LETTERS
LETTERS Presidential Parallels Lyndon Johnson created a totally false incident in the Gulf of Tonkin and won tacit Congressional agreement to declare unconstitutional war on North Vietnam. The...
...H. Levy San Francisco, California I have some problems with Jesse Jackson's assessment of the "slave-labor conditions" endured by foreign workers...
...Maybe you could reduce the size of your existential expressionist artwork (which a lot of readers don't like anyway) to make room...
...One man's indiscretion is another man's truth...
...Daphna Golan Hannan Hever Orly Lubin Zach Adam Berkeley, California Vacation at Club Dead They say that travel is so broadening, but that usually isn't the case...
...Gandhi's fasts to bring Hindus and Moslems together in India did work in the short term, primarily because of his celebrity and because neither group wanted to be held responsible for Gandhi's death...
...It has created a terrible vacuum of leadership...
...If it's slavery for them, why isn't it slave labor for us...
...Please keep The Progressive monthly...
...Girth control is an admirable habit—one that more publications, and people, should observe...
...Susan Forthman Northridge, California Lean and hungry is fine with me...
...Fielding Dawson New York, New York If I were Jesse Jackson, I'd sue you for libel for your cover picture...
...For the sake of the future of Israel, we urge you to do whatever you can to end this unconditional support...
...The current pattern is identical and includes many of the same players ("The Emperor's New Clothes," Comment, July issue...
...Even The Progressive has fallen for it...
...Gandhi, probably the most famous hunger artist of this century, used fasting in both senses and was very sensitive to issues of blackmail and coercion that were raised when it was used as a political technique...
...He is, hands down, the most handsome, photogenic, and interesting candidate this country has ever seen...
...Milton Nation Elgin, Illinois Nissan, Tennessee Looks like The Progressive has adopted the latest vogue—Bash a Jap...
...Is the Nissan system responsible for American corporate duplicity...
...We need to diffuse the power of the Presidency...
...Gandhi himself said, "I must state that I cannot give up an opinion honestly held even if the whole world fasts against me...
...I might as well give up my belief in God because a body of atheists fasted against such belief...
...If there is any way of getting it back, I would be eternally grateful...
...We need all of The Progressive, and we need it bad...
...This is the crisis of leadership we have been whispering about since 1967...
...As she admitted, she had some firm notions when she went to Central America...
...Carol Mottl Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania Israeli Occupation On behalf of a group of Israeli academics residing temporarily in the United States, we call upon those concerned about the future of Israel to oppose the continuing occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip...
...Hugh A. Ross Just don't eliminate Molly Ivins's Small Favors...
...Now is our best chance to take charge of our own future...
...By calling for impeachment, we don't mean just the legal procedure...
...In a society that values academic and other honors almost as much as it honors dollars, Schwartz's decision to forgo the rewards he would receive by tuning into and feeding the brain circuits of young, materialistic, ambitious physicists is courageous and admirable...
...John Junkerman can bash with the best of them ("Nissan, Tennessee," June issue), but he apparently didn't notice the contradiction in his own concoction...
...Best wishes for beating the crisis...
...We now have a Persian Gulf "incident," and "Iraq" is suddenly spelled "Iran" so that another President can wage another self-aggrandizing war...
...AH letters may be edited for clarity and conciseness...
...Randall Williams Martinsville, Missouri In the eyes of this beholder, you're beautiful— whether lean or hungry or whatever size...
...The Progressive, too, deserves credit for resisting the impulse to stick with easy, "politically correct" formulations...
...People tend to take along their prejudices and preconceptions when they travel, and bring those prejudices and preconceptions back intact...
...We are growing again...
...Occupation of Arab territories with more than 1.3 million Palestinian inhabitants, daily abuse of human rights, expulsions, arrests, and humiliation—these undermine the moral and democratic foundations of Israeli society and perpetuate the Israeli-Palestinian conflict...
...Allen Sawyer Gainesville, Florida I hope you will be getting angry if not outraged responses to the cover illustration depicting Jesse Jackson as a psychotic and divided monster...
...Dan Wagner Glenside, Pennsylvania Jesse Jackson's Challenge While I admire most of Jesse Jackson's attitudes and actions, and read Salim Muwakkil's article ("Jackson's Challenge," July issue) with great interest, I still believe that Jackson's current lead in the polls for the Democratic Presidential nomination is only statistical and temporary...
