Reader Comments

Editor: Your editorial on government spending hit the mark. It is no longer sufficient to talk about spending control in general terms.  We need a structure delivery system that – reliably from year to year – can and will dispatch wasteful, unnecessary – yes, stupid – federal programs and pare departments and agencies. At our earlier Tax Cut Working Group coalition meetings I asked our spending control subcommittee chairman Steve Slivinski (CATO Director of Federal Budget Studies) to take a look at the Army Base Realignment and Closure model for domestic programs.  At our last meeting in Washington on September 8 th Steve discussed briefly the best current model, co-authored by Sen. Brownback and Rep. Tiahrt.  I think it is time we united behind this approach – or something similar – that will give us a concrete mechanism for advancing the spending control ball vis-à-vis discretionary and some mandatory spending. Concurrently, we should bring resources behind an effort to subvent federal mandatory (and some discretionary) programs to the states with finite block grants and few strings, as we have done successfully with welfare.  Medicaid, food stamps and SSI disabled are the principal big-ticket items that fit this model.  At our request, Bob Carleson (Reagan’s former Director of Welfare), a principal architect of federal welfare reform, is beginning to work on this effort. Lew Uhler, president, National Tax Limitation Committee.

Editor: You're absolutely right on the spending matter. I really have had it with the GOP, not just the leadership, but the party as a whole. It really stands for nothing anymore. Conservatives must distance themselves from this. Brent B

Editor: Concerning your editorial on big government spending, the last president to serve six or more years without a major meltdown on or about Year 6 was Teddy Roosevelt. The only question in my mind is, will the 2006 elections replay 1938 or 1918. Be well. AT

Editor: In regard to your editorial on Katrina, did you know an intensive investigation is being made in the New Orleans police to determine how to "be fair" to the 250-300 cops who deserted the force. The usual left wing tunnel vision arguments are being applied and the usual "when did you stop beating your wife" logic to alibi for their desertion. It's the same old issue over and over As you know the left always tells us the most handy excuse. Let me humbly submit the fact that the cops made no attempt to contact headquarters and were not heard from for a while is our answer. Since no Mississippi cops deserted or are making excuses you do not need further evidence. Al Lemon Grove

Editor: Why do we need John Bolton at the United Nations?  Here is the way several key nations vote in that body:

• Kuwait votes against the United States 67% of the time
• Qatar votes against the United States 67% of the time
• Morocco votes against the United States 70% of the time
• United Arab Emirates vote against the United States 70% of the time.
• Jordan votes against the United States 71% of the time.
• Tunisia votes against the United States 71% of the time.
• Saudi Arabia votes against the United States 73% of the time.
• Yemen votes against the United States 74% of the time.
• Algeria votes against the United States 74% of the time.
• Oman votes against the United States 74% of the time.
• Sudan votes against the United States 75% of the time.
• Pakistan votes against the United States 75% of the time.
• Libya votes against the United States 76% of the time.
• Egypt votes against the United States 79% of the time.
• Lebanon votes against the United States 80% of the time.
• India votes against the United States 81% of the time.
• Syria votes against the United States 84% of the time.
• Mauritania votes against the United States 87% of the time.

Annual U. S. Foreign Aid:
Egypt,$2 billion
Jordan $192,814,000
Pakistan $6,721,000
India $143,699,000

Why does our government insist on giving your and my money to governments, like the Palestinian Authority, that call for terrorism against America? Do they think our money will make them like us eventually? Daryl F

Editor: Paul Weyrich’s article on Ideology uses the same thinking in his article as liberals use to argue against conservatives.  Liberals argue that conservatives are imposing morality on people while they are the neutral ones with their ideology of secular humanism.  This is absurd.  There is no such thing as moral neutrality on questions of right and wrong. All laws are the imposition of morality on people. Indeed, that is a good definition of a law. The Judeo-Christian morality, which the laws of the United States presuppose, is an ideology.  From a theological sense, it is universal.  But from the sense of human history, it is by no means universal.  Our laws such as murder and theft are clearly Judeo-Christian in origin, stemming from the Ten Commandments.  The nations and tribes originally occupying this land did not all share the same definitions of property rights or what constitites a murder.  One of the great failings of our constitution is that it does not spell out that our laws are based on Judeo-Christian morality.  In one sense this was not necessary back when the constitution was written, for it was assumed.  In another sense it has proven a problem all along.  Indeed by not naming it, the constitution has allowed judges to build up a case law based on Calvinism as opposed to other Judeo-Christian ideologies that are less radical. America has always been an ideological state; indeed a state without an ideology is a state of anarchy.  Anarchy is the negation of ideology.  If the rule of law is to be imposed upon an anarchy then it must use some ideology as a basis, if it picks and chooses laws from various traditions it has merely created a new ideology.  We as conservatives should not argue that we have no ideology as the secular humanists do.  All laws must be based on some ideology.  The only legitimate questions to fight about are whose ideology will be imposed and to what extent.  Heaven knows we do not want to return to the false non-ideology (as all are) of the 1950's that allowed Democrats in the south to practice the ideology of racism and treat people differently by race and tell them they may only marry people of the same race.  This was ignored by the rest of the country who were practicing the ideology of non-interventionism and states rights, while falsely believing they were being non-ideological. Paul Weyrich's critique of the ideologies of the neo-Marxist ideologies of political correctness and multiculturalism are right on. But we need to be realistic about the past and what we believe, that is, our Judeo-Christian ideology. Let us leave claims of not having ideological motives to the liberals who don't care about lying. David Schimmel, Crofton, Maryland

Editor: I read with interest Wes Vernon’s article on the Saudi Prince's investment in "Fox News".  Being an avid listener of Fox News, I already sense an apparent change in the demeanor of Bill O'Reilly, shown in his attitude towards his support of our war effort in Iraq.  Again today, immediately after President Bush addressed the nation, a female "Fox News Political Analyst" was introduced for her comments on the presidents speech.  She immediately went into an extremely partisan left wing, liberal diatribe about American deaths in Iraq would soon reach 2000, and that civil war had broken out in Iraq.  I question the so called "Fair and Balanced" philosophy of Fox News in their portrayal of her comments as "Political Analysis".  Her comments were shallow and very anti-Bush biased.  Folks are listening with keen, perceptive interest in these trying times.  Let us hope that Fox News does not go the way the majority our major media has gone, bought out by left leaning liberals.  Regards, Norman E. Duquette LTC USAF Ret Ex-POW Korea.