Paramount Theatre
Instead of Labels, Let's Focus on Issues and People
RECEIVED Tue., July 6, 2004
Dear Mr. Swanson,
I don't know about Mr. Moore's voting status ["Postmarks Online," July 5] but I and many Americans have a problem with a president that did not actually win the election. When I try to urge my apathetic friends to get out and vote this year and they reply "why, your vote doesn't count for anything," based on the last election, it's pretty damned hard to argue with them. Also this Richard Clarke that you call a liberal actually served two Reagan terms, one daddy-Bush term, and two Clinton terms. He mostly worked for conservative administrations and was highly respected because he is America's foremost expert on terrorism. Funny, but these previous presidents held weekly, sometimes daily meetings with him to gather the latest information on terrorism, and yet Condoleezza Rice and the president himself would barely give him the time of day. That is until after 9/11. I also saw the press conference myself where Richard Clarke admitted to getting the bin Laden family out of the U.S. because he (as a government servant) was ordered to do this by the White House for their own personal safety. He didn't lie about it. Given his background, the fact that he was respected and utilized by previous presidents, whether Democrat or Republican, hardly constitutes this "liberal" tag that you've put on him. He quit his post in frustration back in January after years of dedicated public service because Bush refused to come clean with the American people about what they knew prior to 9/11, and the fact that they didn't care to know anything prior to that date. I don't blame him. It would be hard to work for people that dumb. In my eyes he's a patriot more than anything else and has the résumé to prove it.
I don't know about Mr. Moore's voting status ["Postmarks Online," July 5] but I and many Americans have a problem with a president that did not actually win the election. When I try to urge my apathetic friends to get out and vote this year and they reply "why, your vote doesn't count for anything," based on the last election, it's pretty damned hard to argue with them. Also this Richard Clarke that you call a liberal actually served two Reagan terms, one daddy-Bush term, and two Clinton terms. He mostly worked for conservative administrations and was highly respected because he is America's foremost expert on terrorism. Funny, but these previous presidents held weekly, sometimes daily meetings with him to gather the latest information on terrorism, and yet Condoleezza Rice and the president himself would barely give him the time of day. That is until after 9/11. I also saw the press conference myself where Richard Clarke admitted to getting the bin Laden family out of the U.S. because he (as a government servant) was ordered to do this by the White House for their own personal safety. He didn't lie about it. Given his background, the fact that he was respected and utilized by previous presidents, whether Democrat or Republican, hardly constitutes this "liberal" tag that you've put on him. He quit his post in frustration back in January after years of dedicated public service because Bush refused to come clean with the American people about what they knew prior to 9/11, and the fact that they didn't care to know anything prior to that date. I don't blame him. It would be hard to work for people that dumb. In my eyes he's a patriot more than anything else and has the résumé to prove it.
Allen Cunningham
Wimberley
Wimberley