SATURDAY, AUGUST 28, 2010


KLMNO FREE for ALL The life of William Saxbe


I was disappointed by The Post’s Aug. 26 obituary of former attorney general William B. Saxbe. The obit contained statements that merit clarification. Watergate involved two break-ins, not one. The less publicized one occurred May 28, 1972, and included the installation of wiretaps, 20 days before the famous burglary discovered by guard Frank Wills. Saxbe’s comments about Patty Hearst (“a common criminal”) did not violate applicable law or prejudice her defense. She declined to testify against her own alleged kidnap- pers, which made Saxbe’s comments seem all the more reasonable.


Saxbe was a remark- William B. Saxbe in 1975.


able attorney general and a demanding litigator; he campaigned against gun crimes so aggressively that, were he to do so to- day, he would be targeted by the National Rifle As- sociation; he was one of President Richard M. Nixon’s few appointees


who had the courage to publicly condemn him, even while in office. He exhibited a liberal social conscience. The Post’s readers deserved to know more, and bet-


ter, about this remarkable lawyer. Mark C. Williams, Alexandria


Ken Feinberg is an arbitrator Your Aug. 21 headline “Gulf Coast on edge as Sept. 11


mediator assesses oil spill claims” made the common mistake of confusing mediation with arbitration. Were Kenneth R. Feinberg a mediator, he would


moderate meetings between BP and those affected by the oil spill, and the parties themselves would decide on what relief, monetary and otherwise, there should be.


Feinberg is an arbitrator vested with the authority to decide himself how claims are to be paid. While ar- bitration and mediation each have their own virtues, I suspect that neither would satisfy all of the many and diverse interests across the Gulf of Mexico region. Jonathan Chace, Chestertown, Md.


The writer was a mediator and administrator for 33 years with the Community Relations Service of the Justice Department.


STEPHEN DUNN/GETTY IMAGES Ryan Lochte swims the butterfly leg of the men’s 200-meter individual medley in California on Aug. 21. Why don’t you cover ...?


Wow, big news in the swimming world. The Post was on top of it: “Like Phelps, Lochte starts impres- sively” [Sports, Aug. 19] at the Pan Pacific Championships in Irvine, Calif. Then, “Phelps not up to speed in the 400 IM” [Sports, Aug. 20]. Amy Shipley focused on Olympic multi-medalist Michael Phelps in the first paragraphs of both arti- cles, both of which were illustrated by photos of Phelps in action and no other men. But she did have to acknowledge


that Ryan Lochte, a two-time Olympian, not only posted the fast- est time in the Aug. 18 200-meter freestyle preliminary but also won the 100-meter backstroke. I might have let the de-emphasis


BILL O’LEARY/THE WASHINGTON POST


Take a good look: On the right is “The Zombie Survival Guide” in the office of FEMA’s W. Craig Fugate.


FEMA’s expert on zombies


I shall sleep better knowing from the photograph ac- companying the Aug. 26 Style article “Standing in the path of disasters” that the director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency is ready for the even- tual zombie apocalypse. Why else would “The Zombie Survival Guide” be one of the few books shown in W. Craig Fugate’s sparsely furnished office? Jean Lightner Norum, Charlottesville


Abandoned by The Post If not for the fact that I’m a Post addict, being from


that generation equating “breakfast” with “paper,” I would certainly cancel my subscription. Why? Well, this month there had been no reports in


The Post of the important news that 33 gold and cop- per miners in Chile were trapped Aug. 5 and not found alive until Sunday. You finally ran a wire story on Mon- day and a wire Digest item Thursday. There are so many aspects to this story, touching, in- spiring and awesome. I’ve been following it through other means but expecting to see it in “our” paper. I guess that life-affirming news is not your specialty. Virginia B. Levy, Rockville


Where’s the political balance?


