This young woman in Nebraska sent me a nice e-mail message the other day and has posted comments on this blog. She’s a libertarian, just as I was when I was her age. I don’t think people should be conservative until they reach the age of 45, and I don’t trust anyone over 45 who’s not a conservative. In case you’re wondering, I classify libertarians as progressives. They have more in common with egalitarians than they do with conservatives.
To the Editor:
Tony Snow’s decision to leave his White House position (news article, Sept. 1) provides yet another revelation into the hypocrisy that pervades the Bush administration. An annual income of $168,000, which places him in the top 1 percent of Americans, is insufficient for Mr. Snow, and he has chosen to exit for the more lucrative private sector well before the end of the administration.
It would seem that working within a budget and fulfilling one’s commitment remain little more than hollow rhetoric to this bunch, platitudes that are fit for admonishing the public but not for personal adherence.
Susan Lally
New York, Sept. 1, 2007
Note from KBJ: How does the letter writer know what Snow’s commitment was? For all she knows, he committed to serving the president for two years (or however long he has been press secretary). How does she know what his medical bills are? (Snow has cancer.) Snow has three children. Has the letter writer checked the cost of a college education recently? I read the other day that it costs $50,000 per year to send a child to The George Washington University. Is it irrational for Snow to want to make a lot of money quickly, in case his cancer kills him? Isn’t that what any parent in his situation would and should do? And what’s this about hypocrisy? Has the Bush administration ever preached that Americans should not better themselves financially? If it hasn’t preached that, how can it be failing to practice what it preaches?
Keith,
This looks like something that will be interesting to play with. You fill in a term, and it graphically presents its relationships with other terms. But when I tried it out with “Trojan horse,” the definition it gave lacked the essential attribute of “deception.”
Mark Spahn (West Seneca, NY)
Note from KBJ: Interesting! Try typing “conservative” and “progressive” into the search box.