LETTERS

...Nixon was also guilty of using government agencies for political purposes to assure his reelection...

...The United States maintains a naval "presence" in the Persian Gulf at Bahrain island, a presence which probably has done more to entice the Soviets to make naval visits to ports in the Gulf than anything else...

...Finally, as a Congressional staffer, Todd must realize that there was absolutely no way the Congress would let the Library build that building without making a grab for space, and his amazement that this has come to take place rings hollow...

...This is a familiarly determined line of the U.S...

...military establishment, i.e, that the United States is trying to maintain a balance of power in the Gulf...

...Frances H. French Baltimore, Maryland Arab Arms Trade In The Progressive's October issue, Judith Miller's Comment, "Accelerating Arab Arms Trade," is misleading in certain important respects...

...First, there is reference to "wealthy Arab purchasers" who "can affect U.S...

...The actual Watergate break-in was a minor incident and because it bears the name of all of Nixon's transgressions, a large percentage of the public think that Nixon was unduly punished for the Watergate break-in...

...increase— still—of 4,000 consumers daily, not to mention a global growth of more than 9,100 per hour...

...The format of her remarks was to report "government analysts," and to leave the reader with their concern, which reflects internal U.S...

...Neither parents nor teachers nor school administrators should have the right to decide about textual material required— there should be no required reading, but a wider choice for all...

...Larry Burns New York, New York Reason for Amnesty Many reasons for amnesty for the draft evaders and deserters have been written and spoken, but I have yet to hear or see the reason that means the most to me...

...But I agree with Lens...

...If it was right that our young men of the 1960s were to be required to fight against North Vietnam, then the Congress, not the draft evaders, was the guilty party for failing to declare war...

...I hope the American people realize that Nixon isn't being punished for a mere break-in of the Democrat Headquarters...

...Article 1, section 8 of our Constitution, includes the provision that "The Congress shall have p o w e r . . . to declare war...

...But how could any educated man compile so much discussion about shortages and inflation with not a word about the continuing population explosion...

...Also, to say that steroids "resemble" estrogen is to belie the fact that they are actually quite different in function, and are merely members of the same family of compounds...

...At one time the Presidency of the United States was thought to be a great honor, and candidates sought the job for that purpose and because they felt that they could make a contribution toward the welfare of our country...

...Our troubles do not stop with the military and monopolies...

...A. Schmitz New York, New York...

...The Shah of Iran's pressures to raise oil prices despite Saudi Arabian attempts to hold them back have been clouded by such reporting, which leaves the onus for all our oil problems on the Arabs, perennial political scapegoats in this country...

...Nixon turned it into an instrument for personal gains such as his income tax evasion, making improvements upon his California and Florida homes at the expense of the taxpayers, accepting jewelry for his wife, and many other things to enhance his personal fortune...

...Our arms sales to all and sundry of the riparians are simply the deplorable end result of fuzzy policies that relate as much to our weakness in the face of our Israeli problem as they do to our lack of determination to reduce arms and weapons systems generally...

...we will have to get it by "slashing*' military budgets...

...LETTERS Freedom from Coercion I read with much interest Carrol Cagle's Comment in the November issue about the breakthrough for education and freedom from coercion in the New Mexico schools...

...All this saber-rattling will get us more war than peace, whereas a fifty-fold increase in birth control would cost only 10 per cent of the world's present arms race and just might bring us back a happy world...

...The Watergate incident would never have amounted to anything if it had not been for the criminal coverup of it...

...Estrogen, furthermore, is not used to speed the weight increase of cattle...

...Hania Ris's letter in the September issue that my once progressive home state (Wisconsin) still has an anti-birth control law, and I trust that Planned Parenthood, Inc., and others are taking steps to rescind it, as a violation of the U.S...

...For instance, Todd aptly pointed out the cramped conditions in the Library of Congress, yet he ignored the fact that modern microfilm technology makes the construction of libraries (in this case a taxpayer-supported addition to the Library costing $90 million) an unnecessarily expensive luxury...

