The war on terror, at home and abroad
Heartfelt thanks to outgoing Secretary of Health and Human Services Tommy Thompson for his most valued comments regarding the ease with which terrorists might attack us through our food supply. They might not, indeed, have realized how easy it would be.
Thanks are equally due to Tom Ridge, outgoing secretary of homeland security, for his brilliant notion in the headlines as to how terrorists could so easily cooperate with the obliging drug cartels to infiltrate our southern border. I mean, if Jose can do it, why not Abdullah?
Who needs the hassle of hand-held Stinger missiles or laser beam technology, though I must admit, the latter idea is not entirely without merit.
So, keep those helpful ideas rolling in, especially from outgoing senior public officials.
M. GLYN LONG
Bonita
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As much as I support President Bush, and as shocking as it sounds, I do not want any of my three sons joining the military because the military does not make protecting U.S. service personnel an important enough priority.
Countless soldiers and others have been killed on the road to the Baghdad airport because the military refuses to push housing and landscaping away from the road, thereby giving the insurgents an easy place from which to launch an attack.
We are told that everything is being done to provide armored vehicles, only to find out from the manufacturer that it could produce more if asked.
Iraqis, it seems, are free to drive wherever they like no matter how many cars are used to blow up American 20-year-olds.
And we fret about civil affairs projects for poor Iraqis while our soldiers eat and congregate in tents which for months now have been the targets of insurgents lobbing mortars and rockets.
Frankly, I don't care if sewage flows knee-deep through Fallujah and Sadr City if the choice is between building hardened structures at exposed military bases or digging trenches in a Baghdad slum.
War is a deadly and dangerous business. But, still, the Army has an obligation to take all reasonable steps necessary to protect our soldiers, to the greatest extent possible, from obviously foreseeable risks.
Bush, Donald Rumsfeld and the rest can continue to ignore the problems. And I will continue to tell my sons to ignore, when the time comes, the increasingly rich entreaties of military recruiters.
STEVEN E. COWEN
San Diego
A few days ago I saw a picture of our soldiers eating in a tent and told myself that is not good. Then last week I opened the Union-Tribune and there it was: "20 Americans killed in a mess tent."
And what does President Bush say? "It should not stop the elections and I am confident democracy will prevail in Iraq."
What would we do if some country tried to force something on us? Are we trying to save the world again? We tried and accomplished it twice, but this is not the same as other wars we have fought. I cannot believe it continues. Where are our heavy bombers? Why have we not used them?
WALTER E. HERR
Escondido
People complain about the fact that Iraq is not prepared for the elections scheduled in January, and want them to be delayed. Iraq will not be any better prepared three or six months down the road. Have the elections as scheduled. It may be ugly, but it is necessary. You have to start somewhere.
ROBERT JONES
San Diego
It is quite a stretch for Robert Caldwell to connect the mess in Iraq with the Battle of the Bulge ("Iraq evokes history lesson in fortitude," Insight, Dec. 19).
In Belgium, the United States was fighting a war where the enemy had declared war on us. The Battle of the Bulge took place in a country that supported the United States in liberating it from a foreign power, and 60 years later the populace there still supports the troops who fought there. None of these things are true or will be true in 60 years regarding our combat in Iraq.
A more apt analogy regarding "fortitude" would be Vietnam. The similarities are striking. In Vietnam, U.S. policy was to "stay the course" in a country where the populace didn't want us there, didn't assist us while we were there, and didn't support the "duly" elected leaders we foisted on them. So our leaders provided "fortitude" by sending in troops (and bringing back bodies) until it took a political storm at home to see that "staying the course" was a bankrupt policy.
So what did "fortitude" in Vietnam bring us? Do the Vietnam people welcome us back as liberators today?
Maybe Caldwell should frame his "fortitude" concern based on our experiences in Vietnam, which more closely represents what is going on in Iraq, rather than try to steal the glory from a much different war 60 years ago.
MICHAEL PASTORE
Encinitas
Homo sapiens and global warming
"The real consensus on 'global warming'" by Roy Spencer (Insight, Dec. 19) is a perfect example of why another consensus predicts that Homo sapiens is not going to last the 10 million-year-average of other species. We cannot agree with each other. Half think one thing and the other half think the opposite.
Our mean-spirited culture in particular has no concept of thinking about one, much less seven generations into the future. Stopped by deadlock, always willing to wait some more before taking action, having unspoken political and religious agendas – that's us.
Fact: Islands are going under and people there are moving away. The Gulf Stream in slowing down. The human population curve tracks the rise of CO2 in the atmosphere.
