(Page 3 of 11)
br> -- Mike Torrence br> Winston-Salem, North Carolina /p> p> Mr. Tyrrell, you know that any slur against a white guy is supposed to be laughed off. If Johnny Miller had made those same comments about Tiger Woods, he would have been gone from NBC and never heard from again. I do remember hearing Johnny refer to Tiger as a hometown "boy" once and he corrected himself so quickly he almost bit his tongue off. Come on now. We all know the rules. If you are Charles Barkley you can say you hate white people and suffer no penalty, but it doesn't work the other way around. I think Mr. Tyrrell was just being his facetious self. br> -- Barbara Anderson br> Cincinnati, Ohio /p> p> R. Emmett Tyrrell's column about Don Imus and Johnny Miller included some sloppiness about the meaning of the First Amendment. Tyrrell suggested that "As an ardent defender of the First Amendment I opposed Imus's extinction." Of course, the First Amendment only refers to government actions. If Imus was terminated by his employer because his sponsors were afraid that he would alienate too large a segment of the listening audience, too bad for Imus, but it is not a First Amendment issue. The First Amendment does not protect anyone from offending their employer, nor should it. br> -- John A. Penkrot /p>I don't think Mr. Miller's problem is with ethnicity, but he does have a problem that at time causes one to cringe. I remember a year or so ago he said that golfer Rod Pampling (paraphrasing since I don't have the exact quote) "looks like the guy who show up to paint your house or garage door" or something along those lines. What to read into a comment like that? I don't know, but it was senseless and certainly added nothing to the commentary.
Miller also frequently makes references to how much money Tiger Woods has (how rich he is), which I find in rather poor taste.