Letters to the Editor

Metaphorically speaking

I say Cathy Young’s New Year’s resolution to stop overusing Adolf Hitler and Nazi analogies (“Ad Hitlerum,” Culture, Thursday) is reminiscent of the German church’s head-in-the-sand approach to Nazism in the 1930s.

The reason these analogies are so effective is the emotions they evoke. As the generation that lived through World War II dies off, though, so too will the effectiveness of these analogies. All that will remain will be the moving and still pictures of the slaughter. Even those images will become stale as real-to-life carnage foisted in violent video games and movies desensitizes a new generation to the true horrors of life under Hitler.

History has shown that man inexorably repeats his mistakes, and Cathy Young is getting the new generation off to a fast start.

STEVEN VAN EPPS

Glen Burnie, Md.

The money trail

I am reluctant to respond to your lead editorial on Thursday, “Influence vs. integrity,” because it is both inaccurate and, ultimately, silly. However, I also recognize, as Mark Twain put it best, that “a truth is not hard to kill and … a lie well told is immortal.” So, hoping against hope that the truth might live, let’s set the record straight.

The Center for Public Integrity is a nonprofit, nonpartisan investigative reporting and research organization that has produced more than 250 reports and 12 books about ethics and public service issues. The past seven years, center reports have been honored 21 times by the Society of Professional Journalists, Investigative Reporters and Editors and other respected organizations. Our funding comes from foundations, including George Soros’ Open Society Institute, and individuals, and we disclose our major donors on our Web site. We don’t accept contributions from corporations, labor unions, governments or advertising. This information, plus three years of annual IRS 990 forms, staff and board biographies, etc., are all posted for the public on our site.

We alienate both parties equally. Not only do we have an elaborate, entirely independent editorial process of researchers, writers, editors and lawyers, but our donors — George Soros among them — recognize that we investigate any subject without fear or favor. For example, the Center for Public Integrity has the most extensive, Web-searchable database about 527 political organizations in America, where we recently disclosed the activities and spending of that same Mr. Soros, which everyone from the National Review to the New York Times has used in recent weeks. It was the center that first disclosed that Democratic-leaning organizations out-raised the Republican 527s by a 2-1 margin.

Our “integrity is suspect” to The Washington Times not because our reports and data aren’t terrific, dead-on accurate or heavily used by the public and journalists. No, we have had the temerity to write true but unflattering things about the powers that be, who right now happen to be the Republicans and George W. Bush.

From 1993 through 2000, during the period in which the Center for Public Integrity broke the Clinton White House Lincoln Bedroom fund-raising scandal and was quoted thousands of times throughout the nation criticizing the ethically challenged Clinton administration, we were very popular — our integrity celebrated — at The Washington Times. Indeed, center employees actually wrote three Op-Ed columns for The Times about Commerce Secretary Ron Brown’s infamous trade missions and other Clinton administration misdeeds, and center findings or perspectives were quoted 96 times in The Washington Times.

In the three years that Mr. Bush has been president, our work has been cited a mere 18 times. Now, why did that happen?

CHARLES LEWIS

Executive director

Center for Public Integrity

Washington

Baseball’s legend

In reference to yesterday’s column “Baseball’s tease of D.C. continues” (Sports), which says, “Many of the nearly dead white men in the vicinity cling to the false deity of Joe DiMaggio, the late ballplayer whose grace was one of the subjects on ESPN Classic the other night.”

As one of the “nearly dead white men” mentioned in Tom Knott’s piece, I would like to say that DiMaggio was certainly a much better hero figure than, say, Michael Jackson. Someday, Mr. Knott also will be “nearly dead,” and I hope his generation gets more respect than he gives to mine. I found the quote highly offensive and would not expect his remark to be found in The Washington Times.

STEVE LEO

New Market, Va.

Check the dictionary

I am surprised by Thomas Sowell’s objection to the use of the word “insurgent” (“Verbal posturing,” Commentary, Jan. 8). Regardless of political bent or opinion about the war in Iraq, the use of the term “insurgent” has nothing to do with neutrality or objectivity; it is precise and correct. From the Merriam-Webster dictionary: “1: a person who revolts against civil authority or an established government; especially: a rebel not recognized as a belligerent.”

My nephew, Capt. Ernesto Blanco, was killed Dec. 28 by a bomb placed by insurgents. These insurgents, or insurrectionists, used terror tactics, and that fact also makes them terrorists. We have to stop demonizing one another and pull together as a nation to complete this task successfully. Political correctness from the left or the right is not going to help us win. We can delude ourselves that all is going just peachy in Iraq or that we, the people of the United States of America, are in it only for oil and the glory of Halliburton, et. al. Only looking at things as they really are is going to help us succeed in Iraq.

Like it or not, a substantial majority of “we the people” committed ourselves to this war by voicing support for the president. We can complain that we didn’t have all the facts, that we were misled by faulty intelligence, that we thought we were going to go in fast and get out fast, but that is not going to change reality. If the war in Iraq is the main motivation for you to vote in November, and you agree with the actions President Bush initiated on our behalf, vote to keep him in office. If you are against his decision to go to war, by all means vote him out of office. I guarantee that if a Democrat or a Libertarian or a Green Party candidate gets elected in November, the troops will still be there for many more years. If you cannot keep faith in the president, at least keep faith in the troops and support them in this terrible and difficult task so they can complete it as soon as possible and so that no other troops have to be sent to Iraq 10 years from now.

This is how we honor the sacrifice of all the men and women killed and wounded and those still fighting in this war against insurgents, insurrectionists and terrorists in Iraq.

JOSE M. CALDAS

Atlanta

Misleading descriptions

The Marijuana Policy Project does, indeed, applaud Rep. Dennis J. Kucinich’s strong support of legal protection for medical-marijuanapatients (“Kucinich’s own crusade,” Page 1, Thursday). However, the story erred in calling project members “pro-pot.”

The Marijuana Policy Project does not advocate or encourage the use of marijuana or any other drug. Believing that responsible adult marijuana users should not face arrest and jail does not make one “pro-pot.” After all, those who supported the 1933 repeal of Prohibition were not necessarily “pro-booze”; they simply didn’t want the liquor market controlled by gangsters.

BRUCE MIRKEN

Director of communications

Marijuana Policy Project

San Francisco