Better than Sugar

Sir: At a time when the Negro is extremely suspicious of all praise given him or to one of his peers, and overly sensitive that behind the "sugary" praise there lurks hidden meaning, let me congratulate you on your article [Nov. 17] about the newly elected mayors, Carl Burton Stokes of Cleveland and Richard Hatcher of Gary, Ind. This was indeed a splendid article and one which I felt to be very sincere. It brought out good points on both men, but the praise was not "sugar-coated." It was one of the few articles I have read on the Negro which was truly sincere, straightforward and unpretentious.

MARGARET JUSTICE St. Albans, N.Y.

Sir: The Stokes victory clearly proves that it was the individual, not the name. His zest and vigor, coupled with his platform for office, won him many friendly votes.

(SP4) STEPHEN BREGSTONE A.P.O. San Francisco

Sir: The minority group pulled a nifty trick in Cleveland. First it urged all voters to consider the Man rather than his Race. Then it went to the polls and voted 99% for Carl B. Stokes.

WALTER W. SEIFERT Columbus

Sir: Sorry, but John Gardner is the Secretary of HEW. I'm the Secretary of HUD.

ROBERT C. WEAVER

Washington

That Soviet Society

Sir: Congratulations on the brilliant expose on contemporary Communism [Nov. 10]. However, the total effect may lead your readers to believe that the Soviet Union is a diminishing threat to the security of the U.S. This is not so; the abandonment of the cocoon of the Marxist mystique of historical inevitability exposes only the giant moth of Russian nationalistic aggression--cunningly Stalinist. This contention is substantiated by a report in your NATION section. The identical "liberalized" Soviets who now espouse Libermanism and plan to triple their output of autos have secretly developed the Fractional Orbital Bombing System designed to thwart U.S. nuclear defenses. We cannot afford to fall into a false complacency when dealing with the Soviets. They have not yet proven any sincere desire to coexist.

A/1C JOHN J. NEUBERT Duluth Air Base Duluth, Minn.

Sir: I am not unAmerican, on the contrary, I am an admirer of the U.S. since 1947 working in the accounting department of a great American company. But I think the comparison between the U.S.S.R. and the U.S. must not be made on the basis of the year 1967, but on the basis of the U.S. about 1870 and the U.S.S.R. 1967. On this basis you will find a striking similarity between the young U.S. and the young U.S.S.R.: in both countries violence (see Western films), slavery, poverty and log cabins. In the young U.S. was capitalism to place the cornerstone of the greatness and the liberty of a nation, using the slavery of the Negroes and the cheap labor of white immigrants; now the poor Italians and Irishmen are independent and some of them rich and opulent men. I am sure the Negroes will be in the near future. In young U.S.S.R. Communism is to put the same cornerstone using the slavery of its own people.

A "great society" does not spring forth from the earth as a mushroom after a rain. It must struggle as an oak against wintry winds and dry spells. The Roman poet Lucretius, contemplating death depleting nature for the food of the living, in a verse full of melancholy says: "nature does not allow anything to be brought forth, if not helped by the death of another thing," and this is the same in the social and economic life of mankind.

STANISLAO CATTANEO Rome, Italy

Sir: When I read the statement of William Griffith, professor of political science at M.I.T., "The current leaders have no moral authority. They are regarded by intellectuals as a combination of bureaucratic idiots and criminals. There is a terrible alienation from the government." I made a quick check on what country you were rambling on about. Save that little quote; it could serve as an appropriate filler under "The Nation" any week.

GERALD V. LITTIG Kalamazoo, Mich.

Viewed From the Outside

Sir: You label as "atrociously tasteless" antiwar slogans such as RUSK KILLS CHILDREN FOR PROFIT and RUSK--L.B.J.'S SECRETARY OF HATE [Nov. 3]. Well, of course. What did you expect? How could any incantations regarding the U.S.'s slaughter and crippling of the Vietnamese people and nation be anything but atrociously tasteless?

JORGE E. TRISTANI JR.

San Juan, P.R.

Sir: I view the anti-Viet Nam and antidraft protests with mounting apprehension. Do these people really know what they protest against? I wish they were with us in Czechoslovakia in 1945 when the people of that and other Eastern areas fled in utter panic before the occupying Russian troops. These people left behind all that had ever been their lives and their heritage to enter areas to be occupied by the Americans. Could we be such fearsome conquerors?

Why is it that today people forsake all, and risk their lives to leave East Germany? Do the protesters feel that the people of Asia and the Pacific Islands could find peaceful cohabitation with a Communist government? If they can, why could not these others?

MRS. E. E. SPACKMAN Riverside, Calif.

Sir: This "quiet American" has long been searching for a voice. How do I associate myself with the Citizens Committee for Peace with Freedom?

As the hippie pothead protesters cast off their panties and bras, I'd like to start rolling up my sleeves. Yours in LSD--Let's Save Democracy.

