Fight over Gunfight
Tom Kelly’s “Terrorism, 1950” (March 27) is, I think, a review of a different American Gunfight than the book I read. I understood this book as an incisive analysis of a firefight that showed both the stoic heroism of the Secret Service and the desperation of the Puerto Rican nationalists. Do I understand why Torresola and Collazo thought they could succeed or why they even attempted the assassination? Not in the slightest; nor do I understand the mentality that drives airplanes into buildings or explodes suicide vests in crowds of innocents. I do understand the man that stands and does the job he’s sworn to do, even in moments of surprise and fear. Stephen Hunter and John Bainbridge attempted to explain, not justify, the nationalists. That they didn’t fully succeed says more about the misguided nature of the Puerto Rican nationalists than it does about the quality of this work.
Al Saibini
Stafford, Va.
Be Nice
I was saddened by the rancorous tone of Steven F. Hayward’s “Pious the First” (March 20). Though I would not expect Hayward to write a favorable review of Our Endangered Values, I might have hoped he would provide reasoned dialogue and disagreement with President Carter’s views.
Hayward’s use of terms like “the smallness of Jimmy Carter’s soul,” “Carter’s essential fraudulence,” and “it is too much of a leap of faith to hope for any substance behind this man’s moral vanity” is of no help in a debate with liberal ideas. Hayward makes religious judgments that are harsh and, I think, beyond the ability of men to make. Carter may be liberal to the core, he may be totally lacking a sense of “statecraft,” but those criticisms should not lead directly to impugning his personal faith. Instead, the item-by-item response to Our Endangered Values in the second part of Hayward’s review is an example of arguments I can confidently share with my liberal friends so that they will be convinced by ideas rather than put off by ad hominem attacks.
Preston Nowlin
Powhatan, Va.
