishment in Ohio that trashed the current nominee for Gov., Ken Blackwell, a black conservative, who can clean up the mess the country club crowd made. I, proudly support both Wallace AND Blackwell. br> -- Morris J. Turkelson br> Deatsville, Alabama /p> p> As to Mark Michaelsen's article on Alabama's corruption; go check out North Carolina. Wake County's School System had over 3 million dollars embezzled before they got caught. Of course the Superintendent knew nothing about it -- even though his next door neighbor (also his deputy) was convicted. Or how about the Speaker of the State House? Jim Black's campaign took in checks that were blank, had staffers that also lobbied for the gambling interests who pushed through a lottery on a two-vote margin. (Two state legislators were out of town that day.) br> We've become the Louisiana of the upper South without the entertainment value of the Longs. br> -- Paul Winborne br> Raleigh, North Carolina

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