If Americans took to the streets, we'd make progress

Once again as the holiday season approaches, I think about all of the families who will have an empty seat at their family gathering this year because of the war in Iraq. Every year since the invasion, we seem to add about a thousand new names to the total, and since nothing seems to be changing with our government, the war dead will probably hit 5,000 by this time next year. That hundreds of thousands have died in Iraq is another difficult thought to fathom.

The sad thing is that the majority of the people in this country do not want this to continue, but the people whom they elected to represent their wishes seem incapable or terrified of losing their positions and consequently allow this fiasco to continue, and the death toll mounts.

As I watch the people of Pakistan take to the streets to voice their opinions of their own government's actions, I'm mystified by why we Americans don't do the same. Every other country seems to have stronger voices, which they take to the streets, effecting changes in many cases. I remember when 5,000 people marched against this war on a snowy day in Pittsburgh. What silenced them?

If the news reported thousands of people in the streets of America every day, my bet would be that Congress would come to life, the war machine would be stopped and we would not be silently staring at more empty chairs in our homes.

DICK MARSHALL
Crafton

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Insensitive remarks

Army reservist James Cannon, a former member of a presumably elite Psychological Operations Unit in Iraq, is correct to mourn the passing of a brave young Iraqi translator and speak against the lack of support such individuals receive from the U.S. government in return for their important and dangerous service to our troops ("Attached to Iraq: I Just Learned That Our Translator Is Dead," Nov. 10). However, I wish Mr. Cannon could refrain from wearing his prejudices on his sleeve.

His comments regarding Iraqi women wearing their traditional religious clothing is offensive and won't be repeated here. His swipe at Mexican immigrants lends nothing to the story and confirms he holds narrow views on complex issues.

These comments illustrate the fact that our young warriors are often less than ideal ambassadors to the world. I often wonder how much of our reputation as "ugly Americans" results from the actions of the horde of immature servicemen and -women stationed around the world. The armed services should do a better job training our troops to be sensitive to foreign cultures to promote a positive view of the United States.

Sadly, it is my experience that military culture more often supports and promotes arrogance over tolerance.

MICHAEL A. TAKACS
Swissvale

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Our power: Voting

I read the Nov. 9 letter "Why Do People Not Vote When It's Clear That We Need New Leaders?" I agree 100 percent with Doreen W. Hodder. These elected fat cats could care less about the average Joe, until they need our vote. It is sickening what these professional bums do for their paycheck. Most of the time that is selling out the working man for special interest groups. This has to stop.

The only way to get their attention is to vote them out. I am sick and tired of my elected officials ignoring me and the other good, hard-working, decent folks who put them in office. Please send a clear message the next election and dump these bums (on all levels -- city, county, state, federal) before we all have our wonderful country overtaken by terrorists flooding over our unprotected borders.

DAN CRANE
McKees Rocks

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A better way

Here's a two-word solution to all present and future strike threats by schoolteachers -- binding arbitration.

Do the negotiations from June through September. If this were done, Seneca Valley would not have its problems ("No Gains Reported at Seneca Valley," Nov. 12) and the city schoolteachers wouldn't intimidate taxpayers with a strike threat.

JOE PONIEWAZ
Lincoln Place

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Think, PennDOT

On Thursday, Nov. 1, at 8:30 p.m., we became the victims of poor planning and badly executed work being performed on the Parkway East outbound while returning home from Oakland.

At the on-ramp near Bates Street, three lanes were at a standstill. We worked our way in, creeping along until reaching a point where three lanes condensed into two. Compounding the insult of being stuck in traffic for hours was realization of gas prices, as we sat with our motors running.

Near the Squirrel Hill Tunnel, an additional merge point forced two lanes into one, which struggled through the tunnel past the Edgewood/Swissvale exit where state police cars escorted workers still deploying lane barriers.

The PennDOT Reconstruction Program Information Web page described the inconvenience as "crews trimming trees, improving shoulders, repairing bridge dams and performing other miscellaneous improvement activities."

One questions the timing and reason for creating such a disturbance miles away from the work site beginning in Oakland. The last time I checked, there were no bridges, trees or shoulders in need of repair within the tunnels.

Parkway work should be performed on the weekend and be scheduled to begin at 10 p.m. rather than at 8 p.m. The term "rush hour" is a misnomer and no longer ends by 6 p.m., as it did 50 years ago.

Time and again, PennDOT and the construction companies performing the work have inconvenienced the public without regard to the results, although common sense would dictate a better way.

DAVID MARSHALL
Monroeville

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Daring to dream

Concerning Katha Pollitt's Nov. 4 Forum article ("New Facts About Abortion"): After reading her almost gleeful recitation of the "facts" surrounding legalized abortion, I could almost hear the collective huzzas of approval by local "choice" supporters and activists breaking through the quiet Sunday morning.

What bothered me the most, though (besides her insistence on tweaking pro-lifers by calling them "anti-choicers," as if choosing anything other than life is even conceivable), was the thought that there would be no need for abortion, legal or not, if Ms. Pollitt and others like her would direct their time, talents, energy and resources toward creating a world where children matter and where mothers (and fathers) can provide health care, sustenance and education for their children from conception to independence with the full and unconditional support of their government, workplace, worship community, family and friends.

