George W. Bush vs. Ralph the Dog; A Feeble Attack by a DC Music Hack

E. White, Brooklyn

Not "Naughty Bits"? I just wanted to thank New York Press for Celia Farber's outstanding article. This piece is a perfect example of the high quality of writing that brings me back to your paper every week.

Scott Jones, Grand Junction, CO

Absolve Us, Father For the life of me, I don't understand why New York Press finds it necessary to print such garbage from Celia Farber, an agenda-laden journalist with a penchant for quoting only fellow AIDS denialists.

In remanding itself to the realm of HIV-is-not-the-cause-of-AIDS sensationalism, I trust that your publication is prepared to live with the consequences of dangerous public health reporting: abandonment of safer sex practices, fewer HIV-infected pregnant women seeking care to prevent transmission to their newborns and a general disregard for the vital medical care needed to promote longer and healthier lives.

Tim Horn, Manhattan

Excess Population I don't get to New York City much, which might explain my fine health, but I certainly enjoyed Mimi Kramer's dis of Andrew Lloyd Webber and her comments on the Great White Way ("Culture Desk," 5/24).

Wasn't Elton John an orphan? If so, this new Aida thing reminds me of a quote from Mark Twain about opera sounding like someone burning down the orphanage. I'm thinking that if a certain number of English composers could be rounded up to tour some old orphanage destined for demolition, we could come up with a quick way to save Broadway.

Skip Press, Burbank, CA

Gee, That Is Hip Okay, so Mission: Impossible 2 is empty, noisy crap (Armond White, "Film," 5/24). Why is a newspaper that regards itself as an alternative to the mainstream press bothering with a summer movie, anyway? Or at least in such humorless fashion? Is this some sort of hipster ritual you have to go through to prove that you aren't a Slave of the Machine?

In the meantime, I'll stick to Stanley Kauffmann in The New Republic. He's hip enough that he doesn't even mention many Hollywood films.

Matthew Patton, Deltona, FL

End of the Fin MUGGER: I bet a friend five dollars that Rick Lazio would defeat Hillary Clinton in the New York Senate race, and I was feeling pretty confident about the wager until I read your 5/24 column. You say all the smart money is on Lazio. You see, I've been doing so well betting against your political predictions that now I'm afraid I'll have to kiss that five dollars goodbye.

Robert Prichard, Manhattan

The Bughouse Rules Congratulations to New York Press' Jim Knipfel. His new book, Quitting the Nairobi Trio, received a starred review in the 5/22 Publishers Weekly. And a p.c. slant in the "PW Talks" excerpt, too. Now he's gonna sell some books.

Mark Sannino, Brooklyn

Nice Try, You Hack MUGGER: I find it amusing that someone who fancies himself a coherent judge of journalistic integrity would choose to disparage the Sunday New York Times for being a pompous delivery system for the fiftysomething take on pop culture ("The Times' Beatniks Rock On," "Editorial," 5/24). While your complaint sounds good?I have several complaints about both the Times and, specifically, that piece about Patti Smith and Lou Reed you cited?the way you argue the point makes me wonder whether you're a credible critic or a dipshit.

Then I remember your previous work and realize that you aren't credible on much, except maybe when you're talking about your children and family, a subject that most readers find about as interesting as listening to conservatives bitch about the liberal media's bias when things don't turn out "right." Oh, wait. You do both, but you're not a bore, I promise.

Anyway, I digress. My real complaint isn't that you're a jackass, as it seems more your wife's problem than mine. It's that you commit the same sins that you rail against. As a liberal-commie-faggot journalist of little note, and as a self-important arts critic of slightly higher profile, I feel your sorry writing is my concern, because it makes my various jobs harder to do well. And trust me, between nitwit editors and my own failings, I have plenty of trouble getting this shit done well without you mucking it up with a bunch of whining about the Times.

