Letters from the Issue of December 19, 2002

Antiwar advocates go on the attack

Comments (0) Thursday, Dec 19 2002

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My passing comment seems to be all Brett Sokol heard. Afterward he came up to me and asked whether I thought Bush was Hitler and Republicans Nazis. Um, no. What was I saying then? I tried to explain. He said he wasn't following my point, and I tried to explain again. He seemed frustrated and I suggested he drop it, but he didn't. So here, for the record: Do I think Bush is Hitler? Puh-leez. Do I think Republicans are Nazis? Come on. (Brett: Both mean "no.") Do I stand by my claim that there is too much polite and eerie silence around the Bush administration's activities? Yes.

Readers who are tired of silence should pick up a copy of The Nation magazine or try Harper's or Z or the Progressive (all have Websites), or they might want to start by looking at www.miamiforpeace.org, which has links to other sources as well.

Jennifer K. Uleman

Coral Gables

We Have Met the Enemy and He Is an Elderly Cleric

All along we stupidly thought it was the bearded one:Thanks to Kirk Nielsen for making clear who the true enemies of America really are ("Righteous Bombers?" December 5). Some of us had a distorted perception that a certain dictatorship, which has consistently harbored, trained, and financed terrorists from the U.S. and internationally, and which sent specialized "technicians" to torture and interrogate U.S. servicemen imprisoned in North Vietnam and murderous hordes to fight wars of "liberation" in Africa, plus countless other feats -- some of us perceived that this dictatorship was in fact an enemy of the U.S. Thankfully, Mr. Nielsen has saved us from such delusional nonsense.

No, the real enemy of America is right here in the Magic City: a 74-year-old Roman Catholic bishop, a group of elderly Cuban-American Protestant pastors, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Miami, and a handful of senile "terrorists" here and in Panama who, supposing their crimes are true, have not done an infinitesimal fraction of the murder, damage, and mayhem perpetrated by that certain dictatorship (and its protégés) here and abroad.

It was disappointing, however, that Mr. Nielsen did not add to the mix the Cuban-American Freemasons, the espiritistas, the santeros, and the Jehovah's Witnesses. You can never do enough when it comes to warning citizens about the danger posed by el exilio. God bless you, Mr. Nielsen, and keep up the good fight denouncing and exposing America's true enemies.

Hank Pagan

Kendall