As most of you know,I have printed a weekly letter to the editor for several years in my little paper.The editor is a true first amendment advocate in a sea of republicans,and I applaud him.
This letter ran in my paper today(in response to an earlier letter against one of mine)...enjoy..
http://www.thedailylight.com/articles/2007/11/23/dailylight/opinion/letters_to_the_editor/letter3.txtTo the Editor,
The first thing I do each afternoon when I receive my copy of the Waxahachie Daily Light is to glance over the front page. Next, I go to the “Voice of the Reader” letters to the editor section, which is the most interesting part of the newspaper. It is very interesting to study the letters and analyze what the writer is trying to say and what techniques he/she uses to get their points across. A letter that appeared in the Sunday, Nov. 18 edition was most interesting. The letter had the title “On Democratic debates.”
The first thing I noticed was that the first two sentences ended in exclamation points. This can be used by writers to make a sentence look stronger. The second sentence of the writer was, “May God have mercy on us!” It is my opinion that the writer is saying this to show that God is on his side. If you can start out your letter with God on your side that is very powerful in getting your beliefs across. The next sentence is, “There is a possibility that one of those people could be elected to the presidency of the United States.” The writer could have said “one of those candidates” but chose to say “one of those people.” “One of those people” are words that are used to associate who you are talking about with groups of individuals that you think are not worthy. One of those people in the past/present could be individuals who suffer from mental illness, minorities, people on food stamps, those who have not received a formal education, individuals with mental retardation and on and on.
In the second paragraph the writer said, “There is one person that will litigate anything for money (John Edwards).” Once again the writer says “one person” instead of “one of the candidates” to put John Edwards in a lesser position. The writer should know that John Edwards would not litigate anything for money. “Anything” is a very strong word the writer used in that sentence. He/she also used the word “money” as if it was something bad to have. Next the writer wrote that “one wants to bomb our friends and talk to our enemies while his wife calls for black Americans to vote for him or else (Barack Obama).” We should ask the writer to give us more credit to know that Barack Obama does not want to bomb our friends. The writer should also know that there is nothing wrong in talking to our enemies. I would rather talk to our enemies and work out our differences than drop a bomb on them and the other innocent people standing around them. We have lost so many young men and women in the present war that we should try to do something different like talking to our enemies. We could save the lives of those young men and women in our armed forces. Then the writer says that the wife of Barack Obama is calling for black Americans to vote for him or “else.” “Else” is a very strong word because the writer did not tell us what “else” is. We can imagine that if we don’t vote for Barack Obama his wife is going to kill us all or is it that she thinks that if we don’t vote for him we will not be electing the best candidate for the job? I would like the writer to let me know what’s wrong with asking black Americans to vote. We denied them their rights for so long, what’s wrong with asking them to vote? I wish some writers would realize there is nothing wrong with black Americans voting. We ask white Americans to vote.
The writer said that “one guy” (that is a put down when you say “one guy,” just say “one candidate” came to the debates in a UFO). The general public knows that you are trying to make Dennis Kucinich look like he is mentally ill. My wife has a mental illness and it is no joking matter. You lost a lot of support in your letter because many of us have loved ones, friends, those that we work with and others who suffer from mental illness. Please don’t joke about mental illness. Then you said the UFO dumped Dennis Kucinich because they were looking for intelligent life. Why do some writers have to put down people because you think they are not intelligent? You lost a lot of people there because there are a lot of wonderful individuals that are not intelligent. Who are we to judge a person’s intelligence? My niece has Down syndrome and my wife and I have a friend whose son is autistic. They may not have a lot of intelligence but they are so loving and wonderful.
You said that Hillary Clinton talks out of both sides of her face and both sides of her mouth. Have you read your own letter? You said that Joe Biden and Christopher Dodd are unbelievably stupid. Now come on. It’s not necessary to call someone stupid, much less unbelievably stupid. I may not agree with everything they say but they are not stupid.
Your last sentence was, “May God have mercy on us.” If in writing a letter we once again can imply that God is on our side we might believe that what is being written is the truth.
What you have failed to realize is that there are many of us that read the paper and want change. We don’t care if someone is a Democrat or a Republican. We care for what is best for the American people and for our great country of the United States of America. In the next election I hope that we will vote out all the Democrats and Republicans who are not looking out for the needs of the American people.
We don’t want to lose our jobs to Mexico, China and many other countries so companies can accumulate vast sums of money to buy other companies and not pay their workers a decent wage. We don’t want to worry about lead paint and other chemicals in the toys that are made for our children. We don’t want to have to worry about dangerous chemicals in our food supply. We don’t want global warming. We don’t want the Trans-Texas Corridor. We don’t want corrupt politicians, whether they are Republican or Democrat. We don’t want to fight endless wars around the world that take the lives of those we love. We don’t want to worry about how to care for our loved ones who are sick because we don’t have adequate health care. We don’t want our roads to be built and owned by foreign governments and then have to pay a toll to travel on them. We don’t want to pay more than our fair share of taxes. We don’t want higher gas prices while the oil and coal industries are getting government subsidies.
What we want is change and let’s hope that we will have that change after the next election. It’s up to us to make that happen.
Waldo DeCuir,
Waxahachie
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