The problem with your take on the Times piece is that you refer to the latest efforts by Reed and Smith as the worst of their careers without arguing why. It might seem like nitpicking, similar to asking a presidential candidate to identify the names of foreign leaders, but most writers try to make sure that they prove a point shortly after making it.

I have not heard Reed's latest effort, but the mere existence of 1975's Metal Machine Music demands that you make even a passing case for the former being worse than the latter. This is required because: 1) for what it's worth, most critics, not just those at the Times, give the former a passing grade; and 2) the latter is a hearty musical abortion that even Reed admits might have been made to fulfill a contract.

I can make a better case for Smith's Gung Ho. While it has also been lauded by many of my peers as a critical success, I don't care. We probably agree that most music critics suck (look up the reviews of the most recent Red Hot Chili Peppers record for evidence), but in writing about Smith's recent appearance here in DC for City Paper, I had the chance to review her back catalog. While I consider Gung Ho a decent record, I won't get into a back-and-forth about its merits, because my complaint is that you didn't even try to prove a point that is not at all clear. What is obvious is that to claim that Gung Ho is so obviously worse than Peace and Noise, Gone Again or even Wave as to not even merit your making an argument, reeks of the casual sophistry that seems to come so naturally to your writing.

Next time you decide to assail such a ripe target as the Times' pop writers, please try not to do so in a manner that makes you look silly. It isn't becoming for a man with such obvious skills as a writer, editor and?apparently?interior designer.

Mitchell Prothero, Washington, DC

John Strausbaugh replies: My real complaint is that Prothero is a jackass. How many ways can you be wrong in such a short letter?

First, the assumption that Russ Smith writes all editorials in New York Press: wrong. The editors write the editorials. I wrote this one.

Second: congratulations to Mitch for being the latest to traffic in that old, lazy cliche that Metal Machine Music was "the worst album Lou Reed ever made," "the worst album in rock history" or however Mitch in his rock-scribe-in-the-boonies wisdom would care to word it. If one-hundredth of the fools who "know" how bad that album is had actually bought and listened to it, it'd have been the chart-topping smash-hit success of Reed's career. It's rock's equivalent of all those cinema experts who "know" that Plan 9 From Outer Space is "the worst movie ever made." (Really? Worse than You've Got Mail? Worse than Message in a Bottle? Worse than the interminable soft-porn drone of Eyes Wide Shut?) But I digress. For repetitive, aggravating machine-made noise, I can name 50 "electronica," "techno" and "rap-metal" records released in the last 18 months that are worse than Metal Machine Music. Gun to head, I'd instantly choose Metal Machine Music over any recording ever made by Journey, Foreigner, Styx, Kid Rock or Limp Bizkit.

Or, more to the point, Lou Reed's new Ecstasy (which I have heard?and how the fuck could this dolt have written about "casual sophistry" and not have listened to it? Are there so few freelance rock critics in DC that this guy's really writing for City Paper?), or Smith's new Gung Ho, the only redeeming value of which is that it's so awful it's occasionally unintentionally funny. If Prothero really needs a long explanation of why these two records are as terrible as they are?or why only an idiot can't hear that Lou Reed, much as we all loved him back when he was still the Lou Reed we all loved, has been on the downhill silver-age side of his career since at least New York?or why it was ludicrous boomer hokum for the Times' Stephen Holden to worship Smith as rock's visionary priestess and make absurd claims for Dylan-Reed-Smith as a rock-poet Holy Trinity historically paralleling a Beat Trinity Kerouac-Burroughs-Ginsberg... Well, then it'd be a fool's errand to try to explain it to him.

But of course Prothero's real purpose in writing this weasely passive-aggressive note was to take MUGGER to task for his political opinions, which evidently Prothero does not share. If Mitch's politics are as idiotic as his esthetics, he's in the right city.

Now, want me to explain why DC sucks, Mitch?

