The American Spectator

Reader Mail

(Page 2 of 3)

Our son, like Cpt. "Sully," was one of the few who went through the four years of character building at the Air Force Academy. It was four long years of hell, and your character, if not fully shaped by hard work and clear aspiration, would not have made it through unscathed. Sully's character has been defined repeatedly through the years of flying, thinking safety and building his own business based on his own vision of safety. And, to top all that off he had glider pilot experience, some of which dated back to his years at the Academy.

Years of finely honed leadership, flying acumen, and great ability from years of experience. Just the person you want at the helm. Would it be that we had such at the helm of our Nation. I don't know about you but give me a modest unassuming Cpt. Sully any time over some one who brags about himself and his policies and change all the time, with no great experience to give him an understanding if what he says is true.

Capt. Sully knows, like true heroes do, that he was in the right place at the right moment and is ready to move on. Give him his modesty and move on news folks. You have enough to do covering someone else who is blowing his own horn!
-- B. Gunn
Texas

I've seen one news show host -- okay, it was Bill O'Reilly -- go on about how there's more to the crash than meets the eye. Whereas there are certain reports of problems with the airplane beyond that of geese being sucked into the engines, reports that require investigation, it subtracts nothing from Captain Sullenberger's achievement of bringing the plane down safely in the Hudson with no loss of life -- and just because a guy won't come on a show doesn't mean he has anything to hide.
-- Robert Nowall
Cape Coral, Florida

CORRELATE POTENTATES
Re: Stephen Moore & John Tamny's Weak Dollars, Weak Presidents:

It was Milton Friedman, if I remember correctly, who pointed out the relationship between gold price and the strength of the dollar. If the dollar is weak, gold is high. Since commodities track the price of gold, it is safely argued that the weak dollar is inflationary. Witness the price of gasoline.
-- J. B. Layne

Although the captioned article was interesting within the confines of its thesis, I would daresay that the authors failed to establish anything beyond colinearity between dollar strength and presidential electoral outcomes. The conclusion they draw calling for a stronger dollar mischievously avoids providing the prescription for such an outcome and further failed to establish causality between presidential policy and dollar stature as it may be possible that actors beyond the president participate materially in its ebb and tide. However I do not want to punish the authors for scope beyond their intents.

Yet on the subject of a strong dollar, many prescriptions abound for its resuscitation one of which includes higher interest rates. If you accept that higher interest rates are part of the prescription, it is nigh unto impossible economically or politically given that the present administration is committed to trillion dollar deficits as far as the eye can see and that the voodoo economists guiding macro-economic decisions are hell-bent on driving interest rates low to spur economic activity. Such thoughts are delusional.

I advocate higher interest rates whether or not they contribute to a strong dollar because the regime of falling rates of the past 28 years is highly destructive to capital formation. Higher rates may in turn provide the adult restraint against such juvenile inclinations of stimulus packages and deficits of biblical proportions.

But in all fairness to the authors these comments are digressive from the merits of a strong dollar -- however one may measure that.
-- David Bonn

DON'T HARRY BARRY
Re: Jay D. Homnick's Doing the Limbaugh:

If, as has been reported elsewhere, President Obama's actual words were, "You can't just listen to Rush Limbaugh and get things done," is it not possible that the so-called "alternative media" is doing precisely what they criticize the "mainstream media" for doing? That is, are conservatives columnists, bloggers, and talk show hosts taking the comment out of context and choosing to interpret it in a way that most advances their agenda?

It seems to me that a careful reading of the above quote does not provide the meaning that has been assigned to it. Is it perhaps more accurate to paraphrase the quote not as a slam on Limbaugh, but as an admonition that a leader must do more than simply listen to the radio, a leader must actually accomplish things? Could it be that the president's actual meaning was more along the lines of, "You can't just watch cooking shows and get dinner on the table"?

I am by no means President Obama's most ardent supporter, but I would like to see "our side" demonstrate to "their side" what fairness really means.
-- Dan Davis

SAYING BAD THINGS
Re: W. James Antle, III's Change Has Come: