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OpinionSeptember 3, 1998

I WATCHED the Cardinals ballgame with Atlanta. I find that when the Cardinal pitchers are working, the strike zone gets very small. When Atlanta works, the strike zone gets very large. If a ball is one inch outside of the plate, it is a ball. All pitchers would be good if they got the calls Atlanta does. ...

Some pitchers get the breaks

I WATCHED the Cardinals ballgame with Atlanta. I find that when the Cardinal pitchers are working, the strike zone gets very small. When Atlanta works, the strike zone gets very large. If a ball is one inch outside of the plate, it is a ball. All pitchers would be good if they got the calls Atlanta does. McGwire gets called out on strikes when balls are six inches outside and six inches off the ground. I think umpires are crooked or else they get paid a lot extra for calling the wrong type when the wrong pitcher is up there.

Stiff punishment must be given

OUR TWO communities are besotted with shock, grief and rage. A young woman -- a creature of light and living -- has been brutally torn from us by the sudden and random forces of depravity and violence. The planned wedding which will now never take place -- the children who will never be born -- all the ripple effects of a productive and positive life cut senselessly short. The carnage is incalculable. All because of the actions -- and solely because of the actions -- of one scurriless subject (please, God, let no officer of the court or of this state refer to this human silage as a "gentleman"). We cannot have her back, and he and his equally repugnant accomplices will survive. We can address the obvious -- that this subject was not an accident waiting to happen, and he was an accident demanding to happen -- that his actions made a tragedy inevitable, and we must assure that his just punishment is equally inevitable, that his victims have already suffered the consequences of his actions, and that he must also suffer the consequences of those actions. Any first-year law student learns the reasons for punishment: We are not in the least interested in the rehabilitation of this subject. We are interested in his removal from our environment.

Attack is close to murder

BOMBING THE pharmaceutical factory in Africa really bothers me. If someone from a foreign country, maybe Libya, came over here and bombed a pharmaceutical factory, we would call it murder and terrorism. I think the same applies in Africa. If we bombed a pharmaceutical factory in Africa, killing innocent factory workers for the sake of trying to divert attention from domestic scandals, it is murder. If we did it for a good reason and they were building components of mass destruction, it's OK. We should have warned the workers to get out. We could have warned them 15 minutes ahead of time that there were incoming missiles, and they could have gotten out of there and not killed innocent people. But we didn't. This is very close to being murder.

Which candidate is without sin?

I READ in the Speak Out where a person should not vote Republican or Democrat, just vote Christian. I'd be happy to do that if that person would be so kind as to list in the paper for us which ones are without sin. I mean, I don't believe that I've seen any without sin. That includes Emerson, Bond and Ashcroft and anybody who runs against them.

Apologies all around

I MUST respond to the caller who thinks Monica should apologize to the country and Mrs. Clinton. Yes, Monica Lewinsky is obviously a power groupie and as my mother would say, a floozy. Of course, she knew the president was married. You call her a grown woman. At age 21, I call her a very immature kid, albeit of legal age. People of her age group frequently make very poor judgments in their behavior, whether it be sex or drinking. However, Monica could have not access Clinton alone unless he wanted and arranged it. He who supposedly is mature, brilliant, strong and more than twice her age, should have had no trouble resisting her advances if indeed she made them. What if she had been some assassin or spy? Yes, Clinton owes Monica and her family a huge apology for taking advantage of a hot-to-trot young girl with stars in her eyes all for his own sick pleasure. He owes the rest of us an apology for being such an uncontrolled fool and putting our country at risk. As for Mrs. Clinton, she has known for years what kind of a husband she has, but she too is a power groupie and has traded her honor for the title of first lady. Is this what you call equal rights?

Eleanor could have warned her

IT'S BEEN said that Hillary Clinton speaks with Eleanor Roosevelt occasionally and visits her quite often. It's a surprise to me, I wonder why Eleanor didn't tell her anything about Monica.

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Not a matter of forgiveness

I WOULD like to say something about all the people calling in saying that we ought to forgive the president. I don't think forgiveness has anything to do with it, whether or not you're a Christian. The president's not above the law. He was never meant to be above the law. If so, we would have had a king and not a president. He lied to the court. He didn't know in advance that the Paula Jones case was going to be dismissed. It shouldn't have made any difference to him if it would or not. If you or I commit perjury, we will be punished, and he should be too. Jesus never said that if you're a Christian then you're supposed to do away with law. The law exists, and when you commit a crime you should be punished for it. If you are a Christian you should get that punishment as something deserved. When the thief hanging on the cross was sincerely sorry that he had done his crime, Jesus forgave him, but he didn't say OK, now I'm going to let you down off that cross.

Bad-check writer explains

I GUESS I'm the only person in this area that has this particular problem. That's how I feel anyway. I wrote a bad check knowing I didn't have enough funds there to cover it. I simply couldn't help myself. I saw something, and I just had to have it. I didn't weigh the consequences against the wrong I was doing, at least not at the time. All that mattered to me was getting what I thought I had to have. Now that it's a week later, there's nothing to show for the crime I committed except a piece of paper saying that I had 10 days to pay the amount of the check plus a service fee of much larger than the amount of the check. Would you like know where I so frivolously squandered my money? The kids were hungry. If I had to, I'd do it again 100 times.

Look at Clinton's record

I'M THE person who compared Clinton supporters to the Nazis in Germany, and here's what I said. We told German citizens after World War II that if they supported Hitler they were just as responsible for killing the Jews as Hitler was. I think the same thing applies to the Waco massacre. And as far as Ken Starr and Joseph McCarthy being closer to Hitler than Clinton, remember the Nazis spied on people. Who got 900 FBI files? Who has used the news media to spread the big lie? Who is violating people's civil rights, people like Linda Tripp, trying to put her in jail and get her fired because she told the truth? It's Clinton who did all this and all his henchmen. Who is lying and cheating, like the Nazis did? It's Clinton who did that.

Who was chasing whom?

IN RESPONSE to "Equal rights and responsibilities": I think the sympathy toward Monica Lewinsky was a media play, and I agree with you that she is just as guilty as the president. But then you just had to do it. You just had to add that she sought out a sexual relationship with the president. How does a lowly intern working in the White House go after the president? That's ridiculous. And your attempt to make her more responsible than the married president is also ridiculous. By the way, Patricia Ireland has been on every talking-head show. It's fun to watch her contradict herself. She should go back to reporting the negative aspects of our society.

Dog walker cleans up the mess

THIS MORNING I saw a sight that I've never seen before. A lady walking her dog at Dennis Scivally Park actually cleaning up after her dog. Oh that there were more people like her. Then we wouldn't be walking in animal's excrement, and children wouldn't be getting diseases.

Insulted by biggest liar of all

IN A recent Speak Out, under the heading of "GOP needs to take care of debt," the caller said if the Republican Party wants to be honest, it should "stop every Republican candidate who's talking about a big tax cut. They're insulting to everybody. I hate to be insulted by someone lying to me." I guess the person would rather be insulted by the biggest liar of all of them, Clinton, because he's a liar, a cheat, adulterer, womanizer, draft dodger, a hypocrite, a crook, a socialist and an anti-U.S. protester in Europe and Communist Russia. Now we can add that he's a good actor. He can turn on tears at will. He champions the GOP policies and issues and the good times so everybody believes they're his.

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