Conservative Bill Clinton

Re “Forget Dole; Here’s the Ideal GOP Candidate,” by Robert Scheer, Column Left, Aug. 6:

The snarling Scheer column was delightful. I kept agreeing with him point after point. Most appreciated was, “Clinton could launch a nuclear war and make it seem like a peacekeeping mission.” Whew! Well said. Of course, the ever-subtle Scheer doesn’t want to be taken literally on this Clinton attack. He’s only using Bill Clinton as a straw dog to heap even worse bile on those “mean-spirited” Republicans, who want to end Western civilization by reforming entitlements.

Hey, now that Clinton is accepting the Republican agenda, Scheer will have to come up with some different adjectives: “mean-spirited” just lost its punch.

LINDSEY LEE GINTER

Los Angeles

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* Thank you for printing Scheer’s wonderfully acerbic article regarding Clinton and his betrayal of Democratic Party ideals. The president’s decision to sign the welfare bill evoked in my mind a bizarre image of George Bush’s head, talking about a “kinder, gentler nation,” grafted onto Clinton’s body.

It saddens me that my only choice this November will be between an out-of-touch conservative and his even more reactionary party, a wacky nut-case egomaniac billionaire, and a slimy, dishonest, treacherous “Democrat.”

Here’s hoping that Clinton--or perhaps more importantly, voters--gets Scheer’s message.

DENNIS HOHN CHO

Torrance

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* I certainly agree with Scheer’s position. Clinton is moving the Democratic Party to the right and as a lifelong activist voter, I am very uncomfortable with most of what he’s doing. The problem is that it doesn’t matter that Clinton heads the Democratic Party at the moment; the Republicans are so insane that Donald Duck could be heading the Democratic Party and I’d vote for him. I don’t want the conservative religious right in power. For me that’s the most important issue in this election.

Bob Dole isn’t the problem for the Republicans--the conservative religious right is the GOP’s problem, and it’s the problem that has the Democrats remaining silent while Clinton makes war on children. The damage that is presently being done by Newt Gingrich and his ilk can be undone very quickly, but only if true moderates are in office. Clinton, to give him some credit, has held off the worst of the conservative religious right’s proposals. I certainly will vote for him. But I don’t like him. I don’t like what he’s doing to my party and to my country.

JOAN MEIJER-HIRSCHLAND

Los Angeles

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* As a lifelong Republican, I had decided that I would be voting for President Clinton in November, because I do not feel that Bob Dole has the physical, mental or emotional capabilities to be president.

After reading Scheer’s column, the strong misgivings I have felt toward the president resurfaced. Any man who is willing to shelve personal and ethical convictions just to get elected cannot be right for America.

Unless the Republicans open up their convention and nominate a much better and wiser man than Dole, for the first time in the 50 years since I voted for Wendell Wilkie, I will not be exercising my right to vote.

GERRY LINQUIST

Los Angeles

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* I’m brokenhearted. President Clinton says he will sign the welfare reform bill--breaking a federal trust to the nation’s poor children and their parents. But what can we expect of a president who signed GATT and NAFTA into law, sacrificing the jobs of millions of Americans, and was responsible for the execution of a retarded convict in his home state to prove he supported capital punishment.

But I’ll still vote for him. There aren’t any other alternatives.

IDA LEBOFF

Tarzana

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* Liberals for Clinton are relying on his being as principled as a Republican as he was as a Democrat.

JOSEPH MANDELBERG

Granada Hills