LETTERS

...I would be disappointed by tokenism...

...This is its primary goal...

...The fact that these people hold owls in high esteem is somehow appropriate, for it is a scientific truth that owls have small brains and are among the least intelligent of birds...

...It would have been more appropriate— and more to the point—to examine the hypocrisy of some Americans who are cheering for the insurgent Polish strikers, but who would readily cross any trade union picket line here at home...

...The question was hardly asked by anyone as to just why, with crime on the increase all across the land, the secret police should have spent their time and taxpayers' money deliberately entrapping people into committing criminal acts...

...He finally states the essence of The Progressive's politics: to work toward an imperialist peace between the two most powerful reactionary dictatorships in the history of the Earth so that they can jointly divide the world into spheres of influence...

...A further point was the preference of the secret police for a strong executive power in the country and a substantially weakened legislature, for the legislature had at times been critical of the secret police and had even proposed to pass laws that would curb some of the excesses of which the secret police had been suspected...

...As a cover-up, one member of the other party was also targeted and persuaded...

...such exploitation by institutions such as the World Bank is no mere accident or error of judgment...

...Because of stupid, dogmatic sectarianism, that's why...

...How did he overcome his preference for the horse...

...In this light...

...After the battle there will be plenty of time for ironing out ideological differences...

...Especially telling is Judith Randal's "The Patient Woman"—at least to me...

...So if there could be a way of discrediting members of the national legislature, that would serve a double purpose for the secret police...

...The takeover of power in Prague took place at the end of January 1948...

...Another blow was struck at the good name of the national legislature, and particularly at the selected political party...

...corporations can better exploit the Third World...

...Bernard A. Plovnick Cambridge, Massachusetts Patient woman I write with thanks for your December issue and its special attention to the problems of women...

...I also hope the trend will continue as the issues continue to arrive...

...The lesson that the Left had not learned then and, apparently, has not yet learned is that, when engaged in mortal conflict, you make common cause with all who oppose your enemy...

...As such, it is the mark of a closed mind...

...Irving Gold Miami Beach, Florida ABSCAM Once upon a time, the secret police in a certain country decided that instead of spending all their time trying to apprehend wanted criminals, they would embark on a plan to persuade some heretofore quite innocent people to commit criminal acts so they could entrap them...

...I could tell of a woman who went through every form of hell mentioned—six pregnancies, four successive Caesarians, a miscarriage, a stillborn child, heavy dosing with DES (to be sure that was years ago, and it was then the drug of choice, as they say...

...D.B...

...capital—a tool by which U.S...

...Third parties have long served a necessary function in the American political process...

...That would create a lot of good publicity for the secret police...

...But why is Milton driving an automobile...

...I am proud that I subscribe to a magazine that is indeed "progressive" in the truest sense of the word...

...Edward A. Johnson Ohiowa, Nebraska Superpowers In your December issue Sidney Lens states ("Another Call to Arms") that the United States and the Soviet Union should jointly ensure world "stability...

...He revised his position on nuclear energy and advocated a moratorium on construction of new plants and a crash program for solar and alternative fuels...

...James Storrow New York, New York I wish to commend your magazine for publishing the outstanding article by Judith Randal, "The Patient Woman...

...To assume that women are a quivering mass of complexes that can only be alleviated by tranquilizers, etc., is to do a grave injustice to women...

...Where is the "light at the end of the tunnel" in the world hunger situation as long as his ilk and philosophies such as his Bank's are dominating center stage...

...The Progressive's Milquetoast approach can best be understood, as well as its excuses for Soviet foreign policy...

...Mike Levinson White Plains...

...But the disguised secret police persisted and, after much effort, persuaded some eight or ten members of the one party in the national legislature to accept the bribes while pictures were secretly taken of them doing so...

...The plan did succeed...

...Until both governments cease to exist, we're damned if we do, damned if we don't...

...Mountains of information have exposed how the Bank participates in strategies to undermine Third World liberation movements...

...Americans, like Poles, are bound to learn eventually that "sham ideology cannot satisfy the human appetite for truth...

