A contrast in columnists' perspectives

To the editor:

David Limbaugh and Peggy Noonan, both conservative columnists, provide an interesting contrast in their description of the speakers at Coretta Scott King's funeral. On the editorial page of the Feb. 10 Wall Street Journal, Noonan took the high road and praised King for continuing her husband's unfinished work on civil rights.

While Limbaugh lambasted U.S. Sen. Ted Kennedy and former president Jimmy Carter for their jabs at President Bush, Noonan emphasized that the funeral should be the U.S.'s Exhibit 1 on how democracy and free speech work. In past columns, Limbaugh has chided Democrats for substituting character assassination of Republicans for viable policy alternatives of their own.

In the wake of Republican domestic policies that have given us things like trade protectionist steel tariffs, a prescription drug bill forecast to cost more than $700 billion over the next decade, $200 billion to rebuild New Orleans (more than $500,000 per person) and the laughable ethanol subsidies advertised as a way to reduce reliance on foreign oil, perhaps no policy is a preferred outcome.

BILL WEBER, Jackson