ROBERT J. HOCHSTATTER Asuncion, Paraguay

Sir: We Asians can only conclude that the American opposition to the war in Viet Nam is about as ridiculous as some Americans' sense of loyalty. Since when does a person have to fight fair in a war? And since when does a person go free when he is disloyal? You Americans! You have had freedom so long you have forgotten what that privilege really means. Come live with us in Asia and find out.

K. SATAK Naha, Okinawa

Sir: As a Canadian veteran of W.W. II I am touched at the abuse being hurled at your Administration simply because they are trying to perform their duty in a nasty political situation in Viet Nam. How many European and British citizens care to recall who provided them with food, arms, supplies and ultimately armed forces to obtain freedom and liberty during two world wars. Not a single one of these so-called American allies, including Canada, have had the courage to send any arms or supplies to help out the U.S.A. in their travail in Viet Nam.

FRANK WEINSTEIN, D.S.C. Edmonton, Alberta

Neither Ten Nor Twenty-five

Sir: A tip of the camouflaged steel pot from a soldier in this strong, forward, vital nation. Your Essay "Whatever Happened to Patriotism" [Nov. 10] brings the definition of "patriotism" into its proper perspective. I had seriously worried that patriotism had become a ten-letter dirty word. If that is just how many of the anti-everything Americans had thought of patriotism then an enlightenment is in store for them within your Essay.

(SP4) ROGER S. SCHATZ Seoul, South Korea

Sir: A typical young patriotic American works day after day in a foreign country at a job that his folks don't really understand, his former university mates question the merit of and he didn't know existed before he joined the service, and wanting like hell to get back to those simple convenient places in the States he once took for granted; yet, he knows he is serving his country to the best of his ability--and he knows of no way in the world to explain "patriotism" in 25 words or less.

WAYNE F. NELSON Lieutenant, U.S.A.F. A.P.O. New York

Sir: Patriotism is a word used by politicians to get votes, and a weapon wielded by inept leaders seeking support for unpopular policies. The logistics of our new "national purpose" are born in computers, not the hearts of our fathers. Just as there is no technology that can program love, tolerance, and honesty into the national fabric, no degree of patriotic fervor can be harnessed to a computer.

PETER LEVINE Washington

Sir: Thank God that we don't have to depend on the dissenters to preserve our light to dissent.

G. R. CHURCHILL Huntsville, Ala.

Look! No Booties!

Sir: Cheers for the normal-looking "Little Brother" doll [Nov. 10]. It is high time that life be represented faithfully so that children can grow up knowing life as it actually is. Getting through the blockades some parents erect is difficult enough. Children are people and should be treated with due respect. If they are not, then they will only become the neurotic parents of their time.

NAOMI B. TROEGER Binghamton, N.Y.

Sir: When our toy catalogue arrived, I showed the picture of Petit Frere to my five-year-old daughter (she has a three year-old brother) and asked her what she thought of the doll. She studied the page for a long time, and then said, "It looks funny. Little boys don't have all that hair." So much for obscenity.

KARIN E. HODGES Philadelphia

Sir: The only thing I find obscene about "Little Brother" is the price.

JERELYN KERN Skokie, Ill.

Sir: As one who has lived happily for over half a century with a small but precious collection of sexless dolls, including third generation of same dating back to my Seattle grandmother's "Frozen Charlotte" of 1844, I deplore the new realism. Heavens to Betsy, we knew which was which by the color of their booties.

ANN L. WURTELE Woodstock, N.Y.

Sir: The introduction of the "Little Brother" doll has predictably resulted in irrational, moralistic, and highly emotional protests. The very absurdity of the outcries tends to obscure potentially valid objections. While doll play begins at an early age, little girls continue this interest during a later period characterized by exclusion and disparagement of the opposite sex. There is much psychiatric evidence suggesting that this period of sexual disinterest has healthy purposes. It aids the normal repression of highly threatening infantile sexual conflicts and allows time for exploration and growth in the demanding process of simply learning to deal with others.

It is possible that repeated exposure to realistic male genitalia would complicate and even retard this aspect of development. Sexual openness in a seven-year-old child is not necessarily a virtue.

FRANKLIN G. MALESON, M.D. Pennsylvania Hospital Philadelphia

Once Removed

Sir: I'm sure that your review of Graham Greene's The Comedians [Nov. 3] is fair to the picture, but I know that it isn't fair to Haiti. "Greene's fictional Haiti," you say, "seems not very far removed from the real one . . . a Black Power station," etc. Well, this just isn't so. Greene found what he came looking for--Papa Doc, the Tontons Macoute, Black Power, a sick society. The visitor without this preconception will see little or nothing of Haiti's cloak-and-dagger world. He will be overwhelmed instead by the Haitian people who have spurned those who strutted in the capital and stole their taxes, from Dessaline's time to the present. The Haitians continue through all this to be the most creative, outgoing, generous and ebullient people in the Caribbean; and the poorest--but without a trace of self-pity, xenophobia, or racial arrogance.

SELDEN RODMAN Oakland, N.J.

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