The Aug. 22 news story “Ruling sets up IRS as over- seer of groups’ gifts to campaigns” pointed out the tac- tics of four groups, all of them right-leaning, as exam- ples of slippery interpretations of rules governing campaign finance and taxes. C’mon. Spread the wealth and start reporting on


what the full panoply of groups — including left- leaning ones — is doing. One-sided reporting does not serve your readers.


Mike Wendy, Washington


The writer is vice president for press and external affairs at the Progress and Freedom Foundation.


A failure to communicate


In her insightful Aug. 25 op-ed column [“Our instant karma needs some repair”] Kathleen Parker cited the line “What we’ve got here is a failure to communicate” from the Paul Newman movie “Cool Hand Luke.” She attributed it to Newman, but a larger share of the credit should go to the great character actor Strother Martin, who uttered the words first — sub- stituting “failure” for “a failure” — in a Southern drawl that still has imitators knocking audiences dead. New- man spoke the famous line later in a taunting imita- tion of Martin.


Wes Pedersen, Chevy Chase


on Lochte go. Hey, I’m a Ryan Lochte nut. He’s an awesome swim- mer, easy on the eyes, a nice guy, he swam in college with my children’s former coach. Maybe I overreacted. But when I saw the Aug. 20 and 22 Sports sections, I had to write. The Aug. 20 articles on Olympic champ Jason Lezak and Phelps’s failure to make the finals of the 400 individu- al medley were accompanied by a large photo of Phelps. The Aug. 22 profile of Phelps [“ ‘A long way to go’ ”] revealed the startling news that he has been practicing less and swimming slower. Why not focus us the real story:


Lochte has worked “harder over the last seven months than he ever has, and his results demonstrate the difference”? But that was bur- ied on Page D3. At this rate, I am afraid Michael Phelps himself might jump out of my Sports page tomorrow. Phelps’s coach quipped that the


two swimmers have “traded places.” Good for Lochte. So why the enormous photos of Phelps only?


Nancy Walsh,Henrico, Va. 


Last weekend, Annapolis was host to Major League Lacrosse’s Championship Weekend, and the hometown Chesapeake Bayhawks were one of the final four teams competing for the title. In fact, the Bayhawks upset two higher-seeded teams — the Boston Cannons and the Long Island Lizards — to claim the championship. Unfortunately, Post readers had only a 14-line Digest item Aug. 23 to let them know that any of this took place, although the greater


MITCHELL LAYTON/GETTY IMAGES The Chesapeake Bayhawks celebrate their national lacrosse title Aug. 22.


Washington area is home to some of the nation’s finest college, high school and youth lacrosse pro- grams. I guess that Post sports edi- tors are simply not in tune with the current demographics of team sports.


Tom Owens, Silver Spring 


In response to the reader from


Ashburn [Free for All, Aug. 21] who believes that The Post’s Sports sec- tion devotes too much attention to coverage of Maryland Terrapins football (at the expense of the Uni- versity of Virginia and Virginia Tech), let me state the obvious: The


University of Maryland is in the Washington metropolitan area, and U-Va. and Tech are not. Of course there will be more stories about the Terps, because the Terps are the local team.


Online maps show that Char-


lottesville is 117 miles away, while Blacksburg is even farther at 269 miles. Asking the Post Sports sec- tion to dedicate as much print to these teams is like asking The Post to include the same number of Philadelphia Eagles stories as Washington Redskins stories (Philadelphia is 142 miles away). AndrewViscardo, Bethesda


Not yet Regarding Mary Beth Sheri-


dan’s Aug. 22 front-page arti- cle, “Women at head of the ta- ble when U.S. engages in nu- clear talks”: So what? Until it is consid- ered commonplace for female officials to take lead roles in negotiations, and not front- page news, equality has not been achieved. Andrea Kronzek, Rockville


The ‘surge’ only starts the discussion


Christopher Coughlin [Free for All, Aug. 21] complained that the Aug. 19 article about the end of the combat mission in Iraq did not give credit to President George W. Bush for the “surge” that allowed the current administration to withdraw troops in victory. In fact, there is ample de-


bate as to whether the surge did “work.” Many experts say that the decline in sectarian violence can be attributed to the Sunni Awakening at least as much as to the surge. Further, it appears that sec- tarian violence is on the rise again. If the purpose of the surge was to drive down the level of violence for a period long enough to give the United States cover while withdraw- ing our troops, then Bush was right, and the surge worked. Since Coughlin wishes that


the article had been more fo- cused on who was right or wrong, perhaps the article should have delved into whether Bush was right to have begun the war in Iraq. Jeff Martini, Churchton, Md.


