LETTERS: IDEAS FOR REALLY CONTROVERSIAL COLUMN

To the editor:

Congratulations to Cape conservative David Limbaugh, who has been chosen by the prestigious Creators Syndicate to pen a nationally syndicated column. This is quite an accomplishment, and all citizens no doubt share my pride in what Limbaugh has done.

However, there is one thing that puzzles me. According to the article in the Southeast Missourian, Limbaugh was chosen in part because his ideas are controversial. Excuse me. Controversial? What in the world is controversial about a column that will, according to the story, extol the virtues and verities of various and sundry right-wing nostrums? Not that there's anything wrong with this, but such views are hardly controversial. Indeed, they are about as mainstream as you can get. To one degree or another, we are all conservatives. Aren't we.

If Limbaugh is going to write a truly controversial political column, then it seems to me that he should publicly advocate abolition of democracy and abandonment of the U.S. Constitution. Indeed, if newspapers are looking for controversial columnists, they need to seek out those who call for the legal, non-violent scrapping of democracy and the wisdom of adopting a whole new framework of government. Now that would be controversial. For columnists who may be aspiring to do just that, I will briefly review some of the non-democratic forms of government you might consider worthy of consideration: Autocracy -- government by the automobile industry (this would not be all that radical and goes along with whoever said, "The business of America is business."), Monarchy -- government by monarch butterflies (though some would consider this to be a flighty form of government, it would appeal to nature lovers, and columnists could certainly make a good case that monarchs would be beautiful rulers), Oligarchy -- a column calling for government by the oligs would be particularly interesting since no one knows what oligs are, Anarchy -- government by the residents of Antarctica (such a column would have special appeal to those who may be cold natured or cold-hearted), Plutocracy -- government by those who populate the planet Pluto (this would be extremely controversial in light of the fact that we recently thought about doing away with Pluto's planetary status. Thus, the plutocrats are probably put out with us and might be mean). Mr. Limbaugh, I again wish you the best of luck in your endeavor. However, if you want to become truly controversial, I hope you will consider one of the above. And, if someday youre looking for a guest columnist, well ... ahem ...

STEVE MOSLEY

Cape Girardeau