Appreciate your freedom of speech

I am writing in response to Mariam Durrani's article, "Thinking outside the borders." I must ask her a question... Are you kidding me? I only thank God that over 85 percent of the American people don't buy into your nonsense. While I thank your father and all of those serving our country, they are doing what their job is designed to do: fight and win war. It's not your sappy tear-jerking articles that keep us free. No normal person can say that they enjoy war or the deaths of innocent people. We all feel for the innocents. Let's keep in mind here that while the United States and all of our allies here are trying to avoid innocent deaths, these sick terrorists love nothing more then killing innocents. If bin Laden and his crew have their way, I would be dead, and you, and your father, and both of our mothers·then they would praise their god. These people want us dead, and our government, Republican and Democrat, is trying to protect us. Thoughts such as Durrani's are unrealistic and off in some far fantasy land where everyone holds hands and sings with each other. Welcome to the real world, it's not always a pretty place.

Fortunately for people like Durrani, they are allowed to print such madness because at one point, someone lost their life so that they may have that freedom today.

Manuel R. Espinoza
political science senior

Durrani column absurd, shocking

On Jan. 11, 2002, four months after the worst terrorist attack on American soil, Mariam Durrani shamefully fell into the same category as most liberals in the United States. For example, we have Amnesty International watching every move the U.S. military makes when handling the suicidal, Islamic militants at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Not only do American Military personnel have to worry about being killed by prisoners that believe if they kill Americans they are guaranteed paradise in the afterlife, but they also have to worry about pampering those people so as not to upset the radical left.

Durrani's statements were utterly shocking. She wrote, "I do not feel how a patriotic American should feel in a time of war. The self-righteous spirit that has swept the country was inspiring to many Americans, but not me." How dare you cheapen our country's nationalism and trivialize patriotism just because you are not proud of our country and the men that defend us? Your idea of thinking outside the borders is absurd. Has it ever occurred to anyone on the left that war is a necessary evil at times? Do you think our country would have gained independence from Great Britain had we gathered with protester signs and tie-dye colored T-shirts with peace signs? Or maybe Hitler would have finally understood and become brotherly to the Jews in Europe had they just petitioned him and had an International Human Rights March in the streets of Berlin. Get real people, and snap yourselves back into reality. The real world is not some marijuana-induced fantasyland.

Durrani also points out that over 3,000 Afghans have died since the war began. She ignorantly assumes that the United States is responsible for it. Had you really been watching the news, you would have realized that the Northern Alliance was on the ground fighting the al-Qaida forces for much of the early stages of this war. Many of the deaths had nothing to do with the United States air raids.

Coming from a family that has fought in the Civil War, WWI, WWII, Korea and Vietnam, I am proud of what President Bush, Donald Rumsfeld, and our military is doing. People like Durrani may please exit the nearest border and that way you can think outside our borders and away from all of us patriotic Americans that you don't quite understand.

Pam Simpson
communication junior