Of course, the time, talents, energy and resources of the pro-life activists and supporters could be oriented toward the same goal, almost guaranteeing a world where life everywhere is nurtured and sustained. Boy, am I a dreamer or what?

TIM M. KILLMEYER
Robinson

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I am thankful for my children, whose adoptions enriched our lives

November is National Adoption Month, and, while I am thinking about turkey dinners and holidays, my thoughts also turn to the two children my husband and I adopted.

It is estimated that 1 in 10 American couples is infertile, yet relatively few couples adopt. Some people seem fearful of getting a child who looks different, or who isn't smart or athletic. Some find the adoption process daunting, and still others may be deterred by the costs.

But, oh, how adopted children can enrich your lives in unexpected ways. I cannot carry a tune or execute a pirouette, so imagine my pride watching my older son perform as Joseph in Schenley High School's "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat," or dance in Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre's "The Nutcracker." Two years ago, my younger son won the Evans City 5-6 Middle School writing contest on the meaning of Memorial Day. A child born in Guatemala touched the hearts of hundreds of Americans the day he read his essay.

Because of my children, I have learned about the rich heritage and culture of Central America. I have a deeper appreciation of what it means to be a minority in this country. I have visited orphaned children in El Salvador and been moved by their desperate need for attention and affection.

My children's looks, talents and heritage are very different from my own. National Adoption Month reminds me to celebrate these differences, just as Thanksgiving reminds us all to celebrate our good fortunes.

LAURIE J. KIRSCH
Evans City

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We receive more letters than we can fit into the limited space on the editorial page, so we'd like to share some additional letters with our Post-Gazette Web site readers.

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Air quality should be locally regulated

It would be a big mistake to cede the duties of Allegheny County's Air Quality Control Program to the state ("Onorato Exploring Shift of Air Quality Duties to State," Nov. 4).

We have done this job locally for 50 years under the county health department. In addition, there are a number of local regulations not covered under the state Department of Environmental Protection regulations. These include lead, coke oven emissions, asbestos and school-bus and diesel-engine idling, all of which target local air pollution problems. Significant progress is being made under these local regs, but still Pittsburgh ranks among the top metropolitan polluted areas due to microparticulates.

We have an excellent air pollution advisory committee. Let's keep it local and under our own control.

MARTHA RAAK
Squirrel Hill

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Too pampered for Iraq

In the Nov. 1 PG I read that 300 Foreign Service officers objected to the State Department's decision to force some of them to take jobs in Iraq ("U.S. Envoys Take Issue With Forced Iraq Postings").

One of them, Jack Croddy, said assignment was a potential death sentence and, this is the part that got me, asked the question of who would raise their children if they were killed or seriously wounded. I am sure it is difficult for pampered elitists like Mr. Croddy to envision an overseas assignment that doesn't include cocktail parties, bridge games and shopping. I am equally sure he doesn't regard either himself or his equally privileged colleagues as public servants, like the 18-year-old men and women risking their lives every day on the streets of Afghanistan and Iraq. No, Mr. Croddy and the brie and chardonnay crowd he represents don't want to get their hands dirty doing real diplomatic work.

I applaud the State Department for standing up to this bunch of prima donnas; give them their orders, show them their desks and, if they refuse, fire them.

JON GROGAN
Upper St. Clair

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Seneca silver lining

The Seneca Valley teachers' strike is obviously a great inconvenience for everyone involved, and yet there is a silver lining here.

Apparently, the students in the district are making no secret of their desire to get back to class. And while this may be due to their wish to get on with their lives, it also demonstrates the value of an education, which might otherwise have gone unnoticed.

JOSEPH CARDUCCI
Mt. Lebanon

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Another attempt to dehumanize

I disagree with Dr. Amesh Adalja's recent Web letter, claiming that an unborn child's body is actually a part of his or her mother's body and, as such, has no rights ("Still Part of the Mother," Oct. 31).

Perhaps Dr. Adalja forgot about classes in medical school where basic human development was taught. An unborn child has its own unique DNA, often a completely different blood type from his or her mother and is a completely unique individual.

Regrettably, Dr. Adalja's assertions are nothing new. For example, there was a time when certain people in our country deliberately engaged in the dehumanization of people of African descent because it made it easier to justify the atrocity of slavery.

Today, certain people in our society engage in the same tactics -- even though it flies in the face of basic scientific facts -- to dehumanize unborn children in order to justify the atrocity of abortion. They call it choice. Whose choice is it? Certainly not the child's -- that very living child who "is housed" in its mother's uterus.

Despite ongoing efforts to defend the indefensible act of dismembering and trashing innocent children, many of us still can think for ourselves. Despite the energy and rhetoric spent to dumb us down and desensitize us to the killing of unborn babies, we know the difference between fact and fiction, right and wrong, life and death.

For those of us who know these things, we don't depend on others to spoon-feed their loaded political and personal agendas to us.

PATRICIA BEAUMONT
North Fayette

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