Pig on the Run John Ellis' "Myths of the New York Senate Race" ("Convergence," 5/24) was right on the money, but I ask myself: Why would New Yorkers elect a fraudulent, egotistical, power-hungry, ultraliberal rhymes-with-"itch" to the Senate?

The whole world is watching, and laughing. If Hillary Clinton's elected, New York would lose a Senate seat and Arkansas would gain one.

Miguel Monge, Queens

Bombe Glacée Christopher Caldwell writes in his 5/24 "Hill of Beans": "And what makes airport security most reminiscent of an authoritarian state is that the whole rigmarole is totally useless. (When was the last time you heard of a bomb being smuggled on board a plane in a carry-on bag?)"

Uh, yeah Chris: Terrorists prefer the convoluted, difficult approach to bombing. It's more exciting for them.

Khaled Khalil, Los Angeles

Adlai, Good Guy Christopher Caldwell's inclusion of Adlai Stevenson, of all people, in the category of trite candidates ("Hill of Beans," 5/24) leaves one gasping for breath.

No person then alive could fail to recall Stevenson's cogent and witty prose. He famously wrote it himself, too?no ghostwriters?and worked on polishing it right up to its moment of delivery, driving his staff mad in the process. He had evidenced this talent since the years when he was governor of Illinois; his veto of an asinine piece of legislation purporting to forbid cats from roaming unattended was a small, dismissive, cutting gem that was, and for all I know still is, included in many anthologies.

In the early 1950s, the dead center of Stevenson's party pandered inexcusably to the large number of veterans they saw as easy votes. Adlai Stevenson not only stood up against unnecessary and indefensible giveaways (while still paying full honor and respect to those who had served), but he didn't do it from a safe distance. He got himself invited to a VFW convention, stood up in front of it and, with all due deference, explained where he stood and why he would keep on standing there.

I was a veteran myself at that time. I knew personally a fellow GI who made no bones about what he was going to do when the Army sent us home from postwar Germany, where we'd had a relatively easy time of it. He intended to, and did, simply take the guaranteed weekly pay the government offered for 52 weeks. Never mind that it was intended to help guys who might have a rough time getting a job. He had no intention of doing anything until the money ran out. (I heard that he eventually became a New York cop.) Stevenson was not only right, he wouldn't double-talk about what he thought was right.

Is Mr. Caldwell thinking of some other Adlai Stevenson, in some alternate universe?

Lucian Chimene, Austin, TX

God Save LeeKing I'd like to compliment you on your 5/17 Summer Guide. It was a very thorough entertainment guide. I liked it a lot.

It was really good. Thanks a lot.

Alfonso A. Holston, Manhattan

Stop Wining Re: Matthew DeBord's latest stupidity ("Outdoor Eats, Summer Wine," 5/17): "A few [wines] I haven't sampled yet but am looking forward to are..."

Why is he looking forward to these wines? Or is this just gratuitous product-mentioning? Dumbass. Fire him!

A. Munoz, Brooklyn

Teaching Him Bad Habits MUGGER's 5/17 description of Al Gore's campaign manager as "the brain-dead Donna Brazile" has inspired me to renewed civic involvement. So I hereby offer the following proposal to break the presidential campaign's pre-convention lull: I challenge George W. Bush to a major foreign-policy debate with my dog, Ralph.

To give the torpid Texan an intellectually level playing field, Ralph will be briefed only by me. However, W. can receive briefings from all the foreign-policy advisers he's inherited from his daddy.

Although the GOP considers the members of this, um, "brain trust" to be heavy hitters, it should be noted that these are the nitwits who reduced Russia to a snarling, Weimar-style, pre-fascist economic basket case; helped elevate China and Serbia to the status of regional bullies with little fear of the U.S.; and caused the deaths of some 250,000 Iraqi and Kurdish civilians, while deliberately leaving regional bully Saddam Hussein in power to menace the survivors.

Also, Bush's handlers beware: unlike your candidate, Ralph does not mispronounce nuclear "nuk-u-lar," or drop final consonants or even whole syllables.

Let the games begin!

Michael Katz, Berkeley

None Shall Pass Just read New York Press for the first time (it was your 5/24 issue). Despite our mostly opposing political viewpoints, MUGGER makes for a tasty read. I thoroughly enjoyed his column, as well as other features in the paper. I'll tune in again.

However, what's up with Taki? After I read his column, I could only assume he was on crack. His loony burblings are reason enough for New York Press to institute random drug testing on its journalists.

Elisabeth Greenbaum, Los Angeles

Orin Down the Hatch New York Press is amazing. I thought politically incorrect speech (in print) died about 30 years ago.

Where is Taki? I want to buy him a drink.

Orin Cassill, Manhattan

Christian Soldier MUGGER: As usual, you're right on in your 5/24 column. It's one of your best columns to date. I'd like to think that, down the road, your opinions about the Clinton presidency will be used in history books to show that while much of the press slobbered in its corrupted puppy-dog loyalty to a sick and (arguably) evil Bill Clinton, there were a few reasoned voices. In short, thanks.

Christian Zwahlen, Boston

The Man from Hope If Hillary Clinton develops breast cancer, it's a race.

Brian R. Higgins, Manhattan

Soup Bones Why didn't you send George Tabb to interview Sonny Barger and call him a pussy ("Hell's Angel," 5/24)? That would have produced some interesting results.

Norman Kelley ("Opinion," 5/24): I love guys like you. You define your position as the "black position," and then accuse anyone who disagrees with you of being an oreo. It's a standard tactic used by the likes of Johnnie Cochran and Spike Lee.

For example, your only response to Mike Green's argument ("The Mail," 5/3) that Democratic policies were bad for blacks was that white people have problems too, which is neither here nor there. Then you attributed his criticism to some personal problem of his own. You know, you really should give black people more credit sometimes. They aren't all as stupid as you think, and some of them really are conservative.

What is a Pet Negro? It's a derogatory term used by black people to insult blacks they don't like, particularly those more successful and more educated than themselves. When you can't win an argument with ideas and logic, this is a nice all-purpose put-down that you can use so that at least you won't go home empty-handed.

You, of course, are not a PN. You are the opposite?a real black man. Beholden to nobody.

It sounds to me as if a black guy gets to be a Pet Negro by, among other things, acknowledging that there are widespread problems in the black community that cannot completely be blamed on white people, while real black men like yourself would never think of doing so. Real black men would never break ranks with the gangbangers, the crackheads, the unwed mothers and the others who can't read but spend all their time trying to get laid. Real black men know that if it weren't for slavery, they would be well-educated and successful. Those Pet Negroes are just fooling themselves, chasing after the white man's crumbs.

You say that Pet Negroes never criticize the pathologies of whites, but certainly the conservatives you mention do that all the time. Actually Thomas Sowell and Alan Keyes are pretty race-neutral, so I was surprised that you singled them out. Sowell seldom writes about blacks per se. So I guess you're just upset that he's not a flaming liberal.

You apparently think that conservatism is a white thing. Brother, most of the whites in America are liberals. Conservatives like Alan Keyes are a small minority. And believe me, Keyes and Sowell are not conservative because they're overcompensating. Some black people really do think for themselves, and are not just following the crowd.

Joe Rodrigue, New Haven

Norman Invasion Rarely have I encountered a more racist, bigoted article than Norman Kelley's "The Politics of Pet Negroes." What a true picture it offers of the mentality shared by those who form the Vast Left-Wing Conspiracy.

I have read similar antiblack, anti-Semitic, anti-intellectual trash in Pravda and various Chinese and Middle Eastern papers. All the stories seem to flow from the basic liberal hate line, and mimic Kipling's Bandar-log.

New York Press' advertisers will be glad to know that Kelley is the reason I will no longer use their products or patronize their businesses.