R


A11


Why Israel went to war


Evidently Amal Jadou was not living on Earth in 1967 if he believes that Israel was re- sponsible for starting the Six- Day War [letters, Aug. 24]. In May 1967, Egypt ordered the removal of the U.N. Emer- gency Force from its Israeli border, which had been in place since 1957 to preserve the peace. Egypt also blockaded the Straits of Tiran, preventing shipping from reaching the Is- raeli port of Eilat. This unilat- eral, illegal action was consid- ered an act of war and resulted in Israel’s defensive attack against Egypt to reopen this international waterway. As a result, four Arab coun- tries were defeated in six days and lost territory to Israel. Irving Shapiro, Rockville


Steps toward cultural tolerance


In her Aug. 20 Metro column [“At Pentagon, a lesson in tolerance N.Y. mosque debate should heed”] Petula Dvorak began with a statement that there is a “sanctuary where Islam could be celebrated.” It took more than half the column before she finally stated that this is


an ecumenical space with a window that has images on it and Christian New Testaments on a table — a sure clue that it is not set aside for Islam- ic celebration. Many public institutions have a space set aside where one may go for contemplation or prayer, mostly silent. That the Pentagon has a place for this purpose is not unique or something to comment upon in regard to the controversy about where mosques should be located. All such places in the military are multi-religion spaces — a most sat- isfactory solution in our multicultural society.


James M. Blass, Mechanicsville





Thank you, Washington Post, for the most helpful picture and graph- ic, right on the Aug. 20 front page, that shows the scene between Ground Zero and the planned mosque and cultural center in New York, and vice versa [“The views from Ground Zero”]. Your Style articles also were helpful, reminding everybody that this is


d


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The Post and should include the writer’s address and day and evening telephone numbers. Letters are subject to editing and abridgment. Please do not send letters as attachments. Because of the volume of material we receive, we are unable to acknowledge submissions; writers whose letters are under consideration for publication will be contacted.


a New York matter and really nobody else’s business. Also, that the cul- tural center will be open to all and will include a basketball court, a swimming pool, gym and lecture hall. It would be nice if the chattering classes were to “button it” and the politicians were to devote themselves to the people who elected them (or may elect them) and leave New Yorkers to make decisions about their city.


Michael G. Sandmann, Easton, Md.


Not the New Orleans I know I found Hank


Stuever’s review of Spike Lee’s new pro- duction [“Katrina re- visited: Once more into the breach,” Arts & Style, Aug. 22] to be negative. Fine; he’s entitled to his opinion. But his den- igrating attitude toward New Orleans and its citizens was mean-spirited and gratuitous. Yes, New Orleanians continue to insist that Hurricane Katrina did not flood their city. They do this because it is the truth. Inade- quate and failed levees flooded the city. The Army Corps of Engineers admitted its own culpability after independent engineering studies found damning evidence, and a federal judge has lambasted the Corps for its fecklessness and in- competence. As for New Orleans being below


REUTERS A shot from Spike Lee’s new film.


The Netherlands manages to keep itself dry in similar circumstances. What about the recent catastroph- ic flooding in Iowa, Tennessee, Pa- kistan and China — not a place near sea level among them. Using a film critique to ridicule


sea level, that applies to only half of the city. And how is it relevant?


the victims of a very real man- made disaster should be beneath a news organization of your caliber. Joyce Levine, Sunrise, Fla. Joyce Levine, an urban planner, is the author of a chapter on New Orleans in the forthcoming “International Handbook of Crisis and Management.”


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