The American Spectator

Reader Mail

Ready or Not

2.9.07 @ 12:01AM

(Page 6 of 6)

Sommers is correct, feminists no longer have the credibility they once had, but they still control classrooms from elementary schools through college. Every graduating class contains students that have learned to despise men for crimes we never committed while those same students over look the many ways men sacrifice for others.

From the Titanic to much higher death rates in the work place, to the very long days and hours men work, we have done our share. We need to hear from more people like Bernard Chapin and Christina Hoff Sommers who care equally for both genders.
-- Steve DeLuca
U.S. Army (retired)
Mendocino, California

FRANKEN'S MONSTER
Re: Jay Homnick's Hot Air America:

Enjoyed Jay Homnick's piece on Air America, which had many of the comic flourishes I've come to count on in his writing. There's something to his thesis about progressive attitudes making for bad talk radio, and he may well be right.

I do not think he is right to praise Al Franken, however. Anyone who has ever listened to Franken's show comes away with the impression that he's hit the cough syrup too hard. His attempts at wry and deadpan sound stilted, because to be wry or deadpan you need more wit. Steve Martin, for example, can deadpan like nobody's business. Not so Al Franken.

As to the contention that Franken has earned his living in comedy for many years-- he was a mediocre joke writer who branched into standup, but he's never been in the same league as greats like Bill Cosby. I say he makes his money as a B-list "personality," not as a comedian. If, as rumored, Franken runs for a U.S. Senate seat from Minnesota, his lack of intellectual heft should be even more glaringly apparent than it already is.

Sadly for Air America, Franken's par for the course. Stephanie Miller can be fun to listen to, but Randi Rhodes is crazy-making.
-- Patrick O'Hannigan
San Diego, California

Mr. Homnick's article is typically insightful. However, if I may, I'd like to add a point. Conservative talk radio is commercially viable because it is the alternative to the mainstream media, which, of course, is overwhelmingly and unabashedly leftist. To what is Liberal talk radio an alternative? What does it offer that isn't already provided by virtually every newspaper rabbit ear TV station in the country?

If we conservatives could hear our points of view expressed in the mainstream media the way the Liberals hear theirs, conservative talk radio would dry up in a matter of weeks and Al Franken's program would suddenly become commercially viable. I, for one, would agree to that trade any day.

Between 1949 and 1987 the so-called "fairness" doctrine was in place requiring new outlets to offer "both sides" of the story. But both sides according to whom? To determine such there must always be some kind of Propaganda Czar or Thought Control Committee who gets to make the call. That, at the end of the day, is nothing more than the stifling of free speech. And as we know Liberals are trying mightily to resurrect that law. That is an anathema to freedom and as such we must fight it tooth and nail. It's amazing that this is even under discussion, or that the "fairness" doctrine was in place for so long in this land of the free, but so it is and was. As Rabbis Cohen and Rosen might have commented upon its proponents, the motive of those sinister imbeciles is the opposite of freedom.
-- R. Trotter
Arlington, Virginia

I always enjoyed and read with interest Jay Homnick. Until I saw his statement "Stephanie Miller is a super radio talent who does great production pieces with funny voices and sound effects." That woman is an idiot and if Homnick believes she has talent, I quit reading him right now.
-- Joe O'Mara

A STATE'S RIGHTS
Re: James F. Csank's letter (under "War Torn") in Reader Mail's Cross Purposes:

Mr. Csank is himself begging the question. First, before the War Between the States, there was no such thing as a "U.S. Citizen". One was a citizen of the State he or she lived in so Lee could not renounce something that did not exist. Second, The Commonwealth of Virginia reserved the right to withdraw from the U.S. Constitution at its pleasure, which it exercised prior to the Lincoln setting up a blockade of Virginia's (and the rest of the South's) ports. This was an act of war against Virginia by the Federal Government of the U.S. against the state of Virginia. Add to that the fact that the U.S. government recognized and adopted the "State" of West Virginia, an act that is against the U.S. constitution's protections of State's borders, and prohibition against splitting States without consent. West Virginia's separation was unconstitutional. Lee had every right to defend his State, and his Nation (the CSA) from unconstitutional Federal aggression by the U.S. President and the U.S. Army and Navy. Virginia was under siege and the right of self defense is universal. The fact is that Lincoln had no right to treat Virginia as an enemy and because he did so, Virginia had every right to oppose the U.S. in its actions, even unto war.
-- Sean M.
Orlando, Florida

RULES OF ENGAGEMENT
Re: Jay Molyneaux's letter (under "For It Before They Were Against It") in Reader Mail's The Great Land:

Some thoughts about the interesting response of Jay Molyneaux. In the second paragraph, he omitted the most critical and important rule -- that being: For God's sake, and at all costs, don't do anything that might make the enemy angry with us.

His final paragraph is too simplistic in that it has been proven throughout history not to work, by such luminaries as Hitler, Stalin, Mao and Chairman Kim, and many others.

We need to go back to the old rules -- last practiced in WWII -- fight to win. PERIOD! Starting with Korea, this country has proven beyond a doubt that the lawyers in congress can neither properly prosecute nor win wars. This is precisely why the founding fathers specifically gave us a SINGLE commander-in-chief in the Constitution.
-- Carl Lueders

Letter to the Editor

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