Senator Robin Hood

Sir / Thank goodness that we Americans have a modern-day Robin Hood Congressman patrolling the Administration's activities [Feb. 19]. Wouldn't the founders of the Constitution marvel at the integrity of Senator Sam Ervin, in his bold quest to keep the Administration honest? I'm glad to see a conservative Senator call the President down. Maybe people will pay a little more attention, instead of just writing it off as another radical maneuver to defame the Administration. With the support of the people and other congressional colleagues, maybe Senator Ervin can reinstate the Constitution's concept of checks and balances.

MATT NORRIS CRAWFORD Boone, N.C.

The P.O.W.s

Sir / Surely there is not a dry eye left in the country. The return of the P.O.W.s is a fantastically moving event.

They are without doubt the Men of the Year now and for all time.

(MRS.) MAUDE ANN PLUTA Erie, Pa.

Sir / Is nothing sacred? Apple pie went out with calories, motherhood has been limited, and in this sacred moment as we honor our P.O.W.s you desecrate and belittle them. "They had obeyed orders, dealt in death and presumably understood the odds and consequences." Let me be counted with those who view this devotion to duty with heartfelt thanks, for they have preserved the very freedom of this country so that you may publicly print insults the very first week they are free.

JANE A. VAN PELT Alexandria, Va.

Sir / As an ex-grunt, I feel a certain churlish resentment about the solicitous attention the returning P.O.W.s are receiving. It seems to me that the draftees who faced the war 24 hours every day on the ground are deserving of somewhat more than a veto of the VA hospital appropriations bill and a dismal employment rate. Why were we sneaked back into pur society? So our country can more easily forget the crimes we committed in its name?

SAM BUNGE New York City

The New Rip

Sir / Stefan Kanfer's Essay, "The Returned: A New Rip Van Winkle" [Feb. 19], was a deeply penetrating and moving emotional experience. It may have served as a guide to the new America for the P.O.W., But it also forced me to wonder what and where "home" really is in this country.

RYAN ROSS Santa Barbara, Calif.

Sir / Living in America, we don't realize all the changes that take place. Mr. Kanfer summed up four or more years in two pages, and did the best job of it I have ever seen.

MARYBETH CACCIA Hastings-on-Hudson, N.Y.

Reconstruction

Sir / Anyone who thinks that the American people will happily spend billions of dollars developing our recent enemy North

Viet Nam [Feb. 26] or any other part of Southeast Asia when the rebuilding is needed here at home had better think again.

HENRY M. BISSELL Los Angeles

Sir / I get tired of hearing the wails regarding North Viet Nam reconstruction--even while we are still getting out our P.O.W.s. Two billion dollars, about $10 per person, is cheap to get us out of a lost war.

ELIZABETH H. MCARTHUR Chicago

Beneficial Crime

Sir / In your story "Crime--The 'Irregular Economy' " [Feb. 19], Lisle C. Carter, a Cornell sociologist, notes that ghetto crime is a source of investment resource, and he warns against moving too fast in rooting out crime in the ghetto.

Does he really mean that narcotics traffic, muggings, rapes and car theft are economically beneficial to this community? Perhaps he is historically minded and has noted that many of our white predecessors made their fortunes through outright theft and murder and similarly "moral" means and became national leaders.

Is this the glory of free enterprise?

Is this the American ideal?

RONALD A. TULL New York City

The Heat Is On

Sir / It is about time that the blame for an energy shortage ceases to be dumped on environmentalists [Feb. 12].

Perhaps after a winter of cold buildings and exorbitant fuel prices, we will have the sense to give priority to the formation of a national energy program. Research into new energy sources as well as the development of safer and more efficient methods of handling oil is needed now. Lifting foreign oil quotas will not solve the energy crises of 1993.

EILEEN HOTTE New Brunswick, N.J.

Sir / Why don't the American people stop blaming environmentalists, oil companies and lobbyists for the recent fuel crisis? We can only look to ourselves for blame. How many unnecessary trips are taken in the auto? How many heating systems and light bulbs are burning for no reason?

INGRID HARTLEY Cortez, Colo.

Amnesty

Sir / I suggest that there be a vote by all of the returning prisoners of war to decide whether to grant amnesty to the expatriates. Certainly, the freed prisoners will vote to free another set of prisoners, caught in a different set of impossible circumstances.

JOHN MAGGI Lieutenant, U.S.N. Pearl Harbor, Hawaii

Equal Rights

Sir / How sad that one wealthy woman can sabotage the Equal Rights Amendment, the cherished ideal of so many working women [Feb. 19].

Please tell that confused conservative that there are millions of U.S. women who are heads of households and who are daily discriminated against as we go forth to work. Most of us must compete against heavy odds until we pass on to a realm of fewer biases.

LILLIAN ROUNTREE Denver

Sir / Go home, Phyllis Schlafly! Who is washing and cooking and cleaning for your husband? Who is taking care of your six children?

(MRS.) MARY LOU WELZ Rochester

Urban Schools

Sir / Your article about the inner-city schools of Detroit and Philadelphia [Feb. 19] was the most depressing thing I've read since Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee. And some say this is the greatest country on earth! They must be either kidding or totally blind. Yet who is to blame? Much of the responsibility must be placed on our leadership in the White House, past and present, and on our Government, which spends billions on testing and perfecting new weapons that can never possibly be used. And then we're surprised at the crime rate in this country!

KARIN STEELE Stockton, Calif.

Sir / When both parents and students feel that education is making substantial contributions to the lives of American youth, the problems of the schools will be solved. It is hard to convince parents that they ought to pay taxes to support an absurd institution --just as hard as it is to convince students that they ought to behave sensibly while there.

The fact is that most American schools are handing out diplomas and knowledge just as they did in 1900; neither today's society nor the society of the future can support such institutions.

S.E. PHILLIPS Supervisor, Secondary Education Syracuse

Acey-Deucey

Sir / Prince Obolensky is overlooking a pool of highly experienced and talented backgammon players in not hiring retired U.S. Navymen to accompany Playboy bunnies and teach backgammon to "the masses" [Feb. 19]. The Navy's variation of backgammon, acey-deucey, is played extensively on board ships at sea by crusty senior petty officers and chief petty officers. They've even been known to wager "small sums" on the game's outcome.

A.L. CAMPBELL Lewisville, Texas

Sir / You failed to mention that backgammon has been the most popular game in Middle Eastern countries, from Greece to Iran, for many centuries, and it is not considered the game of the snob. It is a common sight to see people of all walks of life sitting at street corners playing the game.

Back in 1954 in a little Syrian town called Kessab, another youth and I set the world record of games played for one set (normally a set is three to five games). We played a 1,000-game set, which lasted 15 days with six to eight hours off a day for eating and sleeping.

KRIKOR HAKIMIAN Whittier, Calif.

Gun Control

Sir / While it is a tragedy that Senator Stennis was shot [Feb. 12], that is no reason for yet another clarion call for gun control. The same gun control that would supposedly remove guns from the hands of criminals would actually only take guns from honest citizens who, like Senator Stennis, are all too often at the mercy of criminals.

JOE D. ARMSTRONG Guthrie, Texas

Sir / The fact that so many of us ordinary citizens and extraordinary policemen are murdered every week is still not enough to prod Congress into passing some kind of meaningful gun-control law. Limit them, remove them, tax hell out of them, confiscate them--but do something. Personally, I'm afraid of a gun, and I like to think that this attitude shows common sense.

N. DWIGHT HARMAN Redondo Beach, Calif.

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