Letters to the Editor

Kerry couldn’t be bothered

On Wednesday, the Senate, on a 99-0 vote, approved “Project BioShield” legislation to pay for research and the production and stockpiling of vaccines and antidotes for bioterror agents (” ‘BioShield’ gets Senate OK,” Nation, Thursday). Of the 100 senators, only one apparently felt this anti-terror homeland-security legislation was not important. Of the 100 senators, only one did not bother to vote.

That is the senator who seeks to be the next president of the United States, John Kerry.

His absence on such a vital national security issue is disturbing and speaks volumes about his priority of keeping the United States safe from terrorism. When the real work of government needed to be done, fulfilling his duties in fighting terrorism from the Senate, Mr. Kerry was missing in action.

Can the United States afford to elect as president a man who cannot even take the issue of terrorism seriously as a senator?

JEFFREY IMM

Olney

Victory over vitriol

I wonder if the basis of Georgie Ann Geyer’s strong feeling that Tony Blair is on the way out as British prime minister (“Buffeted in Britain,” Commentary, Thursday) is not on the same shaky foundation as if one were to predict the future of President Bush based on what reads in The Washington Post, ignoring The Washington Times. Of course, one’s personal bias also helps, and there has been no doubt for some time as to where Miss Geyer stands on this issue.

Those of us whose memory stretches that far back — and I’m sure Miss Geyer falls in that category — may recall the vitriol faced by Winston Churchill when his pleas for intervention against the Nazis were ignored by Neville Chamberlain. One also may recall the bitter opposition to our going to war against Japan and Germany, even after Pearl Harbor, led by that otherwise great American hero, Charles Lindbergh. We are fortunate that President Franklin D. Roosevelt knew what was right.

If there is one personal action in my lifetime that I regret, it is having participated in one of the Washington marches to get us out of Vietnam. We should have stayed the course. We didn’t lose that conflict; we didn’t try to win. Far too many people in that part of the world are being persecuted today because we gave up the struggle to set them free.

We are engaged in a war against a tyrannical cult that seeks to wipe out all our freedoms and liberty and to imprison, enslave or execute all who do not bow to their will in every way. This is a conflict we must win, not just for our own good, but also for the good of all peoples in all countries of the world. Mistakes will be made along the way, but they can and will be corrected.

It’s time to stop picking on one another for the sake of securing a political victory. It is essential that we all pull together to win this war.

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