T. Hughes, N. Bellmore, NY

T.J. Liked 'Em Healthy Re: Norman Kelley's "The Politics of Pet Negroes": When we found out that Thomas Jefferson was banging his "property," it shouldn't have surprised us. The Democrats have been sticking it to blacks since their party was founded.

Of course, it helps to have plantation overseers who whip the noncompliant ones into line. You know their names. (One of them is "Jesse.")

Collis Beck, Killingworth, CT

Kelley's Zeroes Norman Kelley: You seem to be very angry, and prone to making silly statements about race relations. I agree that both political parties use the issue of race, and use black Americans, toward their own ends.

But to tar the Republicans as racist, and against blacks, is a bit much. The Democrats have for years been using black Americans as tools with which to hold on to power. And what has black America gotten for its supporting them? Not much?handouts and pats on the head as they're told to vote the right way, because Massa Democrat will take care of everything.

Look?bottom line?blacks have had it rough in this country and have paid a stiff price. However, black folks are not unique in suffering slavery (every race has been enslaved at one time). And, I might point out, black Americans were sold into slavery by black Africans, who were supplying a thriving slave trade in Africa.

In any case, let it go, man. We will rise or fall together as Americans, not as black or white people.

Michael Frisce, Manhattan

It Can Happen Here Re: Norman Kelley's 5/24 "The Politics of Pet Negroes": Now, let me see. Black people should accept as their political home the party that supported the KKK and all those big-city machines that were so good at seeing that blacks were kept very carefully in ghettoes and were denied the ability to advance.

Please stay with that party, then. Enjoy the moment when the party leadership informs blacks that they'll have no part in its leadership, because they're not part of the majority.

Trust me, it will happen. These are the same kinds of people as those who ran the party in the 1920s and 1930s. They'll turn on blacks, and see them enslaved again.

Keith White, Manhattan

Pet Rocked In propounding his theory of the "Pet Negro," Norman Kelley demonstrates that what he really means is any black man (and, cleverly, he does name only black men, omitting voices like Oprah Winfrey and Maya Angelou) who participates in a dialogue and agrees with a "white" opinion. The only thing that Thomas Sowell, Alan Keyes, Henry Louis Gates Jr., Cornel West and Michael Eric Dyson all have in common is that they didn't really think up any of the ideas they promote?in the same way William F. Buckley Jr., George Will, Jimmy Carter, Michael Kinsley and Ralph Nader didn't really think up what they propound. This is not a black or white issue. It's a public debate issue.

Kelley goes on to say that PNs "never critique the pathologies of whites." This is a complete falsehood. Thomas Sowell on a weekly basis critiques the political and economic stupidities generated by the excruciatingly white ideology of socialism. Alan Keyes was obviously critical of his all-too-white Republican adversaries during the primaries, if not overtly critical of white people's abandonment of their own cultural values. And to say that West and Dyson do not explore "white pathology" is to say that the politics of the left are not about class warfare?a plain mistake for even the elementary student of socialist ponderings.

Kelley's folly is summed up in one statement: "Green parroted all the standard (white?) ranting about blacks being on welfare and the government destroying the black families (I thought slavery began that)." Of course, the fact that illegitimacy in black families in 1935 was roughly a fifth of what it was in 1995 doesn't enter into Kelley's formulation?and neither does the fact that the turning point, smack-dab in the middle of the 60-year period, was that formal institutionalization of White Guilt called the War on Poverty.

Talk about parroting the standard (white liberal?) rant. While nobody denies that slavery was a crime, to say that emancipation and welfare had the same (negligible) effects on the black family is, frankly, dimwitted.

Norman Kelley?who would rather name-call any black man who earns a living as a pundit or ideologue than engage him on matters of fact?has the right to be this publicly stupid. But it doesn't make him anything but a man in need of a summer reading list.