...Government decisions regarding the selection of a weapon...

...It was great to see another prominent author pointing out how the extravagant military complex is robbing the human family of needed items...

...No calculation of supply and demand is complete without reckoning with our U.S...

...This extension of super power confrontation has had no effect of "balancing" the situation...

...Morris M. Kling Louisville, Kentucky Congress and Its Library It was interesting to read former Congressional staff assistant Rusty Todd's Comment in the October issue entitled "How to Steal a Library...

...If, on the other hand, the Congress was right in not declaring war, then the Congress and the President were the guilty parties...

...It is not merely lack of space that has lowered the quality of the Library's work in this area but an overfondness for financing university-style research projects that drain funds away from the Library's primary role and elevate the General Accounting Office to a superior source of information as far as the legislative process is concerned...

...It is a minor point, but while Judith Miller knows, unfortunately many Americans still do not seem to be aware that the Iranians are not Arabs...

...Carolyn Vidal Tyner Gainesville, Florida Corrections in Chemistry It is a minor point, but I believe that the reference in Joseph Sanders's "The Racer's Edge," in the October issue, to estrogen as being a carcinogen is inaccurate...

...Unless we can find real and meaningful ways to atone for what our Government did to all those young men, any bicentennial celebration will be only a mockery and a farce...

...They required our young men to fight, like the Hessians in our own Revolution, for a foreign tyranny that its own people were rebelling against...

...Martin Thibault Washington, D. C. Shocked I was shocked to learn from Dr...

...Education is a privilege, a commodity, and we ought to offer it and not rob our children of their freedom to grow up honest and alive...

...There should be no argument as to what dogma to force on our children...

...In addition, Todd conveniently overlooks the Library's primary role in assisting Congress through providing complete and accurate research data to Congress for use in considering legislation...

...Norma Nichols Spencer, Wisconsin People Not Running Out The article, "RunningOut of Everything/' by Sidney Lens, in the October issue, was informative and interesting...

...Judith Miller's piece did not help readers understand much about the problem...

...Obviously there is a need to fulfill very real shortages in space within the Library, but there is also a critical need for Congressional staff space that could better be alleviated by usurping two floors of the Library's new annex rather than building another overpriced Hanging Gardens of Babylon such as the Rayburn House Office Building...

...officials" fear that "secret intra-Arab sales will further complicate the already difficult task of balancing military potential, and hence stability, in the Persian Gulf...

...We should have started twenty years ago investing $25 billion per year in fertility control...

...Unfortunately, in writing a journalistic account of this issue, Todd's advocacy style of writing overlooks several pertinent issues...

...Actually, this is the last thing our policy does for the world...

...He was virtually impeached because of the various additional sins and crimes he committed...

...We owe a great debt not only to those young men who accepted exile or prison rather than deny their Constitution and their consciences, but also to those who had been taught that patriotism meant they could trust their own Government...

...Later, the writer simply reports "Some U.S...

...So much for my twenty-three credits of organic chemistry...

...Compact microfilm readers and storage units are now a reality that can eliminate the hundreds of thousands of little-used books cluttering up shelf space in the Library of Congress...

...I am convinced that this power was given to the Congress to prevent the President from becoming a monarch who could determine to suit himself when and where his subjects must fight...

...They should be free to decide what to them is logical and true, what agrees with the universal laws for persons of honor and reason, and what they can assent to...

...This sentence is followed by declaring that "the Iranian role" in this situation "is a troublesome example...

...We still have to conquer greed, apathy, pollution, and the stork...

...We can surely follow New Mexico's example and make education available to all, but force it onto no one, since life cannot be forced, it must be lived...

...I believe the drug Sanders was talking about is stilbestrol...

...Constitution...

...Lee Dinsmore Elcho, Wisconsin 'Watergate' Deceptive It was a mistake to call Nixon's multiple, gigantic, immoral, and fraudulent manipulations "Watergate...

...political biases rather than objective observations...