...What did he ever do to you...
...Barney Watson Medford, Oregon The hottest national issue the independent peace movement has had since Lyndon Johnson bombed Vietnam is the present Iran-contra arms scandal...
...Which is it...
...But whether he wrought any real change is another matter...
...That's what the Democrats and Republicans fear...
...You respect the intelligence of your readers, and we respect yours...
...Religious and political strife continues in India to this day...
...But even as I do so, I question the ultimate effectiveness and value of their action, both for themselves and for society...
...You will...
...Still, like William Schulz, I must admire the courage, resolution, and discipline of those who choose fasting as their form of personal protest and sacrifice...
...Impeachment will help...
...I found more interesting and significant reading in your "lean" thirty-two pages than in the 100-plus pages of a leading news weekly...
...In 1964, Johnson ran for President promising peace in Vietnam...
...political and economic support for Israel contributes to the continuing occupation...
...Terri Mitchell Los Angeles, California A Physicist Objects The Progressive and Jer-rold J. Neuburger gave discouraged Americans a ray of hope by publicizing the story of physicist Charles Schwartz and the stand he took at the University of California ("A Physicist Objects," Datelines, July issue...
...It's likely that Jesse Jackson recognizes this painful truth, since he has repeatedly said he would accept the number-two position...
...Margaret Dutton Garberville, California The greatest challenge facing Jesse Jackson is truly to rid himself of the chronic case of overt racism he contracted from living in this racist society...
...But she kept her eyes open and her judgment unclouded, and she found that real life is more complicated than political slogans and propaganda...
...You have before...
...Mary Clarke Los Angeles, California It's the content that counts...
...She's to be commended for setting down her observations complete with doubts and contradictions...
...Jean Lyons Saratoga, California You mean the Puzzle is really gone...
...The peace movement has a duty to stand independent of the deceptive Democratic Party...
...I was struck by the remarkable honesty of her article...
...Most of the Party's leaders are either silent on impeachment or actually protecting the brutal Reagan/Bush Administration...
...Roberta Hayes Denver, Colorado Lean and Hungry Ilike the spirit of your remarks in "Lean and Hungry" (Editor's Memo, July issue...
...I hope no more print will be wasted bashing Japanese...
...we mean organizing the anger people feel against the lone-nut-in-the-White-House concept called the Presidency...
...Russell King Scottsville, Virginia The editors welcome correspondence from readers on all topics, but prefer to publish letters that comment directly on material previously published in The Progressive...
...At one point, Junkerman quotes a Japanese supervisor as saying the American production line is understaffed by Japanese standards, yet later he calls the abuses at the plant "a natural consequence of the Nissan system...
...Millions of people like myself broke from the Democratic Party never to return, and some formed an alternative, independent party, the People's Party/Peace and Freedom Party, to run candidates truly independent of the banks and the Pentagon...
...Unconditional U.S...
...It cries for the impeachment of Ronald Reagan and George Bush, yet notice how quiet the Democrats are...
...Ronald Reagan infected this country with a bad case of America the Superior...
...There is no way a black candidate could be elected President in this century...
...Paul Kangas San Francisco, California The Hunger Artists The Reverend William F. Schulz's article on hunger strikes ("The Hunger Artists," Reflections, June issue) raised many important questions...
...He then proceeded to make war...
...For the sake of both the Israeli and the Palestinian peoples, it is necessary to work toward a political solution that will take into account the rights of the Palestinians as well as Israel's right to exist...
...Perhaps Milton Coleman is ready to run for President...
...This difficult but necessary work of purging racism is best done by him as a private citizen, not as a Presidential candidate...
...Wisenberg, who wrote "Vacation at Club Dead" (The Last Word, July issue), is an honorable exception...
...Fasting is an ancient religious technique for spiritual purification, but its popularity as a tool for political and ideological persuasion is of more recent origin...
...And is the Nissan system responsible for sexual harassment on the job...
...You ought to take a long look into your own soul to figure out why you allowed this travesty...
...If only there were more scientists like him...
...The illustrations accompanying Salim Muwakkil's article, like the cover, show no political awareness of Jackson's impact and his passion...
...God help us and our Constitution...
Vol. 51 • August 1987 • No. 8
