Reader Mail

Vote Better By Mail
Please read the article "The Oregon Voting Revolution" [see www.prospect.org/web/view-print.ww?id=11417 ]. I have been promoting Oregon's very good method of voting by mail. I hope you will reconsider your stance put forth by Richard Borkowski in your May/June journal. This is too important to make a wrong call. [See the original article "Vote By Mail: Expensive and Easier to Manipulate" at www.wafreepress.org/81/voteByMail.shtml ] Pat Cunningham

Editor's reply: Thanks for sending the article from American Prospect, and I do encourage people to read it. But contrary to what you say, the WA Free Press takes no stance on the issue. Readers such as yourself are welcome to submit reasoned opinions on any issue of progressive concern.

Personally, I have for years enjoyed the convenience of vote-by-mail, but upon reading Borkowski's article, I can see that there are some real concerns related to mail ballots, especially because they are in some ways more prone to vote tampering, an issue that many people of all political stripes have been very concerned about lately. -Doug Collins

Border Guards Save Lives
In the Free Press article "Undocumented Migrants Face Bigger Obstacles, But Still Come," it states, "...but they [the Minutemen border volunteers] have no feeling for the migrants and the terrible economic conditions they have found themselves in-they won't even give water to a migrant in distress without permission of the border patrol." That statement is totally false. No such policy exits with the Border Patrol Agents. It should be noted that the volunteers and the agents have saved the lives of hundreds of illegal aliens stranded in the desert.

Also, please note that there is no such person as an illegal or undocumented immigrant. If a person is in the US illegally, they are illegal aliens, per the US Justice Department. [See original article at www.wafreepress.org/77/undocumentedMigrants.shtml] Bob Gribble

Think About the Families
In Vietnam in the 60s, Desert Storm in the 90s, and now the War on Terrorism, too many have lost their lives without getting the recognition they deserve. We pay our respect to them, then too soon forget about the families who have lost so much and have to live the rest of their lives with what-ifs, how-comes and why-mes. Too often the political power overlooks all the people who have given their lives with honor for the sake of political issues, whether they agreed with them or not. Today everyone has a point of view on the war. Some are right, and some are wrong. But I ask you all to push that to the side and look closer to the home front, to recognize and show respect to the families that have lost so much but asked for so little. Jesse Lancaster