Letters From the Issue of Thursday, March 15, 2007

Since you had nothing of value to argue and that is all you had, just who is the bigoted little piss-ant?

I will point out that not only is Ankarlo correct in his assessment, but those who aid and abet those who come here illegally and break the law should also be in jail, not out lobbying for reform to allow their actions to be grandfathered in.

Since you seem to be of the opinion that all those breaking the law to get here are just some poor schmucks who need a job, you are a part of the problem.
Melissa Powell, Fort Worth, Texas

And the real situation would be . . .:I'm of Mexican descent, and I don't like what the illegals do to our system. I'm talking about the ones who cross the border and come here to work and the ones who come up and get on welfare. My taxes increase to support them; I have to wait hours in the emergency room for a major injury because 50-plus illegals are using the hospital for common colds.

The ones who do work don't pay taxes. Yes, they put some money back into the community, but most of it goes back to their families in other countries (just check with Western Union). And when they do their peaceful marches?

The assholes pulled into the parking lot and blocked in my car during one of them — the car that I needed to use to go get my 7-year-old daughter who was throwing up in school and needed to go to the doctor.

So get off your racist attitude and address the real situation. Stop jumping on the boo-hoo bandwagon.
Juan Lopez, Chandler

Drive carefully, sir:You really hit the nail on the head when you wrote about Darrell Ankarlo, whose show I never miss because he pisses me off so much. I am a loyal listener who loves to hate him.

I pounded on my steering wheel until I almost broke it one day when he was ignorantly ranting about Mexican-Americans, contending we were traitors to this country for supporting our so-called illegal brethren getting fair treatment in the workforce from the U.S. government — which is what the marches through the streets of American cities have been all about (there's another one coming up May 1).

I am a Latino who was born in this country and whose parents were born in Mexico. I guess that makes me an "anchor baby," according to Ankarlo? Well, he and the other haters spewing such bullshit can go fuck themselves! I pay taxes in this country, and I'll get a parade permit and organize a march right down the street in front of his house if I feel like it.
Javier Villalobos, via the Internet

That Nobody Can Deny

We know, we know:Oh, oh! Stephen Lemons is in a world of doody now! He's gone after the 9/11 "truther" nut-jobs. There may be fewer of them every day, but the remaining cadre doesn't forgive and doesn't forget ("Prevaricators' Powwow," The Bird, March 1; also see Lemons' blog, Feathered Bastard).

The "troofers" have had more than five years to get their "facts" straight and come to their final conclusions. Everyone who disagrees with them is "in on the plot" and therefore deserves to be slandered and lied about. So, watch out, here comes a tempest in a teapot.
Dave Hutchison, Santa Fe, New Mexico

We’ll keep your résumé on file:My impression of Stephen Lemons is that he has a personal agenda that he is pursuing while posing as a journalist. His column before the 9/11 Accountability Conference and his subsequent behavior at the conference were bizarre.

While a group of us talked with him at the conference, I told him that he had convinced me that he was ignorant on the subject [of 9/11 accountability] and that he needed to do his homework. He replied that he had looked at many DVDs and books on the subject. My response was, "Well, now you've convinced me that you're stupid."

Would it be possible for you to replace Lemons with somebody who can approach a subject with objectivity and a commitment to journalistic standards?
Robert G. Kahl, Tucson

Consider it covered:New Times' blog and print coverage of the 9/11 Accountability Conference focused on the flaws of the organizers, at the expense of the larger story.

A real understanding of 9/11 has to go back several decades to U.S. foreign policy in Afghanistan. The American CIA and military created groups of radical Islamists to bring down the Soviet Union, funding the mujahadeen in the Afghan-Soviet conflict. The American power structure acted through CIA bank BCCI and the Pakistani ISI. The U.S. has had a protective relationship with Pakistan ever since. Mahmood Ahmad was allowed to quietly resign, after the wire transfer scandal, on October 6, 2001. Why did he not stand trial in the U.S. for funding terrorism? This is exactly what responsible journalists should ask. It's too shocking for some, but it looks like the 9/11 attack was generated inside the U.S. intelligence networks.

I was a part of a group of 9/11 researchers who recently supplied the Joint Terrorism Task Force with data on [alleged 9/11 lead hijacker Mohammed] Atta's American drinking buddy, Wolfgang Bohringer. When the JTTF seized Bohringer on November 18, the first words out of his mouth were, "You can't arrest me, I'm working for CIA." He was then released.