Response to my Letter to the Editor

[ochazuke]

I wrote a letter to the editor which was published in last Sunday's paper. The letter just said that the Republican National Convention was extremely negative and fear-mongering.

Today, I received a letter by snail from someone who apparently looked up my family name (a rare one) in the White Pages and found my home address.

This guy didn't really write me a letter. His envelope contained a clipping of my LTE as well as some other clippings and a print out of what looks like a posting to freerepublic.com. He didn't really make a point, but I think he was trying to say that Kerry is not fit for the presidency and Democrats are at least as dirty as Republicans.

Whatever.

My question is: why would he take the trouble to send this to me? Is there some chance he's thinking he'll change my mind or shut me up? I can't figure it. The envelope had his return address, so maybe he wants to debate the matter by snail. I'm at a loss to understand the freepers.

Any guesses?

[blm]

1. Send him a printout of the Washington Monthly article about Kerry and BCCI

and how Kerry was the FIRST lawmaker to go after terrorists and their criminal financiers.

That article really gives rightwingers pause. Ones that are open to sharing information, anyway.

[RodneyCK2]

2. Odd that he could not express himself. Please be careful, ...

there are a lot of nut jobs out there. He has your address and more importantly, took some effort to get it. No one wants a stalker and especially not a Repug stalker. :-)

[mongo]

3. I wouldn't worry too much about it

The guy is just blowing off steam. Being the smut peddler of Zanesville Oh, I get hate mail for just about every LTTE, and when my name is mentioned in the paper.

Here is one I got after being interviewed after an article printed where I was interviewed about a protest of a * rally in Cambridge, Oh. It was in an envelope with a copy of the article.

[ochazuke]

5. Thanks for your replies (to all)

I think I figured it out:

They're running scared. They've got nothing but fear and hate to offer and I called 'em on it.

Here's what I wrote:

The Republican National Convention had two stand-out
features:

• Vicious attacks on John Kerry, all either flat-out
lies or disingenuous distortions of fact. I have never
seen such offensive language used at a party
convention. Nominal Democrat Zell Miller established
himself as the Southern demagogue of our generation.
The mocking of Senator Kerry's Purple Hearts was
contemptible.

• A campaign of fear-mongering based on reminding us
of the attacks of September 11th and linking the war
in Iraq to the war on terror (a link thoroughly
debunked by the government's anti-terror chief among
others). Bush has a record of total failure on all
fronts, and can only cover it up and hold on to power
by mesmerizing the electorate into a state of fear --
constant fear of a terrorist attack, and unfounded
fear of Senator Kerry. Having resorted to such
tactics, the Republican party should be frozen out of
American political discourse. Failing that, we will
completely descend into despotism.

<end>

(They cut the last two sentences as well as my parenthetical. I should have put in two or three lines of fluff so the editor could be happy without cutting out my reference to Richard Clarke as well as my conclusion!)

[SheilaT]

4. Don't even give it a second thought.

I got a mailing from some anonymous person a few days ago that contained a printed conservative Christian rant. No return address, just a postmark. It was hand addressed. I have a few suspects in mind, but won't even bother to ask them if they mailed me that garbage.

[vduhr]

6. I think it's bad that most newspapers require that you supply

your first and last name, or that they publish it at the end of your letter. It should be that you can give the newspaper your first and last name, but that they should respect your privacy and publish only your first name. My last name is very unusual also, so I hesitate submitting LTE's because of that, especially on controversial subjects. You never know what kind of nuts are out there.

[Dark]

8. Welcome To DU vduhr

:hi:

[Libby2]

7. My guess is the return address is a phony

In the 2000 campaign I had the fortune (?) of having my letter printed in a major newspaper in a large city.

Several people sent letters and cards, the positive ones, were the only ones that put their real return address.


The death threats, and the "if you don't like it leave America trash," had phony addresses.....because repukes are cowards in real life.
Believe me I tried to respond to the repukes, but they all came back with no such address.

Thankfully since then, this newspaper has changed their policy of printing the addresses of the writers.