Charlie Finley, Fair or Foul

To the Editors:

How can you devote a cover story [Aug. 18] to the robber baron of our national pastime? The way Charlie Finley can save baseball is to get out of it.

Edward G. Sell II

Hickory, N.C.

Charlie O. Finley is an exciting, successful, dynamic genius.

Anne T. O'Neil

Chicago

Charlie Finley is arrogant, obstinate, contrary, repulsive and shifty, but if he could transform the 1960 Kansas City Athletics into the Oakland team of 1972, 1973, 1974 and possibly 1975, imagine what he could do for the financial woes of New York City.

Michelle Williams

Woodside, N. Y.

Thank you for the big picture of Charlie Finley. It mounts perfectly on my dart board.

Preston A. Pairo III

Ellicott City, Md.

Baseball lacks action today because team-shuffling shylocks like Finley have been instrumental in league expansion, which has spread player talent so thin that rule changes and orange balls are needed to keep fan interest.

John A. Hubicsak

San Mateo, Calif.

You stated there was laughter at the naming of Mr. Finley on my list of the 20 Sexiest Men in the Eastbay.

Just jealousy, I suppose. He is indeed one of the sexiest men I've met... and one of the most gentlemanly.

Marcy Bachmann, columnist

Oakland Tribune

Oakland, Calif.

Let's see a TIME cover story on Mrs. Finley. Anyone who could endure 34 years married to that pompous, miserable, acid-tongued idiot deserves recognition.

Barbara Recchie

Lexington, Ky.

Betty for President

Kudos to Mrs. Ford for her sincerity and strength to speak from her heart [Aug. 25], and a double hex on the bishop who so scornfully and distastefully berated her.

John Holt

Denver

If President Ford expects to be elected President, I suggest he put a muzzle on his wife.

Vonda Woll

Sparta, Ill.

As far as I'm concerned, Susan Ford can do anything she wants. I just wish her dad would fire Earl Butz.

Patrick D. Kelly

Los Angeles

Betty for President!

Louise Givens Reynolds

Blacksburg, Va.

Grain of Wisdom?

With reference to your article about grain export to the Soviet Union [Aug. 18], wouldn't it be a good idea to offer liquid grain (vodka) to the Soviet Union instead of shipping them grain? This certainly should keep them in good spirits and would save their own grain for bread.

Raimund Paul Scheffel

Elkhart, Ind.

How can anyone even consider selling U.S. grain to the Soviet Union, at this point in time, with the staggering food prices here in our own country?

Scott F. Micek

Cedar Rapids, Iowa

The Hustle Embraced

If the Hustle, the dance with partners [Aug. 25], is a sign of things to come, I embrace it. Dancing with a partner is prettier and friendlier than just standing opposite someone thinking your own thoughts, doing your own thing. It is a social grace, nicer than saying hello and it is fun to exchange bons mots while dancing with an old friend or someone you have just met.

Above all there is something joyous about dancing. There is a sense of taking part and a sense of accomplishment as one fits the steps to the music. It is too bad that the name is not more romantic, but then I guess the young people would not like it.

Ginger Rogers

Eagle Point, Ore.

I like the idea of the Hustle. It is much nicer dancing with a partner.

Ruby Keeler

Laguna, Calif.

Hiss and Perjury

We were dismayed to read your statement that Alger Hiss was "drummed out" of the legal profession [Aug. 18].

Perjury is one of the most reprehensible crimes that a lawyer can commit, and Hiss, after a fair trial by jury, was justly convicted of lying to a grand jury. The Massachusetts bar had no choice but to disbar him.

The fact that Richard M. Nixon led the attack against him makes Alger Hiss no less guilty.

Mrs. Alfred Knies

Winchester, Tenn.

Lethal Stress

The Medicine section [Aug. 18] described a study that implied the higher coronary death rate among American men compared with Japanese men was due not to dietary factors but rather the higher stress of American life. The Education section, however, highlighted a peculiar feature of life in tranquil Japan: the importance of a prestigious academic background (gakureki). In what you called "an especially telling incident," a Japanese mother, upset that her injured daughter could not prepare for some exams, strangled the girl in her hospital bed and soon after committed suicide.

Arnold Barnett

Cambridge, Mass.

Timese

I was glad to see in your article "Can't Anyone Here Speak English?" [Aug. 25] that TIME has discovered that decimate means not to destroy but to reduce by a tenth. As recently as last February, you did not know that: "China took another giant step toward consolidating the leadership that was almost completely decimated by the Cultural Revolution..."

About energy and the economy, TIME has said this: "For all the rhetorical smoke, the President and the Democrats are not far apart on many other aspects of the program." Rhetorical smoke was used by American Indians when sending up signals that did not require an answer. Of course, TIME may have had in mind the saying, "Where there is smoke, people are far apart."

TIME has told us that the National Football League since 1963 has successfully avoided any direct brush with gambling interests, evidently to help those who might otherwise have thought that the N.F.L. had unsuccessfully avoided a brush with gambling interests. It has told us of a stage that the audience surrounded on all sides, a difficult circumstance to avoid when surrounded. It has told us that Representative Patman of Texas "reigned supremely" over the House Banking Committee for twelve years. More likely, Patman reigned supremely confident. That is what led to his downfall. Have a care.

Edwin Newman

NBC News

New York City

Hiroshima Remembered

I, for one, am not sorry about Hiroshima [Aug. 18]--in fact, I'm glad. It ended the war, brought my father home and, by best estimates, saved 500,000 American lives.

TIME should seek professional help for its overblown guilt complex on behalf of the American people.

(Mrs.) Priscilla H. Loewenstine

Newtown, Conn.

I am one of the relatively few Americans who have visited Hiroshima and its atomic museum.

I remember that I left with tears streaming down my face.

Samuel Beach

New York City

Could you possibly spare one single tear for the memory of the Americans who in 1942 were forced into the "Death March" on Bataan and Corregidor?

Maurice Axelrod

Seattle

Not Tooting a Tuba

Senator Humphrey is not tooting a tuba [Aug. 18] in the photograph. The instrument he is using is a baritone horn (also known as a euphonium). The valves are fingered with the right hand (not the left, which the Senator used). Well, at least he was blowing into the right end.

Marshall S. Somers

Philadelphia

Condom Commercials

I disagree with the naive people who called the television station with complaints about the condom ad [Aug. 11]. The condom commercials should be shown until the public service announcements on VD are no longer necessary.

Sheila I. Lemberger

Fort Knox, Ky.

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