Were Americans Lied To About the Iraqi Arsenal?

A thunderous applause in response to your April 29 editorial “Tell the Truth on Weapons” and Robert Scheer’s “Are We Dumb or Just Numb?” (Commentary).

The Bush administration has lied to the American public and the world. I feel betrayed by our government. No weapons of mass destruction have been found. The United Nations inspectors were correct. Who knows how many other lies the administration has told us and will tell in the future. I hope that the American public will clamor for truth, honesty, integrity and justice -- just a few of the hallmarks of true democracy.

Robert H. Fernandez

Granada Hills

*

The Times misses the obvious points of U.S. strategy. It is to change the geopolitical structure of the terrorist threat posed by Iraq. It is to destabilize and modify the total area in terms of its long-term potential to undermine the security of the U.S., if not all of Western civilization.

The U.S. was faced with the fact that France, Germany and Russia supplied arms and military aid to Saddam Hussein while exploiting the corrupt oil-for-food program. This is a record of deceit greater than any the U.S. may suffer if no weapons of mass destruction are found in Iraq.

Otis Page

Arroyo Grande

*

That the American people don’t mind being lied to should come as no surprise to Scheer. President Bush’s State of the Union claim that Iraq had purchased uranium materials from a country in Africa turned out to be based on a second-rate forgery. Yet revelation of that deception has gained virtually no traction.

Alan and Precy Benson

Newbury Park

*

It’s interesting how often the question “Where are the weapons of mass destruction?” is met with the answer “Our brave troops have conducted one of the most effective military campaigns in history, with amazingly few casualties and a minimum of collateral damage.”

Jim Stein

Redondo Beach

*

First, Sen. John F. Kerry snaps at Howard Dean (April 29). Now The Times’ rabid attack-dog Scheer goes after the New York Times’ Thomas L. Friedman. Does it get any better than this?

Next, could we hear Yasser Arafat denounce Osama bin Laden? How about the pretender, Martin Sheen, ripping the Dixie Chicks? Delicious!

Geoffrey Cushing-Murray

Studio City

*

Michael Ramirez’s unintentionally hilarious assertion that the Dixie Chicks are somehow engaging in the suppression of their fans’ right to free speech by attempting to defend themselves against an onslaught of smear and innuendo from the neo-con right is so typical of the inanity coming from those precincts these days (editorial cartoon, Commentary, April 29).

You can’t help but wonder what the problem is out there in the land of a thousand boycotts.

Are Bush’s supporters feeling so exposed by his inability to deliver the oft-promised WMD bacon that they’ve decided, in the spirit of preemption, to bring the war home? Are they upset because said president has yet to receive a Caesar-style deification and rose-petal-strewn parade over his historic triumph to the east? And, honestly, are those who have taken such dire umbrage at the Dixie Chicks’ outspoken views on the war in Iraq really aggrieved and sorely abused fans or merely cranks with well-honed ideological axes to grind?

John Crawford

Sierra Madre