A Colorful Pattern

Sir: Your all-knowing writers have declared that busing [Nov. 15] is the only noble thing to do for the poor neglected black Americans. Does our Constitution state that all neighborhoods and schools must have a mixture of every race and nationality in them? There are some people who prefer to live with their own nationality or race. Because some interpret this as an evil racist attitude, the right of people to live with whom they please is denied. Is it the courts' duty to arrange us all in a very colorful pattern?

SANDRA WOZNIAK Mt. Clemens, Mich.

Sir: I hope that your objective report on busing will help the public understand that the issue that matters is not the bus ride but what is at the end of the bus ride. If discrimination can be reduced, if children can receive a better education, then every educational tool, including busing, should be used. Success or failure rests not with the bus but with the dedication of leadership to a truly equal education system and society.

LEON E. PANETTA

Former Director

Office for Civil Rights

Health, Education and Welfare

Carmel Valley, Calif.

Sir: The blacks rightfully want their children to be in a school where the surroundings are best for learning. So do the whites. Both agree the place isn't the ghetto.

Bus the blacks where they want to go, but don't punish white children by putting them in the ghetto.

SUSAN GREEN Portland, Ore.

Sir: Blacks do not want to exchange their culture for white culture. All they are demanding is their constitutional right to attend schools of far better standing than those of the ghetto. Education will then give black people the "tool" to further enrich their own culture.

MRS. MICKEY JONES Boston

Sir: You say black children do not get a good education in ghetto schools. I agree, but if it's not good enough for the blacks, it's not good enough for the whites.

WANDA MILLER Newport News, Va.

Sir: When Mrs. Irene McCabe, leader of the N.A.G., says, "I don't think I'm required to study or participate in another group's ethnic culture if I don't want to," she fails to recognize that black Americans have always been forced to study and conform to white culture.

SYLVIA SUE BERGMAN Bean Station, Tenn.

Sir: In the interests of accuracy, Oregon's Representative Edith Green is not a Republican, as you stated, but a Democrat and a very good one.

MARY K. MARK Portland, Ore.

The Charles Thomas Tragedy

Sir: Your story on the Charles Thomas tragedy and the State Department's personnel rating system [Nov. 15] is also applicable to the efficiency reports prepared on armed forces personnel.

One might conclude that one need not live in Communist-controlled territory to understand Kafka, but only that he be subjected to the administration of the State Department or the armed forces.

RICHARD J. KALNOK

Major, U.S.A.F. (ret.)

Chicopee, Mass.

Sir: In "Undiplomatic Reforms," you described the treatment of both Charles Thomas and Willard Brown by the Department of State, and pointed up the need for a full investigation by disinterested parties of the department's personnel policies. Many of us believe that the prerequisite for raising the generally low level of State Department effectiveness and re-establishing public confidence is making State's personnel system more fair, modern and efficient.

One of the principal causes of the present malaise is the "old-boy" network, which for too long has rewarded the toady with honors, good assignments and promotion while it punished those who challenge the conventional wisdoms of foreign policy.

XAVIER M. VELA

President. Local 1534

American Federation of

Government Employees

Washington, D.C.

Sir: Everyone deplores the tragic death of Charles W. Thomas, no one condones the loss of files or bureaucratic error, and reasonable men support objective procedures for the redress of legitimate grievances.

This said, your sweeping and overdramatized condemnation of the selection up or out system is misleading. Each year the selection boards screen the records of all eligible officers. The records contain much more than the annual efficiency reports you so snidely described. They are thorough, comprehensive and contain illustrative detail.

As elsewhere, injustice does occur but, on the basis of my 35 years' experience, not often and seldom without ultimate redemption. I know Howard Mace as a man of kindly disposition. He has given his adult life to his profession, and he deserves a better fate near the close of long and faithful service than to be singled out as "primarily responsible for the selecting-out process."

J. GRAHAM PARSONS, FSO

Department of State

Washington, D.C.

Authorship Denied

Sir: Your Letters to the Editor section [Nov. 22] published a critical and highly insulting commentary on the Iranian 2,500th anniversary celebrations, and attributed its authorship to "Norman R. Burton, Managing Director, Page Communications Engineers, Teheran."

I emphatically deny the authorship of the letter you published over my forged signature, and most especially do I deny the allegations and sentiments expressed in that letter. I cannot divine the reasons why a person would invent a statement so contrary to my own knowledge and beliefs, but let me set the record straight.

Those of us working here in the American and European business communities are proud of the accomplishments made by our Iranian friends. Those of us who are working on advanced technology projects with the Iranian government are pleased with the superior business relationship that exists between us. Contrary to the mischief set forth in the forged letter, we could not ask for a better friend or a better customer.

The reported cost of the celebration was greatly exaggerated--by the false Mr. Burton and by much of the foreign press as well. I know that most of the money was spent for long-range accomplishments, including schools, parks, roads and public communications systems. Much of the work was speeded up to achieve completion in time for the celebration. But to attribute the costs of these projects to the celebration itself would be like putting the total price tag for a ship onto the cost of the launching party.

More personally, my assignments here have spanned much of the past twelve years. As residents, my family and I love the nation and its people. We love living here. We think the celebration was well conceived and beautifully executed.

NORMAN R. BURTON Teheran

> TIME deeply regrets its error in publishing a forgery, as well as any embarrassment caused to Mr. Burton or to Page Communications Engineers.

Unrelated Game

Sir: As the owners and publishers of Monopoly, we reviewed with interest your piece entitled "Mafia Monopoly" [Nov. 15], which makes two other references to our famous real estate trading game equipment in describing a new but unrelated game.

Unfortunately, your piece was so written that it created the impression that we were putting out the new game. Such confusion first occurred among prospective purchasers who made inquiry to us regarding purchase. Secondly, and most unfortunately, at least two groups that publicly took exception to the new game as an ethnic slur advised the press that we were responsible.

Please, before, in the words of The Godfather, we take any more "bum raps," let the public know we do not publish or sell The Godfather game.

EDWARD P. PARKER

President

Parker Brothers

Salem, Mass.

The Power of Love

Sir: In the Essay "Toward a More Fallible Church" [Nov. 15], Writer Mayo Mohs surely caught the direction in which the Roman Catholic Church is moving. If "infallible" stands for power and "fallible" stands for love, then you could say that the church is becoming aware that the power of love is stronger than the love of power.

WALTER ANTHONY, C.S.P. San Francisco

Sir: Mayo Mohs' Essay is a welcome voice in the wilderness of commentary on the recent synod. In an age of computers that is overcome with future shock, many are inclined to forget that "humanity, after all, is the saving grace of the church."

M.C. HESS Columbus

Looking to the Man of the Year

Sir: Look no further for 1971's Man of the Year. President Nixon, with his bold new initiatives, has finally made the grade. MICHAEL MURPHY Louisville, Ohio

Sir: The most talked-about "man" for 1971 is the dollar.

LAUREN JOFFE Chevy Chase, Md.

Sir: I nominate Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, leader of the world's largest democracy, as Woman of the Year, for showing almost unbelievable restraint, compassion and humanism.

JANAK PATEL Stanford, Calif.

Sir: Daniel Ellsberg for Man of the Year! Truth will out. Democracy, to survive, must have it out even though it hurts.

ROYALD V. CALDWELL Portland, Ore.

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