A Reality Check from My Readers

TStrand writes: "As a person who is keenly aware of the aftereffects of 9/11, and a world traveler, I see a lot of unrest in the world that we do not experience in the U.S. Why haven't we had any repeats of a 9/11 type event? No big disasters, no bombs in malls, or whatever qualifies as a 'disaster' in your mind? Did the Radical Islamists simply give up after determining that all the time in training camp was just a nice exercise, but now they've found other pursuits? Highly unlikely. Or is it that whatever measures the government has taken happen to be working?"

TStrosnider writes: "No, I don't think the administration is 'in better touch' with the American people than the media or anyone else. In fact, I think they 'misunderestimated' the public's intelligence to a point where the average, middle of the road moderates are insulted, and have had enough."

Floyd Mason of Denver, N.C. writes: "I live in North Carolina where many people support whatever President Bush says or does. I think part of the reason so many in my state are supportive, no matter the facts, is the perception that he must be a good man because he professes his Christianity publicly. Something along the lines that a leader that says he will pray for someone must be of high moral character."

Trey Kindlinger writes from Fort Meade, Md.: "As someone who grew up fundamentalist Christian near Dallas, I would have to say there are a few points working for the President.

"1) Most fundamentalist Protestants don't care about 'secular' issues (increased power of the Presidency, etc.), they care about abortion, church/state issues, and the like, and they see the President as on their side on those issues.

"2) The current war on terrorism has been couched in pseudo-religious terms, which translates well for Christian conservatives who are fighting their own 'war' (good vs. evil).

"3) Concerning the point about 'whatever the media and intellectuals say,' that's been a point of contention for a long time. There's been a long history of fundamentalist Christians vilifying the MSM (read: East Coast and California) and intellectualism."

P. Minges writes from Bumpass, Virginia: "I live in the southern part of Northern Virginia. Lots of military, beer drinkers, and religious. I've heard it all. I agree that after 911 everyone wanted to be led and they wanted desperately to think we had a competent leader. If we didn't -- what would happen to us? . . .

"President Bush exploited our weaknesses and made us less than what we were. A true leader would have exploited our strengths and made us more than what we were."

miuwtant writes: "One of my friends . . . is certain that the war in Iraq -- and therefore Bush -- has kept terrorists out of the U.S., an argument that makes no sense at all to me but from which he will not budge. He does not believe there are any historical parallels to Iraq and the war on terror -- that the situation today uniquely demands a strong executive taking secret action against a hidden enemy, and to hell with civil liberties. Why would a God-fearing Republican need to worry about the government, anyway? . . .

"What is a common thread . . . is the reliance of my red friends on the red media. The WP & NYT are for lining your bird cage, they say. I get barraged by quotes from the WT and NYP and by some of the most amazing e-mails containing the latest apologies for the administration. One friend went so far as to say he only reads what he agrees with. That speaks volumes about why so many continue to back what I believe any educated, objective person would conclude is a failed presidency."

StonewallJax writes: "I live in Alabama - a red state if there ever was one. Around here, people use the word 'Democrat' the way they use the word 'Queer,' and with the same sort of contempt for lesser beings.

"I don't believe it's the 'strongman' concept that animates Bushies here - I think it's a profoundly intense conviction that people AGAINST Bush are the worst kind of fools. I believe that Republicans who still support Bush do so because they have profited personally somehow, either in business or by keeping out the riffraff."

Eric Anderson writes from Greeley, Colo.: "I live in Rep. Marilyn Musgrave's very very red district of northeastern Colorado, although I was born and raised and lived until I was 28 in some of bluest parts of the north coast of Northern California. One distinct difference here is the influence of old-time, dogmatic, inflexible, father-knows-best Christian religions of various denominations and their power over the people's ability to think for themselves. The majority of people here in red state farming parts of Colorado seem to want very much to live under a classic male authority figure of some type like they find in religion, be it a priest or minister or pastor or father or traditional God, and they readily submit and bend their own thinking powers to that authority figure."

1watt1 writes: "In early 1944, the New York Times asked Vice President Henry Wallace to, as Wallace noted, 'write a piece answering the following questions: What is a fascist? How many fascists have we? How dangerous are they?' Wallace's answer to those questions was published in the Times on April 9, 1944, at the height of the war against the Axis powers of Germany and Japan. See how much you think his statements apply to our society today: 'The really dangerous American fascist,' Wallace wrote, '. . . is the man who wants to do in the United States in an American way what Hitler did in Germany in a Prussian way. The American fascist would prefer not to use violence. His method is to poison the channels of public information. With a fascist the problem is never how best to present the truth to the public but how best to use the news to deceive the public into giving the fascist and his group more money or more power.'

"In his strongest indictment of the tide of fascism he saw rising in America, Wallace added, 'They claim to be super-patriots, but they would destroy every liberty guaranteed by the Constitution. They demand free enterprise, but are the spokesmen for monopoly and vested interest. Their final objective toward which all their deceit is directed is to capture political power so that, using the power of the state and the power of the market simultaneously, they may keep the common man in eternal subjection.' "

neilschneide writes: "The marginalization of the media and intellectuals (not rogue groups or barbarians at the gate, but parties with legitimate places at the national table) is part and parcel of furthering the goal of having an unfettered executive not subject to 'conflicting pressures'--in other words, oversight."

Tristan910 writes: "It is really not germane whether the red state folks want a totally unfettered presidency, not subject to the contending forces that legislators and judges face, or not. The Constitution provides for checks and balances and separation of powers whether they agree with it or they don't."