Thanks for the window in to the NH GOP dinner and Rove’s tactics (“Is The Bloom Off The Turd?”). Rove used Kerry’s early statements prior to the Iraq invasion against him in the lead-up to the 2004 election. So will Rove get away with the same tactic in convincing Americans to vote Republican in 2006? This tactic may have worked then, but in 2006, Bush’s Iraq invasion is generally recognized by 60 percent of Americans as a mistake, putting us in a worse position than before. Turd Blossom will have to come up with some new election-fraud tactics, and I’m sure he will. Frankly, I’m more worried about voter suppression and outright theft of the 2006 congressional elections, as occurred in 2000, 2002, and 2004. The Dems should maintain a pack of aggressive election lawyers and adequate funding, so they can file legal action at the first sign of slander, libel, phone jamming, and purging of eligible voters. These crimes should be considered a separate category, that of “crimes against democracy.” Anyone convicted of such a crime should be banned for life from participation in any capacity (public office, lobbying, voting, etc.) in American democracy. The convicted New Hampshire phone jammer is out of prison and conducting workshops on how to screw with our democracy. John Sununu owes his Senate office to this criminal. Sununu should step down.
Graham Hubenthal
Stanwood, WA
Sexual healing
Regarding your story “Sex (circa 2006)”, I disagree that sex has become impersonal. I think it’s a good thing that today’s youth are less sexually repressed than generations before. Just because they seem more vocal doesn’t meant they are ripe for disease or are otherwise sex-crazed whores. Sex is a good thing, and I’m happy that society seems to have outgrown the “sex is dirty” mindset.
Jean Marie Davis
Chattanooga, TN
Springsteen’s sheen
Regarding Matt Ashare’s “Bruce Springsteen & The Seeger Sessions Band,” I just came from the last tour show, in Holmdel, NJ. Assuming it resembled the Tweeter show at all, I am honestly not certain how you can be a music critic. The irony of your comment about safety is that Bruce took a huge risk here, going in an entirely different direction. “Safe” would have been what the Stones or CSN do year after year. Instead, he assembled a crack group of musicians and worked them, and himself, hard. If it sounded “safe,” that’s a tribute to rehearsal and skill, not to musical cowardice. I counted 21 different musicians on stage, playing at least 17 different instruments, often switching in mid song. Those musicians had not played as an ensemble before this tour. They played an amalgam of styles, again often switching in mid song: three hours of Cajun, bluegrass, Dixieland, folk, country, all delivered with joy and skill. That calls to mind a lot of adjectives, but “safe” is not among them.
I am not a blind Springsteen loyalist — I thought Devils and Dust, tour and album, was maudlin and boring — but what I heard tonight will resonate for a long time. . . . It was a very happy party with an artist who plainly loved it. And Matt, seriously — lose the attitude.
Matt Adler
Voorhees, NJ
Correction
In David S. Bernstein’s “How to Neuter the Republicans," we referred to Nancy Pelosi as the House Speaker. She is, of course, the House minority leader.
