Today's Letters: We need to hear more detail from the candidates

By LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Published October 11, 2007

Our presidential hopefuls don't seem to be able to tell us, in reasonable detail, just what their plans are for the future of our country.

We have a ruthless enemy seemingly already in our camp with a hunger for blood, anybody's blood, and these presidential hopefuls seem to wrangle about mistakes of long and recent past, of things that might not even make the history books.

We have a war without trenches on our hands that we are trying to finish, but probably won't. Plus we have a public debt that's beyond our comprehension. At last look, it was $9-trillion - just $1-trillion short of a quadrillion, which is 1 followed by 15 zeros.

Probably the only thing they can offer us is Winston Churchill's slogan from World War II: "Blood, toil, tears and sweat." And that isn't a slogan that will win the highest position in the land. Besides rationing, carpools and other restrictions have to come first.

Hartley Steeves, Tampa  

Democrats should go with Gore

Amid the primary chaos, I have a simple solution to what Florida Democrats should do: Write in Al Gore. If our votes aren't going to "count" at the national convention, let's make a statement. Let's remind the Republican-controlled Legislature that engineered this primary fiasco that they engineered us into the current political situation in 2000.

Let's tell the Democratic National Committee that while we understand their desire to keep all primaries from moving up to the week after Election Day, Florida Democrats are important. Let's let all the candidates who don't have the testosterone (or estrogen) to stand up and speak to Florida voters face to face know that we are tired of politics as usual.

Let's say: Hey, there's a national figure - who may soon win the Nobel Peace Prize - that we elected before. Since he's not a candidate, maybe the woefully wobbly state Democratic Committee can get Al to speak at the state convention later this month - none of the "candidates" will. Make a statement, send a message, maybe even start a movement: Write in Al.

Mary Hut, Largo

Questionable negotiators

If Democrats cannot reach a compromise on Florida and Michigan's participation in the presidential primaries, they will not be able to reach the painful international compromises necessary to govern. I have offered a very rational compromise - giving Florida and Michigan delegates each one-quarter vote for president at the 2008 convention.

We elected Lyndon Johnson in 1964 by a landslide, believing that he was the candidate for peace while Barry Goldwater would blow up the world. Instead we got Johnson's escalation in Vietnam.

If they win the presidential election, Democrats will be faced with the need to make painful compromises on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Iranian nuclear weapons, Kosovo, Taiwan and the status of former Soviet territories. If they are unable to compromise, their only alternative will be war.

As George Santayana said, "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."

Arthur Volbert, St. Petersburg

Blackwater

Lawless guards

The United States now has some 130,000 civilian contractors in Iraq. None of them are currently subject to U.S. or even military law. The U.S. government actually went out of its way to exempt them from Iraqi law. And yet we claim to lament Iraq's lack of law and order.

When we find some of these contractors are murdering indiscriminately, our government arranges for those employed by the worst offender to have cameras installed in their vehicles and have a federal chaperone accompany their antics in future.

When a drunken Blackwater employee shoots the bodyguard of an Iraqi official, we are told that there is no punishment other than a pink slip. That doesn't say much for the value the U.S. government places on Iraqi lives. And of course, that's just icing on the cake after the Abu Ghraib torture scandal.

Worst of all, I see no indication that the American public cares. No atrocity seems worth getting upset about; they are all acceptable under the banner of the "war on terror."

Jon Olson, Gulfport

Blackwater rules

If our troops had the same rules of engagement as the Blackwater personnel, the war would have not lasted nearly as long as it has. Note that Blackwater has never lost a client.

H.K. Christman, St. Petersburg

A unifying foe

One of the many ironies and unintended consequences of how America's involvement in Iraq is managed is this: Blackwater and other private armies purchase the killing skills of well-paid mercenaries, often taught by the U.S. military in its efforts at nation- and base-building.

The mercenaries' only mission is to protect a few policy promoters and profiteers, and keep themselves alive by whatever means. Their unregulated, unpunishable, killer-bee responses to threatless stimuli may end up being the common-enemy symbol that reactivates an Iraqi nationalism to the point of setting aside fractionating partisanship, the way the Russian presence did in Afghanistan, which led to U.S. support for "freedom fighters" like Osama bin Laden and much of the Taliban's eventual leaders.

Jon McPhee, St. Petersburg

Iraq demands Blackwater action Oct. 9

Give them the boot

Who can blame Iraqi authorities for wanting the Blackwater security firm out of their country. It's about time Blackwater gets the ax. Even with all of their deadly mishaps, our government has been defending the company as though it were "the salt of the earth." Although, I personally can't help wonder if Blackwater is a subsidiaryof Haliburtion.

In any case, it's time to put an end to Blackwater, who has been literally getting away with murder.

JoAnn Lee Frank, Clearwater

Watch antiwar vets and Guards are a valuable asset Oct. 6, letters

Agendas and heroes

It is interesting that the first letter writer feels that people who oppose his view need to be monitored because they lack a neutral perspective, and have a negative mission. I think it is safe to say we all have an agenda, and the letter writer's are well established, if you read the Times on a regular basis. I am glad the military was a wonderful experience for him; not everyone else feels that way, and I don't feel they need to be ridiculed as a result. Many of the most repressive governments of the last 100 years have been run by, or were supported by the military (consider Burma). Thank God we aren't there - yet.

I am at a loss to see how lives are being placed in danger because Blackwater is being investigated. "In a shooting war, innocent people die," the second letter writer says. I would be willing to bet Osama bin Laden would use this same argument.

The true heroes in Iraq are the men and women in uniform who represent the United States, not a private army assigned to babysit bureaucrats at an enormous cost to the taxpayers.

Michael Norona, Tampa

Take care, voters

One senses the muted anger throughout Steven Greenhut's political prescription to cure the GOP (Chemo for the GOP, Oct. 10). He swings his prosaic lash in all directions to include both parties as well as some self-flagellation for voting for our current president.

No, Steven, the cure for American politics in general is the election of persons who have the courage to put the good of the country first over self, financial backers and ideology.

The tragedy of this administration is that it missed the opportunity to lead this country in a positive direction mostly through incompetence and a lack of vision. It will take decades to right the wrongs of the last six years, regardless of who is in the White House.

So don't be too hard on yourself for voting for likely the worst president in U.S. history. Next time, just do your homework before going to the polls.

Wayne Logsdon, Hernando

[Last modified October 10, 2007, 22:47:32]