George,

Back when JFK was president we had the "Ev and Charlie" show. Senator Everett Dirksen and Representative Charles Halleck: a weekly Republican critique of the JFK presidency.

It was very effective, well-covered by the media and, frequently, humorous. Where the dour Dirksen made the oft repeated, "A few billion here and a few billion there, and the next thing you know, it can run into money!" (Perhaps I paraphrase, but it was words to that effect). We need a similar hard hitting commentary from some credible Democrats. I know this would be a difficult undertaking, given the apparent current timidity of the Democratic Party in general and the leadership in particular!

I watched the hearings for Alberto Gonzales and Condoleeza Rice, and, with a few exceptions, their history in the first Bush Administration, bordering on criminal, was let slide!

Gonzales is the closest thing to a sycophantic loose cannon since Oliver North; his contempt for the Constitution, his parsing and dismissing the torture of prisoners at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo as the work of the justice department, if not so tragic,bordered on comedy. He made clear what Bush wanted from Ashcroft & Co. and they fed him what they wanted. Not one word of concern from Mr.Gonzales.

The outcome? A few enlisted "grunts" will take the hit and it will be business as usual.

Shame! No one attempted to expose this sham for all the the horror and damage it did, to not only the victims and perpetrators but the nation, itself. All evidence indicates that Alberto Gonzales was one of the chief architects of this policy more reminiscent of the Third Reich than the U.S.A.

Tragically, he will hold the highest law enforcement office in the land. The goat in the cabbage patch!

"Condi" Rice, the very definition of a sychophant, with her lies and exaggerations that helped lead this nation into a bloody and unnecessary war. Just her alarums concerning the Iraqi nuclear weapons programs should have been enough to disqualify her to fill the office of Secretary of State ... but she will be easily confirmed!

I think the Democratic Party badly needs a spine!

The consequences of these ideologues' actions are just too dangerous to give them an unimpeded path to our nation's role as the newest imperialist power and the destruction of the domestic fulfillment of our Constitution's preamble, "to promote the general welfare".

They have Bush's ear.

AND Bush, too lacking in experience and historical perspective is unable to know the difference!

Harry Tenney (electronic mail, January 21, 2005)