Republicans in soth Georgia

Greetings, imaginary readers. Had to respond to this comment from a gentleman from Georgia who shares my name:

John: We nearly have the same name. I was born in 1936. It was also interesting that you father was teaching at Sam Houston State in Texas. I was born in Tennessee and am kin To Sam Houston.
Your politics seem to fit with the Republicans in soth Georgia. I would have hoped that Chomsky would have have indoctrinated you by now. The US and Israel cannot treat the Arabs with total disregard for Arab life. As a Pol Sci major or Ph D candidate I would have expected you to realize that there will be no peace until we treat Arabs as we treat Jews.
At present the Republican party in the South is composed of the big R's- the rdenecks, the rich , the relious right, and the racists.
Dubya should have been impeached for the lies he has told to get us into a war that should never have been started. As a Vietnam vet with over 9 years in the service before being retired, I agree with John Kerry. Having seved in Can Tho, I could not believe the couage of the guys in Kerry's group. These guys were nuts to risk their lives every day. I just wish I had a rich Daddy to get me into the National Guard. I went to Yale on scholarship, not as a legacy. I was in debt when I graduated. I had to suceed as I did not have my family and the bin Laden family to bale me out everytime iI drilled a dry hoe.
Please rethink your positions. I voted for Dole in 1996. I believe I was right then. The young Bush is not only learning disabled, but he is psychotic. John Payne, Thomasville, GA

John,

You are perceptive enough to figure out my politics (even if only to lump me in with “the rdenecks [sic] ... and the racists”). So you can hardly be surprised that Noam Chomsky has so far failed to indoctrinate me. Chomsky is a professor at MIT, but he teaches linguistics, not political science. I have not read enough of his theories on language to comment intelligently on them, but I have read enough of his political writings to know that he is either an exceptionally poor researcher or a deliberate deceiver.

In his long career Chomsky has continually apologized for totalitarian Communist regimes while continually attacking this great country I love. The fall of the Soviet Union has not changed his tune. I attended one of his sermons as the war in Afghanistan was beginning. He not only predicted that millions would be killed (by starvation), but asserted that this was the true purpose of the American intervention. Anyone who can say such things is a great fool, or simply twisted. Either way, he is no friend of mine.

On the Palestinian question, I agree that the US and Israel can not behave with total disregard for Arab life. What would such behavior look like? Let us imagine. If Israel had no regard for the lives of Arabs, they would simply kill or expel all Arabs from the occupied territories, and from Israel itself. Hundreds of thousands of Arabs would die, and millions would be evicted from lands now controlled by the Palestinian Authority. As it is, the Israelis have put a wall between terrorists and their targets. This and other Israeli actions have succeeded in reducing the numbers not only of dead Jews, but dead Arabs. Are you incapable of seeing the difference between the hypothetical strategy outlined above and the actual strategy pursued by Sharon’s government?

Obviously I disagree with you about impeaching the president. I supported Clinton’s impeachment because he perjured (as is admitted in his autobiography) and obstructed justice. Bush has committed no crime of which I am aware. I do not believe that he knowingly told lies to get us into war. (If you have an example, I would like to hear it.) And I am glad we threw out Saddam Hussein and his goon squad. That man was a real psychotic, as were many of his thugs. Are you sorry they are gone?

For your service in Viet Nam, I thank you. Likewise, I thank Senator Kerry. President Bush’s service in the National Guard was less glamorous and less heroic, but no less honorable. Like those who were exempted from the draft through marriage or education, he has nothing to be ashamed of.

Good for you for finding success on your own. My grandfather started out as a shepherd and ended up as a college professor, thanks to his own hard work and to Providence. As you noted, Bush succeeded in large part thanks to his family. This is a less inspiring achievement, but neither major-party candidate in this election could be called a self-made man.

Please rethink your positions. I voted for Bush in 2000. I believe I was right then. I believe I am right now to support him again.

PS - Noam Chomsky is not only intellectually dishonest, but he is a nihilist, a Communist and an vicious anti-semite. And his slavish cult of dope-smoking, self-loathing teenage conspiracy theorists carries with it the oh-so-proletarian smell of unwashed feet.

--THE HOUSE OF PAYNE