Sybert Reply

* I write to express my personal disappointment at both the manner and content of your Oct. 26 editorial endorsement of Rep. Anthony Beilenson (D-Woodland Hills). The lack of analysis and factual errors disserve your readers. Most of all, the frankly snide tone reinforces the notion that The Times is neither open to new ideas nor prepared to oppose any incumbents.

It is clear that your editorial went out of its way to mischaracterize me on conservative issues in an attempt to bolster the incumbent:

* You criticize me for calling defense conversion “industrial welfare.” Please recall that I said the Clinton Administration’s proposals amounted to such until we in Gov. Pete Wilson’s Office of Planning and Research took the lead in working with other states to make sure they were not. Further, the reason we have “a state devastated by defense/aerospace cutbacks” is precisely because of precipitous and unwise defense cuts championed by Beilenson (and he says he wants $40 billion more in cuts).

* I make no apologies for calling the crime bill ineffective. The partial federal funding will cover precisely 28,740 police nationwide for one year. The effect on Los Angeles will be virtually nil. It is just more pork-barreling.

The amendment to the crime bill securing reimbursement to California for incarceration costs of illegal alien prisoners is a Wilson proposal, from my office, and Beilenson gave it away in negotiations with the Clinton Administration by agreeing to defer full reimbursement until 2004.

Finally, your brief discussion dismisses me as vague on welfare reform. I suggest you read your own newspaper; at your invitation I wrote an article with detailed proposals for such reform in your Aug. 14 issue.

RICHARD SYBERT

Woodland Hills