Tom Campbell’s Israel problem; the ‘tea partyers’ and the ‘60s; Meg Whitman’s campaign tactics

We’re all human

Re “8.8 quake stuns Chile,” Feb. 28

Saturday’s earthquake in Chile was beyond horrific. Homes, highways and the country itself were torn apart in moments.

Haiti has yet to recuperate from the earthquake that turned it to rubble, and now another country is facing similar problems. Whatever the nation, ethnicity or allegiance, we are all human. We must put aside our differences and help those in need.

America, now more than ever, must unite in one goal: the alleviation of the pain of those affected by this natural disaster. Now is the time to take the first step toward making the world a better place.

Uriel Rafael
Los Angeles

Israel can’t be off-limits

Re “Senate race gets heated over Israel,” Feb. 25, and “Campbell’s Israel problem,” Editorial, Feb. 27

For the love of God and peace, will someone please push the reset button on the relationship between the American public, our politicians and the state of Israel?

Political leaders everywhere else, including a handful of brave souls in Israel, overwhelmingly agree that implementing the eternally talked-about solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the single greatest contribution anyone could make to slowing the spread of Islamic terrorism and achieving real security for the United States and Western democracy.

Yet, instead of challenging each other to do this as fast as possible, our politicians of all parties debate furiously over whether America’s “commitment” to Israel should be slavish, or just blind.

Garland Allen
Santa Monica

Your editorial concludes that you will give Campbell the benefit of the doubt. This is very surprising in light of your recognition that, at best, Campbell was “naive, perhaps, and gullible.”

The citizens of California -- not to mention the U.S. -- deserve better than a senator who can be so easily manipulated by a terrorist.

In these perilous times, we cannot afford a senator who is naive and perhaps gullible. Campbell is not qualified to be senator in these post-9/11 times. It is as basic as this.

Hallie Lerman
Los Angeles

Alert Merriam-Webster: I see that “anti-Semite” has a new usage: a mudslinging term used to describe a person who does not show unwavering and unquestioning support for a particular point of view about Israel.

Much as with the term “unpatriotic,” this misuse ultimately will cheapen the word and render it meaningless, which would be quite unfortunate.

Emily Loughran
Los Angeles

Tom Campbell was my representative when I lived in the Bay Area.

I am not a registered Republican and did not agree with Campbell on all issues, but I voted for and supported him because I felt he was honest, intelligent and thoughtful.

Clearly he has no place within the Republican Party today. The claims from rivals Carly Fiorina and Chuck DeVore about Campbell’s stance on Israel are just typical noise. We need reasoned debate about the issues.

The fact that a failed celebrity chief executive (whose entire claim to fame amounts to almost driving Hewlett-Packard into the ground) is even running in a Senate race with Campbell speaks volumes about the sad state of politics.

Mike Vella
San Diego

No sugar in their tea

Re “Tea partying like it’s 1968,” Opinion, Feb. 25

Only a brain-dead leftist could buy into the lame attempt of Democratic political consultants Jim Spencer and Curtis Ellis to re-create history. Do they actually expect readers to believe that the Marcuse-influenced, tune-in, drop-out Woodstock potheads grew up to become conservatives and join “tea parties”?

In reality, it is far more likely that the tea party members are actually the other part of the boomer generation: the often-ignored group who did not go to Woodstock, did not do drugs and who were far more likely to serve their nation in Vietnam.

Connie Brewer
Fullerton
The writer is a professor of sociology at Cal State Fullerton.

I am a baby boomer. I neither protested the Vietnam War nor any other issue in the ‘60s or ‘70s. I was too busy raising children and making a living. I am a middle-class registered Democrat who is a tea party advocate.

We are about less government interference, not more. We want life, liberty and the chance to pursue happiness, not to be told what that happiness should look like by the federal government. We want the Constitution upheld, not shredded.

If Spencer and Ellis want to have an impact on fellow Democrats, perhaps they should actually speak with some tea party activists.

We are not leftover hippies.

Bonnie Guinn
Louisville, Ky.

The article by two East Coast Democratic political consultants was a great read and made my day.

The snobs and liberals have been bashing the so-called tea partyers as a bunch of disorganized, illiterate trailer parkers who are too stupid to “get it” -- and now suddenly tea partyers are portrayed as “75% college educated,” “two-thirds [of whom] earn more than $50,000” and “Woodstock, Haight-Ashbury” boomers?

That’s hilarious. These descriptions define the vast majority of the nation’s elitists.

The commentary is proof that the tea partyers have ignited disarray among liberals. Keep up the good work.

Betty Arenson
Valencia

As a boomer myself, I should be offended at this article, but I’m not -- because I know that what the tea partyers are doing now has nothing in common with what we boomers were doing in the ‘60s.

It’s no wonder the Democrats can’t get anything done, even with an overwhelming majority in the Senate and the House, when they take advice from the likes of Spencer and Ellis.

We boomers are the ones who vote; is it really wise to alienate us?

Spencer Matteson
Los Angeles

I’ll buy some stylistic similarities between the ‘60s protesters and the tea partyers, but the comparison strains beyond that.

I doubt many Vietnam-era lefties, even after outgrowing their Che phase, went all in for James Madison. It is a mistake to dismiss either movement as a childish demand for attention. For all its self-absorption and pretentiousness, the ‘60s counterculture popularized the idea of women’s equality and put an end to the draft.

If the tea partyers move the country on any serious issue, the national debt would be their most deserving target. The debt truly represents generational theft -- the most shameful of the Me Generation’s many dubious legacies.

Michael Smith
Cynthiana, Ky.

Other views of Whitman

Re “Whitman no rookie at playing hardball,” Feb. 26

Hey Meg, give me a break on the “Let’s run government as a business” mentality.

You can’t hire your management team -- we elect them.

And you can’t fire your constituents. You have to work for us. We’re your boss.

I know that’s a completely foreign concept to you.

Tally Briggs
Toluca Lake

I found The Times’ article on Meg Whitman’s behind-the-scenes tactics rather enlightening -- except for one issue:

Where does one draw the line between hardball and sleazeball?

Angus Andrews
Westlake Village