LETTERS TO THE EDITOR (10/31/04)

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Elected officials must be held accountable

Dear Editor:

I have really enjoyed following The Weekly's columns and reader editorials regarding this crucial U.S. presidential election.

What a conundrum: vote Democratic or Republican? Vote for an unknown change or four more years of the same partisan politics? What is a patriotic Ukrainian American to do?

I would like to point out to The Weekly readers that, in my opinion, both parties have lost focus of who they really represent, you and me. Both parties cater to industry, their lobbyists, PACs and other special-interest groups. Both parties loathe the very thought of a third-party candidate. When you look at corporate donations for the presidential campaign, do not be fooled that the Republican Party is the sole benefactor of corporate campaign contributions. The Democrats get almost as much as the Republicans do.

Democrats accuse Republicans of the "War for Oil," non-bid exclusive Halliburton contracts to "rebuild" Iraq and expansion of the defense budget. Leading Democrats, like Sen. Tom Daschle and Rep. Richard Gephardt, voted to support the war because they fell hook, line and sinker for the president's promise to be bipartisan and a uniter, as he claims to have been when he was the governor of Texas. (In Texas, the governor has less political power than the lieutenant governor and the speaker of the Texas House.) Republicans accuse the Democrats of flip-flopping, which is akin to the pot calling the kettle black.

Sadly, our brave soldiers are being sent on suicide missions and some are smart enough to refuse to carry them out. Kudos to them. After all, ask yourselves, why are they really there? Oil, black gold, Texas tea.

Then we have the "fair and balanced" media, not! The only example of reliable media is the "Bill Moyers Show" and "The Daily Show" with Jon Stewart. Remember Fox has a Bush cousin at the helm. As for the CBS issue, do not be fooled. Thoust that have protested too loudly have something to fear. The so- called forged papers were obtained under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). How ironic, since our media are frequently not free to report the truth.

The main point is that both parties play the same game - only the faces change. The time has come for Americans to hold their elected officials responsible for representing the people, not the corporate interests.

We can hold whoever is elected accountable to act in the best interest of all Americans. Just because a candidate runs an ad in The Weekly does not necessarily mean he is the best choice. The entire package needs to be considered. Actions speak louder than words.

Chrystia Wynnyk
Austin, Texas

Some sanity needed in U.S. foreign policy

Dear Editor:

I've followed the U.S. pre-election polemics on the pages of The Weekly with considerable interest. Both the pro-Bush and pro-Kerry constituencies' stances seem to be imbued with a tremendous amount of American patriotism and values rhetoric. What is missing in general is a feeling of "who we are," and why we need to support certain positions.

I am a U.S. citizen. I was born and raised in the U.S.A. I recognize the obligations that citizenship imposes on me, and I accept them. This in no way affects my Ukrainian nationality - my heritage is a result of countless generations that preceded me, and hopefully will continue through my descendants. My views on the U.S, election are driven, therefore, by both the sense of obligation and the sense of self.

Over the past four years the U.S. has abandoned all semblance of any supportive policy toward Ukraine. The Bush administration has consistently courted Vladimir Putin's version of Russia - a non-democratic, authoritarian, aggressive version, intent on re-building its empire. President George W. Bush has said that he has looked into President Putin's eyes and has seen the man's soul. Apparently he likes what he has seen.

I don't! The U.S. is disregarding the decline of democracy in Russia, Russia's current human rights record, the resurgence of Russian hegemony, the destruction of Chechnya, the meddling in Ukrainian electoral politics. And Mr. Putin has returned President Bush's "soulful" compliment. Apparently he likes what he sees in Mr. Bush.

I believe that the only real beneficiary of Mr. Bush's anti-terror campaign is Mr. Putin's Russia. Our president is willing to overlook all its faults because it is a partner in the war on terror - not to mention a real contributor to state-sponsored terrorism itself. This is not good for the U.S. and does not bode well for the continued existence of Ukraine as a truly sovereign nation.

I will support John Kerry in the U.S. election. Not because I like everything he stands for, but because we need some sanity in regard to the U.S. policy on Russia and Ukraine. This I believe, both as a U.S. citizen and a Ukrainian.

George P. Jarymowycz
Short Hills, N.J.

A reader's rebuttal re the campaign

Dear Editor:

I've been reading with interest the U.S. election-oriented letters, and have some comments of my own. First, I'd like to offer a rebuttal to Roman Golash regarding John Kerry.

First, the smear campaign against John Kerry began almost as soon as his return from Vietnam. The Nixon White House's dirty-tricks division hired John O'Neill to discredit Mr. Kerry. Mr. O'Neill continues his dirty tricks today for a new administration. Regarding Mr. Kerry's statements, he merely reported what he'd heard from other veterans at the Winter Soldiers' Gathering, but the swift boat ads are heavily edited to make it appear that Mr. Kerry himself is making these charges.

