Letters, calls and the roar of the crowd:
Beth Woodell, Baltimore: I recently moved to Baltimore after living in the Maryland suburbs of Washington for eight years.
When I moved a friend asked me if I would continue to subscribe to The Post rather than get The Sun.
Frankly, I was appalled.
It seemed elitist to me that a big-town, out-of-town newspaper was automatically considered better somehow than the bucolic local paper. I believe that your hometown paper is the most important paper you can read.
The local paper is always your best source of local news, local politics and so on.
(People) should tell their news-snob friends to pick up a Sun some time and check it out.
L COMMENT: I got bucolic when I was a baby, but it cleared up.
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Elizabeth Vedeloff, Baltimore: This is a question that has puzzled for years: Why do I always see one shoe by the side of the road? Ever since my cousin Johnny pointed this out to me years ago, it has bothered me.
It seems like two weeks don't go by without me driving by a solitary shoe on the shoulder of the road. Is it a prank?
OK, so this question is not on the same level as the crop circles, but every time I see a shoe, I start wondering.
COMMENT: Stop wondering. It's really quite simple: Nobody is stupid enough to lose both shoes.
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Robert Bowman, Baltimore: I'm going to make this letter short and to the point. It's because of idiots like yourself, who not only do not oppose, but advocate hunting (on Sunday) or any day, that we have such a cruel and merciless killing of such beautiful and defenseless animals.
I can't imagine how how your or (other) murderers feel you have the right to kill God's creation. But I hope that you all may Burn in Hell.
COMMENT: Thank you. I have completely changed my mind and now have decided to be against hunting. Thank goodness you wrote.
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Martha E. Gagnon, Ellicott City: On the first day of hunting season my daughter and I were out driving and out of nowhere came a beautiful deer, fleeing a hunter.
The deer managed to avoid my path, but unfortunately was violently struck by the traffic coming in the opposite direction.
We pulled over immediately. Within seconds, the hunter arrived.
My daughter and I were sobbing as we looked upon the gentle deer, lying still.
I cried and cried and lashed out verbally at the hunter who had caused the death of the deer.
I'm sure the hunter couldn't wait until we left so he could decapitate his "trophy" and carry his prized proof of his manhood back to his buddies.
COMMENT: I checked with the state and they said the hunter could claim a legitimate kill, but if the driver of the car insisted, they would have to split the antlers.
And while I admire your guts, I would caution you about lashing out verbally or otherwise at hunters carrying rifles.
One rite of manhood that goes right along with hunting is drinking. And there is no telling what a drunk hunter will do when cornered.
I can tell you what his defense will be at his trial, however: "Gee, your honor, Mrs. Gagnon and her daughter looked just like deer to me."
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Susan Cohen, Port Jervis, New York: Thank you for your column Pan Am 103. My only child, my daughter Theodora, 20, a drama and voice student studying in London, died in that terrorist bombing.
Of course the recent indictments (of two Libyans) are a fraud. Iran and Syria were deeply involved in the bombing.
Only after James Baker met with Hafez Assad of Syria did the Libyan story emerge. Libya's guilt grew as our friendship with Syria grew.
I'd like you to know that many of the victims' families oppose bombing Libya. It would just be a part of the cover-up. A deadly public relations
See SIMON, 2B, Col. 1 SIMON, from 1B
gesture.
My life and the lives of others have been destroyed. Pan Am 103 decimated us.
And now we have to endure the lies and the contempt. So I didn't mind the irony in your column. What but irony applies?
P.S. The average age of the people on the plane was 27. Mostly, they were kids.
COMMENT: Terrorists are the lowest form of life and I would be delighted if we managed actually to grab one or two of them.
But the huge dog and pony show the White House orchestrated overthe indictment of these two nobodies from Libya only served to increase speculation that George Bush desperately wants the American people to stop concentrating on domestic issues and start concentrating on foreign issues -- any foreign issues.
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Martin Mayer, Arnold: I come from a long line of Simons, the most notable of whom within my memory was Richard (of Simon and Schuster.) So it distresses me when a Simon shows up in public as a wimp like you. For all I know you might be a third or fourth cousin.
COMMENT: Might be. I was the kid they always hid in the closet when relatives came.