Controversy Over Duke

The irony is nothing less than stunning--former head Klansman and founder of the National Assn. for the Advancement of White People, now turned politician, David Duke, telling reporter Joanne Harrison his childhood was like that of Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn’s.

Either Duke never read Twain’s “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” or he suffers from an acute form of amnesia concerning one of Huck’s central boyhood experiences--attempting to help a slave achieve freedom.

MILES BELLER

Los Angeles