The American Spectator

Reader Mail

Tony's Awards

3.25.08 @ 12:01AM

(Page 7 of 7)

Of course there are irrational people on the Right, too. They're just not irrational on purpose.
-- Michael Graham

HAUNTING
W. James Antle III's The Safe Talk Express:

Safe Talk gets you nowhere. Odd to me that a man who is known for a hair trigger temper and a foul mouth to boot has decided that he will pull his punches. He's a little old for dancing around the ring, so if he has a punch he'd better land it. And soon.

Why has the Willie Horton commercial haunted Republicans these many years? It should have haunted Governor Dukakis. Perhaps it would not have haunted Republicans if they had not been complicit in the cover-up of WHY poor Willie was in Stony Lonesome in the first place. If that were generally known, Republicans and Democrats alike would wonder what possessed Governor Dukakis in allowing him to go on a week-end leave.

During that whole "dirty trick" flap I only saw one article that described in graphic detail the crime that Willie Horton was doing time for. Perhaps your archival expertise could unearth a Patrick Buchanan piece wherein he described Horton's murdering a man in a gas station, slit his throat, castrated him and stuffed the severed genitals in the victim's gashed throat. This would not seem an ideal candidate for R&R outside the prison. Nevertheless, that is what the compassionate Governor Dukakis did -- whereupon Horton murdered a couple on his rampaging weekend. Would you call Willie's mischief HATE CRIMES or just overkill?

Whoever brought this to light -- and my recollection is that it was a dirty trickster (does the name "Brown" ring a bell?) other that the much maligned -- and now deceased -- Lee Atwater -- when the story first floated it was somehow connected to Al Gore -- whoever brought it to light did a public service. It informed the electorate that Governor Dukakis had a soft heart and a soft spot in his head for criminals who don't get out enough.

Look, if the Governor of whatever state Jeffrey Dahmer was in jail in had let Dahmer out on a weekend-- and if that Governor was running for President -- would it have been all right with blacks if they ran a similar hit ad about that Governor and that WHITE criminal?

Willie Horton was a vicious murderer housed in a prison in a state run by a man who was such a passive/pacifist/pussy-footin' kind of guy he could not bring himself even to want to kill the man who raped his wife. But the Willie Horton ad didn't do him in. His silly statement about Kitty didn't. It was the tiny guy in the tank picture. His political hopes were swirling in the toilet the day that picture ran. We don't elect tiny guys. Howard Dean found that out.
-- D. Smith

OUR FURRY FRIENDS
Re: Gilbert Ross, M.D.'s Jumping Ship from the Rats:

Thank you for this article. Animal rights activists have been saying for years that animal experiments are useless and misleading. Articles like this are important to get the issue before the public.
-- Jane Shakman
Ossining, New York

Letter to the Editor

topics:
Taxes, Education, Trade, John McCain, Bill Clinton, Television, Religion, Islam, Abortion, Constitution, Law, Military, Iraq, Iran, Israel, Pakistan, NATO, Africa, Oil