Marine Families Feel Pinch at Home

It is a sad state of affairs that the families of U.S. Marines serving in the Middle East must struggle to make ends meet here at home (“Times Are Tough for Those Left Behind,” March 18). While these Marines are willing to fight and perhaps die for this country, they should not have the added worry of how their families are surviving at home. This is a shameful situation, and steps should be taken immediately to issue much-needed help in the way of extra money, food, housing, etc., to the families of these brave men and women. Wives of Marines should not have to stand in line for used clothing and day-old bread.

Joan Miller

La Mirada

*

To think that a nation such as ours cannot take care of the families of our servicemen and women is intolerable. The pictures of the wives of servicemen going through boxes of used clothing and standing in line for food handouts is heartbreaking.

The thought that we have money for everything but the care of families of the men and women who will be fighting a war is a sickening one. Soldiers, marines or sailors should be able to know that their families are well and being taken care of.

George Gemeiner

Los Angeles

*

Re “Resist Tax Cuts in Wartime,” editorial, March 19: Remember the fiscal mess President Lyndon Johnson got into with his “guns and butter” program? This president’s plan to cut taxes in wartime seems like guns and caviar, and not caviar to the general populace.

Obviously, the average citizen will not get Bush’s announced “average” tax cut, and since even a C student at Yale should know the difference between the median and the average on such a tax-cut curve, I must assume that we’ve been asked into a shell game.

Will we ever find the pea under the shells that the president shifts about so fast?

David Eggenschwiler

Los Angeles