Letters are posted as we receive them during the week, and before they are printed in the paper, so check back frequently to see new letters. If you'd like to send a letter to the editor, use this postmarks submission form, or email your letter directly to mail@austinchronicle.com. Thanks for your patience.

Dear Editor,
    You can avoid drinking the polluted Austin municipal water by creating your own drinking water supply. You can buy a dehumidifier (free of lead solder in condenser area) to collect water from the air and then run the water through a water purifier to remove airborne solids and dehumidifier impurities. Another method is to collect rainwater in food-safe cisterns and again purify the water using a water filter, but this method is reliant on regular rainfall. Both methods will provide a drinking water supply free from fluoride, heavy metals (like barium, which exists in the Austin water supply), prescription drugs, and hormones.

Dear Editor,
    Re: The review of The Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day [Film Listings, Dec. 4]: I don't understand how some people rely on the opinions of someone that does not share the same tastes as some of the readers. It astounds me that someone who is supposed to be a great critic does not understand how the characters are what make the movies what they are. The fact that Marc Savlov talks badly about the first movie obviously tells you that. Maybe his opinion is not the one readers should listen to. They should go see it for themselves.

Dear Editor,
    For a way to get rid of old tires, go to www.recycle.net/tiredepot.

Dear Editor,
    The world-renowned, esteemed editor of The Austin Chronicle, after an insincere apology, has once again revealed the utter contempt he feels for the majority of people who are fired up and motivated to write their opinions to “Postmarks” ["Page Two," Dec. 4].
    “The lunatics, destroying any hope of a reasonable center, have taken over. … [L]eftists, rightists, conservatives, liberals, Luddites, globalists, conspiracy theorists, capitalists, anti-capitalists, media pundits, reactionaries, radicals, anarchists, unacknowledged fascists, extreme environmentalists, and extreme anti-environmentalists, among so many others.”
    Martin Sheen is among those publicly stating 9/11 was an inside job. Of course, Sheen is so beneath our esteemed editor in intellect, sincerity, public service, and professional success. What a lunatic he is!
    There is this lady who worked public relations for a Houston-based nonprofit focused on organ donation. She contacted the White House of Bush senior, asking that he become a donor. Within an hour, three Secret Service agents were there, giving her “the third degree.” Bush ultimately agreed to become a donor and went to Houston for a photo op. She was in charge of supplying information such as the service history of the elevators in the building and Social Security numbers of everyone working there. As Bush arrived, city blocks were shut down in succession; the lady had a special badge giving her access, but everyone else in the building couldn’t move about (e.g., trip to restroom) without a Secret Service escort.
    So the lady says on her radio program, "We’re to believe that a couple – the male of which has a Middle Eastern name – crashed a White House function? No freaking way! It did not happen! This was a cynical, malevolent manipulation of news the American people are being fed." (My paraphrase.)
    I may be crazy, according to our esteemed editor, but not gullible enough to believe anything I hear on Fox News.

Dear Editor,
    Re: “Fluoride Throwdown!” [Newsdesk blog, Dec. 2]: The Environmental Protection Agency discovered in 1985 the fraud of fluoridation. Altered studies and reviews were discovered claiming safety and benefits that did not exist. Dr. Robert Carton, union president, loudly and clearly called it fraud and attempted to get management to correct the dishonesty. They refused any action. They sued in 1986, reporting 29 pages of violations of the Safe Drinking Water Act, but the federal court refused to hear it. Congress has been asked to halt it by an ever-growing number of EPA unions, with 11 asking in 2005, but there is no response yet. The 2006 National Research Council said current allowed levels were not protective. The EPA management has refused to set a new lower level after 3 1/2 years. The current max is not safe, yet they do not act. Several members of the NRC review thought less than one part per million and maybe zero was the safe level. The EPA union scientists did the math, and risk for high-use persons and susceptible persons and the correct science goal is zero, exactly the same as other cumulative toxins arsenic and lead. These are the top contaminates of the fluoridation product. Phosphate mines, smokestacks, and pollution scrubbers' contaminated toxic sludge is used unprocessed. No government agency ever has even attempted chronic ingested benefit or safety studies. Not one. The health department will claim thousands of studies, but ask for one and it will walk away from the bluff. American Water Works Association's b703-06 is the product, and p.12 is the specification sheet with a full page of deadly contaminates. Many are radioactive as the mines also used to produce uranium from seven recovery units with the last closing in 1998. All this uranium is left in the products unmentioned to the public. The Atomic Energy Commission mine records show this data. Fluoride Action Network has several documented stories with all the proof and pictures for those who prefer denial. Most review panels just cut and paste Centers for Disease Control and American Dental Association public relations puff, which lacks any science and very little truth. Listen to Bill Kiel, Ph.D., who actually has researched the science and has a PowerPoint showing peer-reviewed current science. IAOMT has a detailed science-based fluoridation policy, as another reader mentioned. It beats anything the health department will ever say. Go to Bill Kiel, please, for the real science. Have a debate between Kiel and the health department. The last thing the health department wants is open debate with real science. Its staff members are cut-and-paste experts only, or they do OK at listing endorsements.

Dear Editor,
    Re: “Obama Letdown” [“Postmarks,” Dec. 4]: Not exactly duped, Stefan. Obama told us on the campaign trail that Afghanistan would be his "good war" (to borrow from the Orwellian playbook). What sort of foreign policy should we expect from a president who retained Robert Gates, a major player in Iran-Contra who also armed Saddam in the Eighties, and Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, Donald Rumsfeld's hand-picked assassination squad leader in Iraq? I, too, know lots of well-meaning Democrats who fell for Obama's intellect and cult-of-personality charm. Another handsome frontman for the Company, and completely beholden to the military establishment and Wall Street, as always.

Dear Editor,
    Regarding Brian Parrett's letter [“Postmarks,” Dec. 4]: I think he has managed to miss a particular part of the Texas Constitution. Article One, Section Four reads:
    "No religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office, or public trust, in this State; nor shall any one be excluded from holding office on account of his religious sentiments, provided he acknowledge the existence of a Supreme Being."
    Note that last sentence.
    Also remember that this is Texas, and an amendment to the state constitution which removed certain rights of an unpopular minority has happened in very recent memory. I'm glad that Parrett trusts the people of Texas not to vote for such things; I, for one, do not.