LETTERS NASSAU AND SUFFOLK Edition

• Published in: Newsday
• Main Authors: Lembo, Anthony, Adler, Gary L, Jones, Joanne, Jones, Ed, Roberts, Jay, Burrelli, Al, Sciarrone, Sonny, Jacobson, Howard, Licul, Laura, Bradley, Milton N, Barrett, Irene
• Format: Newspaper Article
• Language: English
• Published: Long Island, N.Y Newsday LLC 09.03.2005
• Edition: Combined editions
• Subjects: Bush, George W; Spitzer, Eliot

This is in response to "A rich Oscar party starring hypocrisy and negativity" [Letters, March 3], regarding the hypocrisy in Hollywood on Oscar night when "they [the Oscar-goers] had no trouble arriving at a lavish party" after "chiding the government for staging a daylong celebration of President George W. Bush's inauguration." The difference is that the president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and his associates did not incur trillions of dollars of national debt partially by instigating a war based on false claims. President George W. Bush has been surprised by the strong and widespread resistance to his sadly mistaken proposal to privatize Social Security. But because he is firmly convinced that his 2004 electoral victory validated both his political philosophy and program, he mistakenly believes that all he has to do to turn that resistance around is to sell his program in person to the voters, just as he apparently did on the campaign trail. Unfortunately for him, that effort is doomed to failure, because Bush doesn't understand why he was re-elected. The reality that Bush doesn't grasp is that the voters didn't validate him; they rejected John Kerry as indecisive and therefore someone they didn't trust to secure America in the face of the terrorist threat now confronting us. So despite their many reservations about both Bush and his program, many "held their noses" and voted for him anyway. But now they are free to address the many issues on which they disagree with Bush, and express that disapproval accordingly.