...capitalism without a concrete framework for doing so...

...Mark V. Morkovin Oak Park, Illinois Poverty brokers I appreciated "The Poverty Brokers," by Joseph Collins, Frances Moore Lappe, and David Kinley (December issue), about the abuses of the World Bank and its manipulation of Third World economies...

...Although your authors hint at this, they tend to present the World Bank as a misguided institution, unwittingly helping wealthy Third World elites, or helping U.S...

...In fact, I think he is right on target when he pinpoints the hypocrisy of "life lived on two levels" as an important factor in the Polish workers' discontent...

...What happened to the working-class movement during the McCarthy era...

...The targeted members of the legislature were in most cases reluctant to accept the offered bribes...

...If The Progressive is really serious about grass-roots renewal, why not include more than five million who voted for Anderson and thousands of the "under-thirty-five group" who collected two million signatures and put Anderson on the ballot in fifty states...

...You have traditionally and consistently provided a forum for discussing vital social issues that other elements of the news media are afraid to touch...

...I, too, would prefer to see different—humanistic— governments in both Washington and Moscow...

...The plan did not...

...Sidney Lens Chicago, Illinois The Left Gus Hall's criticism of David McReynolds's article and McReynolds's reply (December letters) bring home an extremely vital point...

...Furthermore, the article does not discuss how the World Bank works hand-in-glove with the CIA to promote U.S...

...A war between the superpowers would be a terrible thing, but so would a peace between them...

...David Sheppard Boca Raton, Florida After reading "The Poverty Brokers" and the shocking truth about the deleterious effects of World Bank philosophy on the unceasing effort to stem and crush world hunger, I have to conclude that World Bank President Robert McNamara was as much of a "snake oil" artist in that post as he was during the 1960s as Lyndon Johnson's Secretary of Defense...

...They provide a vehicle for a fuller, more accurate expression of the popular will...

...The unfair legal barriers which have been imposed upon prospective third parties amount to a suppression of competition and a national embarrassment...

...They also had noted that the members of one political party were more inclined than those of the other party to question some of the tactics of the secret police...

...Women have a permanent place in a magazine of The Progressive's quality...

...Randal is courageous and forthright in her reasoned attacks upon the sacred cows of the medical profession, namely obstetricians who so cavalierly disregard the true interests of patients...

...But by allowing "The Poverty Brokers" to go into print without insisting that the authors present what they might consider to be alternative approaches to aid the poor of the Third World, you weaken your usefulness...

...But the article left out important information regarding the origins and objectives of the World Bank, as well as the Bank's political activities in the Third World...

...New York Usually, I find The Progressive provocative, stimulating, helpful...

...His fifty-cents-a-gallon gasoline tax proposal was rough but it was no-nonsense energy conservation and revenue calculated to strengthen the Social Security system...

...I am very pleased to see this changing in recent issues...

...At the time, vote projections pointed to a significant loss of communist strength in the election scheduled for late spring...

...While eschewing a "crusade for fundamental and structural transformation of our economic and political system," Anderson nevertheless took sharp exception to Carter and Reagan outbidding each other on increasing the military budget, and championed international arms limitation agreement...

...corporations serving to promote capitalist exploitation of the Third World...

...As it stands, the piece is simple, if not sophomoric, criticism, and fails to recognize the economic, social, and political problems involved...

...The one constant criticism I have had is the position on feminism: I felt The Progressive gave only lip service to the struggle against women's oppression...

...It is high time someone took note of the fact that the male "macho" medical doctor is playing upon the emotional makeup of women in prescribing for them drugs which mask the symptoms they experience...

...I wonder, though, why Shanahan confines himself to the easy case of Watergate in referring to the hypocrisy of "life lived on two levels" here in the United States...

...John C. Spence III San Marino, California I congratulate you for printing the article "The 'Neurotic Woman' Syndrome," by Tona Kiefer, in your December 1980 issue...

...Resistance," November issue), is a juvenile reaction to change...

