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Bush's Personal Agenda

How very important is "Writing in an Age of Terror" by David Swanson [see Nov/Dec 2005 issue or www.wafreepress.org/78/writingInAnAge.shtml]. It should grace the front page of every major newspaper in the country. It sincerely delivers an educational lesson for Americans.

Since the inception of the Bush presidency, Americans have seemed averse to speaking and writing the truth. The truth about GW Bush and his cabinet is not so complex that we're unable to discern it. The answer could lie in its distastefulness, its ugliness, and the danger he represents for the occupants of our nation and the world.

I don't know a single soul who admires Saddam Hussein. I am happy that he's imprisoned and hope he stays so for the remainder of his life. But at what price? 2,220 American youth and an estimated 300,000 innocent Iraqis slaughtered? This fact enrages me so that I cannot find words to express it. For the personal agenda of one man these lives have been snuffed out as if they never existed. For the personal agenda of one man our nation faces debt that will take half a century to recover from.

As we heard his hints about the dangers of Iraq, we're now hearing the same about Iran. On this I'd say we'd best tread very carefully. We'd best get out our copies of the US Constitution, read its words of wisdom and not hesitate to act accordingly.

Sylvia Barksdale Morovitz, Massachusetts

Don't Forget the High Gas Prices of Last Year

Many questions about oil prices are left unanswered from the past year. The price of oil had the biggest impact on the economy last year, and prices jumped by more than a dollar a gallon. The mainstream media led working class men and women of the US to believe that the primary factor was the war in the Middle East. Oil corporations used the war on Iraq as a front in order to get people to pay the high prices without question.

Now in 2006 we are still at war and the prices have dropped dramatically, and somehow the high prices of a couple months ago are not an issue anymore.

Why is it that when the price per gallon was on the rise, it was the primary focus of the media, yet when the price at the pump drops, there is just a sigh of relief with no explanation.

Don't get me wrong: lower prices at the pump are extremely good. But I hope the working class will see that someone got rich off the prices of the past year. We might have assumed that the extra money was being spent to support the country and the soldiers, but it was injurious and well-orchestrated price-gouging by the oil companies. The funds were being banked by big oil as profits without concern for the people paying at the pump or their loved ones fighting for the United States.

Jesse J. Lancaster, Shelton WA

Cartoon by the letter writer.

Migration Across the Southern Border

The economies of Mexico and other countries south of the border are in shambles. Coffee prices have plummeted. Farm subsidies in the US have put Mexican farmers out of business. People are moving north into the US for employment. The 17 billion dollars that Mexicans send back to their families is the second biggest source of revenue to the Mexican economy and is a major stabilizing influence on Mexico.

Operation Gatekeeper was instituted along our southern border in order to stop undocumented immigration at about the same time as the NAFTA treaty was entered into by the US, Canada, and Mexico. The border patrol initiated a strategy to tightly shut down the traditional crossing areas thus forcing the migrants to cross in the very inhospitable desert. In the last decade about 3000 migrants have lost their lives to dehydration and heat stroke.

Recently President Bush addressed the migration situation in a speech in Tucson. He talked about hiring of an additional 1000 border patrol officers. He also properly talked about a legalized system for migrants that do not present a security risk and have jobs available to them. Past experience seems to indicate that the hardening of the border mostly empowers the guides or "Coyotes" to become more clever and the flow of migrants continues. I suggest that the interested reader check out the Kennedy-McCain bill in the Senate. This bill also addresses the legalization of migrants that have previously entered the US.

Phil Heft, Kent WA

Victims of Divorce Court, Unite!

I am trying to contact women (or men) who believe they and their children have been dealt an injustice by our Washington State divorce court system. I would like your voices to be heard, especially if all the evidence was on your side yet the ruling went against you and your children. Please contact me at freddyyl106@cs.com.

Robin Sims Fisher, Fife WA