LETTERS TO THE EDITOR: PAID STATEMENT SHOULD HAVE BEEN LETTER TO THE EDITOR

To the Editor,

In your Sunday edition of the Southeast Missourian (June 6), you published a full page character assassination of our (yours, mine and the advertisement's sponsor) president of the United States of America. This was the most disgusting piece of trash that I have ever seen leveled at any of our presidents.

In my opinion, the person or persons responsible for accepting this paid for piece of trash has less integrity than the person who bought and paid for the space used to print this degrading piece of rubbish.

When you accept payment for advertisements with such derogatory content, it seems to me that you lose the meaning of freedom of expression by the press and the writer.

Accepting payment for printing opinions such as this not only impugns the president but also the integrity of the newspaper and the person or persons who are responsible for the approval of such payment.

It seems to me that to protect the integrity of your newspaper, it would have been wiser for you to insist that this message be addressed as a letter to the editor, Speak Out, or opinions of the people. At least you could have stayed within the realms of free expression.

As a resident of Cape Girardeau for almost 12 years, I am appalled at your decision to accept a few (lousy) dollars to print this type of derogatory, degrading misinformation.

I served in the infantry, the 84th Infantry Division. The Woodchopper Division of President Abe Lincoln. I saw action in the European theater. I do not understand how anyone can equate World War II, Omaha Beach or the European theater, including Italy and North Africa, with the War of Vietnam. World War II was fought for a just cause, the freedom of a continent and ultimately the whole world. Vietnam was a political war, an internal revolution between the North and South portions of the Vietnam peninsula. A political civil war of two nations, both speaking the same language but with different ideologies. It was protested by millions of men and women, including myself. It was fought mostly by men who didn't have the means to go to college and/or maintain a satisfactory grade level to keep from being drafted. Some of our most prominent politicians of President Clinton's generation did not serve.

FRED B. SITZES

Cape Girardeau