...The so-called World Bank is, in fact, a creature of U.S...

...Actually, they were bribes furnished by the taxpayers of the country and offered to the targeted victims by members of the secret police disguised as representatives of these foreigners...

...Accordingly, the secret police tried to persuade members of one political party in its national legislature to accept bribes, allegedly offered by wealthy individuals of a foreign country seeking special favors...

...That means we must start with what exists now, and make our demands on those in power today—hoping that after disarmament the two governments will either fade into the dustbin of history or be helped into it by popular action...

...The World Bank must be understood as what it is—a tool of the U.S...

...It folded up and fell apart, that's what...

...foreign policy in the Third World...

...Dan Abendroth Milwaukee, Wisconsin Monopoly Jim McClellan's article, "Two-Party Monopoly" (January issue), gave a thorough and disturbing account of the stranglehold which the two major parties now exert over the American electoral system as a result of their power to make the rules governing elections...

...If Milton's RC (Resistance to Change) factor is to control his actions, I hope I do not meet him in his 1973 Plymouth Fury at an intersection where he is protesting the red-amber-green signal...

...So if at the same time that political party could be made to appear to have criminals in its elected ranks, that would be another reason for the plan...

...On the issue of inflation, Anderson espoused price and wage controls mandated by employer and union agreement...

...In 1924, prior to television and national election campaign funds, Robert M. LaFollette, a third-party Presidential candidate and founder of The Progressive, received 16.6 per cent of the national popular vote...

...Constitution makes no provision for political parties, let alone a "two-party" system...

...That woman was my first wife, and I am grateful to you and to Judith Randal for a fine, solid, and well-researched piece and for telling a story that needs to be hammered into certain heads...

...Ted Means New Orleans, Louisiana Anderson difference By what criteria does The Progressive dismiss John Anderson's independent candidacy as "barely differentiated from the mainstream parties" (Editorial, December issue...

...I hope the mistakes of the male-dominated New Left of the 1960s and 1970s are not lost on you all, as the lessons of Vietnam seem to be lost on most Americans...

...Lawrence Weaverville, North Carolina Prague winter Milton Mayer's memory erred in his article, "Prague Winter" (January issue): The 1948 elections in Czechoslovakia were not free...

...William S. Mack Guilford, Connecticut Closed mind Milton Mayer's diatribe against seat belts, dial telephones, zip codes, social security numbers, etc...

...Unfair competition, whether in the economic or the political arena, has no place in a nation founded upon democratic principles...

...But we have an immediate problem: to end the arms race before we are incinerated...

...LETTERS Owls G. William Domhoff, in his article "Politics Among the Redwoods" (January issue), has unwittingly explained the generally unenlightened behavior of our nation's business and political leaders with his description of their reverence for that "great symbol of all mortal wisdom—the mighty owl...

...as a rule, work very easily...

...One must have serious doubts as to whether a similar candidacy could ever hope to achieve a comparable vote total today under the present system...

...Thus the balance of power shifted still more to the executive, criticism of the tactics of the secret police was stilled, some brand new "criminals" were created, and the secret police had much front-page publicity...

...Margaret Mozzanini Portland, Oregon You have one of the finest magazines I have ever read...

...Sylvia Steen Chicago, Illinois...

...Partially to blame for this history was a severe case of hypertension, which took her life nineteen years ago...

...It's admirable to support workplace democracy, broad-based decision-making, and freedom to dissent in Poland— if you also support those great causes in the United States...

...Jerry Voorhis Claremont, California Hypocrisy I have no problem with Dan Shanahan's observations on the situation in Poland ("Behind the Polish Revolt," January issue...

...Yet this concept has become cast in bronze by the two major parties and their willing accomplices, the broadcast networks, as McClellan aptly points out...

...The U.S...

...Better still, I'd like to see the nations of the world take steps toward inter-nationhood...

...You form a solid front that has a chance of winning...

...Jonathan Carson Austin, Texas The author replies: Jonathan Carson has a point, but he presses it a bit too far...