Open Forum

An official of the DFL dreams of a world "without our invasion of Iraq' and "life for nearly 4,000 dead Americans" and "support for education, health care." Dreaming is one way to spend your time, I guess. Another, and perhaps more productive, way would be to face reality.

The fact is that we are at war and probably will be for years to come. It's also a fact that education and health care are not issues for socialists and the federal government to decide. LBJ got the federal camel's nose under the tent and public education has gone nowhere but down ever since. Hillary was going to straighten out everybody's health care and look what we've gotten.

Our dreamer imagines having the world's support and quotes Harry Truman at the United Nations' founding. (Harry Truman thought Joe Stalin seemed like a nice guy.) What was hoped for 60 years ago is now a worse than worthless drain on the United States of America. Several years ago Jeff Jacoby got it right when he said, "The U.N. is a corrupt institution, one that long ago squandered whatever moral legitimacy it had. The U.N.'s founding documents venerate justice and human rights, but for the past 40 years, the organization has been dominated to a bloc of states - essentially the Afro-Asian Third World - most of whose governments routinely pervert justice and violate human rights."

Dreaming doesn't change oppressive dictators, provide a good education or create reasonable health care.

Stephen A. Busch

Pequot Lakes