Panic mongering over the flu is a disgrace
To the editor:
I find the "declaration" of a national emergency over the H1N1 strain of the flu to be reprehensible. This strain has killed fewer than 200 people in the United States over the past year, which is a very small number when you consider that the seasonal flu kills 30,000 to 50,000 every year. H1N1 is not a pandemic and labeling it one is panic mongering in the worst way.
DANIEL ZAVESON
LAS VEGAS
Protecting rights
To the editor:
Thank you Thomas Mitchell for your Sunday commentary "If you take liberties for granted, you'll lose them." How true.
Where am I coming from? I'm a World War II combat veteran, a first scout and a sniper who has managed to survive to date. I've lived and worked in several foreign countries where the citizens would pay huge bucks to be a citizen of the United States.
You quote Geoffrey R. Stone saying "that if they are passive about their liberties, they will ultimately lose them." That got my attention and brought to mind the old saying in politics, "Where there is a vacuum, someone or something will fill this space." In government, power hungry politicians take advantage of this vacuum.
Mr. Mitchell's commentary on this important subject was extremely well-written and easy to comprehend. Please keep up the good work and continue to fight those who keep nipping away at our Constitution and especially the Bill of Rights.
Anthony Stephen
LAS VEGAS
Matter of bias
To the editor:
In response to Geoff Schumacher's Friday commentary:
Mr. Schumacher suggests cable TV channels Fox and MSNBC are conduits of their own ideology and, therefore, cannot be relied upon as a source of real, unbiased news. He goes on to say -- in a somewhat rambling, disjointed way -- that a recent poll conducted by The New York Times and CBS News found that a large majority support the public option.
In the actual taped telephone poll, the reference to the public option was phrased in such a way that you might have answered the question completely differently from the way you really felt.
So, are we to magically assume CBS News and The New York Times are not biased and this poll can be trusted?
Beverly King
LAS VEGAS
