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Letters to the Editor

Citizen Staff Writer

Desperate women will do what they must

Many people are missing the point of legalized abortion. We’re talking about two lives, not just one.

I ask that any of those who so strongly object to it think of the women you care about – your mother, sister, daughter, aunt, a dear friend, a mother of a large family or any woman you love.

Now think about which one of them you would be willing to lose due to an illegal abortion.

Think about which one you would be willing to stand beside and watch die. That’s the point.

I have six daughters and six granddaughters. I want them to be able to have a safe operation if they feel they need to for whatever reason.

I don’t want them to have to resort to poking a coat hanger into their uterus in desperation as women used to do before abortion was legal.

I don’t want them to have to go to an untrained illegal abortionist who may perforate their uterus so they bleed to death or cause an infection that may kill them.

I saw my mother nearly die from a coat-hanger abortion.

I knew a widowed mother, the sole support of four children, who was a victim of rape. In desperation over a pregnancy she could not afford or want, she had an illegal abortion and died, leaving her four children with no one.

Stories like that were once very common, as were the stories of teenage girls who committed suicide because they were pregnant.

A women who is faced with a pregnancy she simply cannot cope with is not thinking of a baby. She is thinking of a disaster. A disaster she must avoid at all costs.

It doesn’t matter how she got there or what she should or should not have done. That’s not the point. The point is: If she is going to terminate the pregnancy by whatever means possible, it should be legal and safe.

If it is not and she is desperate enough, she will have an abortion and she will likely die. Which loved one are you willing to sacrifice on your altar?

Barbara Young

Green Valley

Obama turns back on captive Americans

When will Obama get a backbone and defend the citizens of our country? Pirates took Capt. Richard Phillips hostage Wednesday after they hijacked the U.S.-flagged Maersk Alabama, then fled the cargo ship as the crew overpowered them. It was the first such attack on U.S. sailors in about 200 years.

North Korea seized American journalists Euna Lee and Laura Ling last month on the Chinese border and says it intends to try them for “espionage.”

Iran also uses hostage-taking as an instrument of state policy, including the British sailors seized in Iraqi waters in 2007, American academic Haleh Esfandiari the same year and, most recently, American journalist Roxana Saberi, whom the Iranians also accuse of espionage and who is being held in Tehran’s notorious Evin prison.

Then again, why look so far afield? As we wrote yesterday, a Spanish judge may soon order arrest warrants for six Bush administration officials on dubious charges under the preposterous theory of “universal jurisdiction.”

So far, however, the Obama administration hasn’t spoken a word in their defense.

If the U.S. government won’t protect Americans from the legal anarchy of postmodern Europe, how can we expect it to protect American sailors from the premodern anarchy of Somalia, much less the tyrannies of Tehran and Pyongyang?

William Hurt

Green Valley

Miller time: UA has reason to celebrate

Sean Miller’s hire illustrates 25 years of big changes at the University of Arizona that we often overlook.

When Lute Olson arrived from Iowa as head coach in 1982, UA had hit bottom in basketball and was only starting on a path to academic greatness.

I was a UA sports administrator when Lute held his first press conference, a quiet event.

Miller’s debut, appropriately, was one of Tucson’s major media events ever.

We should remember the twin paths the UA has taken, and thank former President John Schaefer for leading the Wildcats into the Pac-10.

He foresaw the immense benefits of aligning with some of the most prestigious universities – Stanford, UCLA, USC, Berkeley, Washington – for athletics and academics.

UA, once a pleasant party school, became respected on the global map of academic excellence. It attracted vast dollars as a Research 1 university, and now it has hired a coach to match its stature.

Bob Davis

founder, Grubb & Ellis

Bush regime puts U.S. in precarious situation

Some Americans believe the Bush administration committed no crime, but we know now that our NATO ally Spain probably will bring charges against at least six former members of Vice President Cheney’s office and the Justice Department.

It seems Spanish officials reach different interpretations of “war crimes” under international law, and I venture other nations will share their view.

I still urge those Bush officials not to travel overseas so the U.S. won’t be embarrassed by its former highest officials’ arrests and trials, damaging relationships crucial to returning the world’s economies to growth and to taking the fight to those who wish to harm the West and its values.

Sad, isn’t it, that legitimate justice systems, even of our friends and allies, conclude the U.S. committed war crimes.

John Bryant

U.S. Army colonel, retired

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This blog page archives the entire digital archive of the Tucson Citizen from 1993 to 2009. It was gleaned from a database that was not intended to be displayed as a public web archive. Therefore, some of the text in some stories displays a little oddly. Also, this database did not contain any links to photos, so though the archive contains numerous captions for photos, there are no links to any of those photos.

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