Prediction of the consensus of atmospheric scientists: The freshening of the Atlantic from the melting of glaciers will change our stable, mild climate to one that is going to be disruptive to our food supply, water supply and our health because of the movement of tropical diseases onto our continent.
Prediction of the consensus of geologists: Global warming will trigger global cooling as fresh water changes the density of the ocean currents, so the once-salty cold currents no longer plunge deep into the ocean.
Prediction of the consensus of anthropologists: Americans are going to do nothing to change their fate, hoping to rely on guns to move into lands where the crops will grow, water is available and energy sources are present.
ELEANORA ROBBINS
La Mesa
Spencer argues that until all climatologists agree to a "scientific certainty" on the causes and ultimate effects of global warming, it should not be considered a serious problem. A remarkable thesis, akin to the argument of the tobacco industry that an individual case of lung cancer cannot be indisputably blamed on cigarette smoking.
Spencer asks us to simply disregard the mounting circumstantial evidence that man-made CO2 is responsible for rising worldwide temperatures, increasingly violent hurricanes, droughts, forest fires, shifting precipitation patterns, diminishing snowpacks, melting permafrost and ice caps, and rising sea levels, and then, like a chain smoker coughing up a lung, just cross our fingers and assume it's all due to natural causes!
Common sense tells us to stop, now, before it is too late. In this great debate over global warming, potentially the most catastrophic crisis in the history of mankind, which side can we least afford to be wrong?
TOM SMITH
San Diego
The Union-Tribune carried a headline on Dec. 19: "U.S. thwarts attempts to address global warming at U.N. conference." This should come as no surprise to the voters who elected George W. Bush last month. But to those of us who did not vote for Bush, this comes as fulfillment of our worst fears.
This dreaded prospect is exacerbated by the U.S. decision to not only block action on global warming but as the U-T article reported, to block any discussion of global warming as a looming problem that threatens the health of our planet.
As if the Iraq war were not enough of a costly diversion from the war on terror, the administration is now perverting the war on terror further by supporting Saudi Arabia's unconscionably greedy position on reduction of the use of fossil fuels. The Saudis refuse to participate in assisting poorer countries and, worse, they insist on compensation for any fall in oil revenue as a result of measures taken to forestall global warming.
This administration, elected on the promise of protecting us, is failing on the real threat of global warming while it is again giving aid and comfort to Saudi Arabia, the chief funder and global purveyor of Islamic fundamentalism, the inspiration for the atrocities perpetrated in the name of Allah by al-Qaeda and others in New York, Bali, Madrid and elsewhere.
JACK SCHAPS
La Jolla
New regime(s) in San Diego
In your Dec. 18 editorial "Necessary move / Aguirre takes on city pension board," you say that the city attorney "is doing his part, however brusquely." That is an unwarranted description of his necessary actions. It's about time we finally have a take-charge city official to shake up the status quo. More than firmness is required to restore San Diego to America's Finest City.
If folks are getting their toes stepped on by Mike Aguirre to accomplish this massive undertaking, too bad.
GEORGIA BANKSTON
San Diego
Mike Aguirre, the "savior of taxpayers," now graces the throne of city attorney, proclaiming he shall put an end to the mismanagement and waste of our kingdom's coffers. And one of his first moves is to demand full-time police protection for himself, paid by (guess who) the taxpayers.
By all means, Sir Aguirre. Is there anything else we lowly taxpayers can do for you?
MARK EBY
San Diego
Mayor Murphy is probably correct in stating, "My election is legal." But I think the election would have more positive value for the many unhappy campers, distressed enough to enable so many "legal" votes for Frye, if the election could be seen as "ethical" too. Aren't the "true" wishes of the voter most important, especially in light of so much disenchantment with the way important city issues are being handled?
So how about a runoff election between Murphy and Frye? It's worth the expense. It puts the issue where it belongs: with the voters. It will make better support for what otherwise could be a lame-duck mayor.
HAL HEATH
Mira Mesa
Give it up. Let it go. Why fuel a fire that is never going to start? Is it going to change anything? No. How many of my tax dollars are paying for these recounts and rebuttals?
If someone is too dumb or distracted to fill in a bubble, I don't want his vote counted. It doesn't deserve to be counted. It's not worthy.
Democracy is a wonderful process and should never be rushed or taken lightly. Even though I work more than 60 hours per week, I spend some serious, quality hours filling in my sample ballot. I research all the issues, candidates and propositions. At the polls, when I am done filling out my ballot, I go over it half a dozen times, comparing it to my sample ballot because I know my vote is important and I don't want any mistakes.
I voted for Ron Roberts. He didn't win. Oh, well. This election is over. On to the next election, when I can voice my opinion again.
CLINT ENGLEDOW
San Diego