With respect to the charge against Sen. Kerry's war record, the swift boat claims have been thoroughly discredited. All the men on Mr. Kerry's boat who were with him have verified that his account was true. Also, two separate Navy inquiries under two different administrations (Richard Nixon and George W. Bush ), have concluded that Mr. Kerry's service was indeed unimpeachable.

Speaking of veterans, let's not forget that the Bush administration has attempted to cut veterans' pay and health benefits, while hypocritically praising soldiers in their campaign speeches. Talk is cheap and actions speak louder than words, as they say.

Regarding the assertion that Mr. Kerry voted against "every known weapons system," there is more to this statement than the Republican propaganda machine's spin would indicate. Mr. Kerry, like most of the Senate at the time, voted to cut weapons funding from the defense budget because of the insistence to do so by then - Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney. This is no secret - Mr. Cheney's speech, where he strongly urges the congress to cut various weapons systems, has been shown at least twice on the evening news.

Everyone in the United States must be aware by now of the mess that the Bush administration has made in Iraq, their incompetence in taking a multi-trillion dollar budget surplus and converting it into a multi-trillion dollar debt, their disregard for environmental protection, and their lack of concern about 45 million citizens without health insurance. And every Ukrainian American must be aware of the Bush/Cheney administration lack of support for passing the Famine Resolution - are our "fearless" leaders afraid of offending Vladimir Putin?

But Ukrainians, with their memories of the Soviet horror, should be especially concerned about the ominous actions taken by this administration in the name of the "war on terror" - the encroachment on our civil liberties by radical extremist politicians on the far-right fringe. The so-called Patriot Act begins to take our country down a road travelled only by police states of the past. Nazis and Communists both used repression as a tool to consolidate political power, then made this repression permanent. One of the goals of fanatic Islamic militants is to destroy America by transforming our society into the kind found in many Middle Eastern tyrannies. If John Ashcroft succeeds in shredding the Constitution, Osama Bin Laden will have won.

Finally, concerning the silliness of "liberal/conservative" labels - conservatives traditionally have been stalwart defenders of freedom of the individual, proponents of fiscal responsibility and reduced government. On all three counts, the Bush/Cheney administration has failed miserably. Their draconian Patriot Act threatens our civil liberties, they've swollen the budget more than any "tax-and-spend" liberal ever did - likewise with our debt - and created more bureaucracy.

Incompetence, corruption, excuses, lies and hypocrisy - aren't you tired of this?

Oleh Sydor
Glen Ellyn, Ill.

Economic numbers don't lie about reality

Dear Editor:

I don't know where Myron Kuropas gets his data to paint such a rosy picture of the American economy. His views seem to reflect typical right-wing spin interpreting any report to their advantage, but the economy uses numbers and numbers don't lie. When President George W. Bush came into office the American economy had a surplus of at least $3 trillion. Now we have a budget deficit of $3 trillion.

What these numbers mean is that Mr. Bush has lost $20,000 for every man woman and child in this country. For Dr. Kuropas and his wife, this translates to a $40,000 loss and, if Dr. Kuropas has two children, then it becomes an $80,000 loss for his family. This also means that these children are that much in debt and, if they earn a typical American salary of $35,000, they will have to work for the government for free for more than two years to pay this off. I hope Dr. Kuropas is happy with the couple of thousand that he saved on tax breaks.

This is not the first time Dr. Kuropas has used the right-wing agenda to attack John Kerry. It is one thing to criticize his war record and quite another to criticize what he said about the war. On previous pages of The Ukrainian Weekly, Dr. Kuropas basically takes the view of the ultra-right-wing swift boat vets in calling eight veterans who served with Kerry liars. Apparently, guys who weren't with Mr. Kerry know better what happened on those boats.

As a Ukrainian American Dr. Kuropas should be more interested in each candidate's stance on Ukraine. We already know the elder Bush's famous "Chicken Kiev" speech. The younger Bush is following right along in his father's footsteps, working against the U.S. Senate resolution declaring the Ukrainian Famine a genocide. Furthermore, his hero seems to be Vladimir Putin, who is quickly steering Russia into a dictatorship.

Oleh Kolodiy
Maplewood, N.J.

Faked photograph depicts diaspora

Dear Editor:

The Russian-language daily Segodnya, owned by Donetsk oligarch Rynat Akhmetov (Viktor Yanukovych's main ally) on October 21 pubished a claim that diaspora Ukrainians were demonstrating against U.S. "interference" in the elections (see http://www2.pravda.com.ua/archive/2004/october/21/4.shtml). In reality, the newspaper showed a 1991 photo of American Ukrainians demonstrating against the USSR.

Should Ukrainian organizations in the U.S. stay silent about this?

Taras Kuzio
Washington

The Ukrainian Weekly welcomes letters to the editor and commentaries on a variety of topics of concern to the Ukrainian American and Ukrainian Canadian communities.

Opinions expressed by columnists, commentators and letter-writers are their own and do not necessarily reflect teh opinions of either The Weekly editorial staff or its publisher, the Ukrainian National Association.

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