Letters to the editor, Friday, Feb. 2, 2007

Saturday, February 3, 2007 2:14 AM CST

The awful toll of smoking

According to a letter in the Journal Times, I as a non-smoker am not forced to eat in a restaurant among smokers.

This is true, however, let me tell all the smokers out there what I was forced into.

As children, my brothers and I suffered from chronic ear infections, bronchitis and severe allergies. We were exposed daily to 60 toxic and carcinogenic compounds including carbon monoxide, hydrogen cyanide, formaldehyde, ammonia, arsenic, and lead.

In 1998, four days before Thanksgiving, my mother suffered a smoking-related massive stroke. She "lived" until 2003 and puffed on fake cigarettes until her death. She was never the same again. She ultimately died from congestive heart failure in severe pain and at times, gasping for breath. In 2003, my father had a heart attack, triple bypass surgery and an aortic aneurism which burst. This too was all smoking related.

They died 18 days apart in the same year and both parents were only in their 50s. It was the worst year of my live. I did not have a choice. I had to make funeral arrangements. I had to sit through a somber military funeral as tears ran down my face when the guard played "Taps" and the serviceman presented me with the flag that recently draped my father's coffin. I also had to give the eulogy at his funeral.

I wish that all smokers, reading this letter could have spent July 2003, looking through my heart and eyes. Cigarettes have been proven to be lethal to you and your loved ones. You have the choice. They do not.

Please don't make them pay the ultimate price for your choice. It is sad to think that the final result of my parent's smoking may be that I develop lung cancer though I don't smoke. God willing that won't happen, but if it should, I will have been forced into that as well. I don't think that was the legacy that my parents had in mind on the day that I was born.

Kimberly Dunn Racine Feingold had different story in 2002 I read with great interest Senator Feingold's remarks about ending the Iraq war. This doesn't jibe with what he and all the leading Democrats were saying previously. I quote the learned senator from the Congressional Record 10/9/02: "With regard to Iraq, I agree Iraq presents a genuine threat, especially in the form of weapons of mass destruction, chemical, biological, and potentially nuclear weapons. I agree that Saddam Hussein is exceptionally dangerous and brutal, if not uniquely so, as the President argues."

In 1998, all the leading Democrats were telling us that Saddam had these weapons of mass destruction. Now, these same people, including Senator Feingold are telling us the president lied to us to get in the war. My question to the learned senator would be, what information did he possess that led him to his previous statement that Saddam had these weapons, which he now states were not there? I would like our Senator, when he introduces his bill to cut out funding for the Iraq war, to also include a section that would simultaneously cut off all financial and military aid to Israel. After all, let's be honest, this is why we are in the Middle East. This would alleviate the greatest amount of anti-American feeling in the Middle East pronto.

It has been said that these conflicts around the world, are the start of World War IV. The American people have to remember that 3,000 lives were lost on Sept. 11th. At Pearl Harbor, a little more than 2,000 lives were lost that led to the eventual loss of around 500,000 American servicemen. It is time to stop the bickering, it is time to stop using this situation for political gain; our servicemen are dying over there. This time around, there are nuclear missiles readily accessible to these rogue nations, gladly supplied by China and Russia. They also supply the other weapons to these nations. This is a threat that cannot be tolerated. It is not a time for any Neville Chamberlainesque type diplomacy, but a coming together of all those who represent us in Washington, to resolve this issue in the best interest of our and the worlds nations.

Richard H. Kristopeit Burlington Vos' hypocrisy on ethics reform I read your ethics reform commentary in Tuesday's paper with great interest especially since it was released by State Rep. Robin Vos, my opponent in the 63rd Assembly race last year.

On May 2, 2006, he voted to keep essentially this same legislation from getting a vote on the floor of the Assembly. Your paper called it a "disgraceful vote" in an editorial and sharply criticized both Vos and State Reps. Gunderson and Kerkman who voted with him.

This ethics reform was one of five major points in my Progressive Agenda for Wisconsin on which I campaigned last year. And now Vos embraces it? What hypocrisy!

Tim Daley Union Grove Ignoring the slaughter of abortion What hypocrites these pro-choice political candidates can be. Let us make a statistical comparison of the present situation.

For the year past, 2006, not by any means to make light of this fact - 865 lives were lost to the Iraq conflict. Yet consider, in one week, each and every week, ad nauseam, we slaughter that many children in America's infamous abortion mills.

These are the totally defenseless, they didn't sign up for hazardous duty to a noble patriotic course as do our military personnel. What can be done to convict those who support and promote such horrendous legislation, disregarding any moral aspect, should there be such, in favor of self-promotion or preservation of their selfish political stature and ambitions? Unless all be entirely godless, can they not fathom the reality of payday someday, i.e., individual accountability before the great white throne judgment wherein appellate court remains no option? A costly trade-off indeed.

Lawrence P. Marsch 6824 Highway V, Caledonia

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