Frank Turk, Pittsburgh

Diddler on the Roofie Christopher Caldwell: The line you quoted in your 5/17 essay "Pleurish the Thought" was not even the most provocative of Mungo Jerry's song. That would be: "If her daddy's rich, take her out for a meal, If her daddy's poor, just do what you feel."

Imagine anyone trying to play that on the radio today (other than on a 70s station).

Howard Hirsch, Carson City, NV

Al's Endearing, All Right I have to say belatedly that Alan Cabal's 4/5 "Meeting Mayor Satan" was the funniest political piece I've read in a long time, and it made me ache with laughter. I found it endearing.

Eileen Smith, Manhattan

Bell Curve Would you kindly inform Taki that he was not "whistled on board" the Missouri as he so claimed in his 5/17 column, but that he was piped aboard? And because he was in the company of a prime minister, presumably the elected head of state, they also would have been accorded the honor of hearing rung at least eight bells and the announcement of "The Republic of Greece"?if Greece was, indeed, a republic at that time.

I may be wrong on that last point, but I am not wrong in my enjoyment of your publication and of Taki's tales.

Dave Wiggins, Tunkhannock, PA

Smokin' J I read with interest the following line from Taki's 5/17 essay, "To a Grecian Summer": "As recently as 25 years ago, I used to sail my beautiful Bushido, a 1937 J-boat, around [Phaleron Bay]," etc., etc.

This may sound like a trivial question, but I would like to know which J-boat she was. All of the American J boats were broken up for their scrap metal value in WWII. To my knowledge, the only surviving J boats are Shamrock V, built in 1930; Velsheda, built in 1932; and Endeavour, built in 1934.

I saw Shamrock and the beautifully restored Endeavour when they sailed a series of exhibition races in my hometown of Newport, RI, in 1989. Newport is actually now Shamrock's home port, where she is maintained by the Museum of Yachting.

By the way, Bushido is a glorious name for a J.

Karen J. Peirce, Arlington, MA

Let's Talk About Me for a Minute I've been considering New York Press' failure to give attention to the legitimate print underground (sometimes known as zines). The more I discover about your publication, the more I see the reason.

Most zine writers are working-class folks from America's hinterlands, who carry with them a core of common sense, while New Yorkers, despite or because of their economic success, enjoy existing in a moral cesspool.

This might seem a strange remark coming from someone like me, who's allied himself with anarchists. But to live in a land without "law and order," people need to live responsibly, not in an around-the-clock amusement park like Manhattan, where everything is relished and attempted while Gauleiter Giuliani stands nearby, ready to keep things under control.

To live without "law and order" would mean having to see the world as it is. This New Yorkers are unable to do.

How else to explain the success of two of your writers, one purely untalented and with the sensibility of a daring and clownish five-year-old (Jonathan Ames), the other talented but confused (J.T. "Terminator" LeRoy)?

A letter writer to New York Press gushed about your 4/5 excerpt from LeRoy's novel Sarah (which I reviewed for BookForum). The letter writer was condescending?was thrilled about LeRoy's past as a boy prostitute?because the lifestyle seemed cute, and provided her with amusement. What I wanted to convey in my review of that book is that J.T.'s young protagonist (and by extension, himself) is not a hero, but a victim. I've seen that world of pimps and lot lizards. There's nothing heroic about those people. They're among the more pathetic persons I've seen: smelly, scrawny, unattractive, many of them missing teeth where some john or cop punched them. They're to be pitied, cleaned up and taken out of that world (in which they exist out of economic necessity, not because it's cute or trendy). They shouldn't be put on a pedestal.

America the Amusement Park is a Roman circus in which victims like LeRoy provide entertainment for an affluent, decadent throng. New York Press, which has a hip, affluent readership?upwardly mobile, on the run?is a conduit for this.

This sad society would be in better shape if young authors like LeRoy were encouraged to adopt the social conscience of Dickens, not the empty narcissism of Dennis Cooper.

Karl Wenclas, editor, Zine Beat, New Philistine, Philadelphia

The editors reply: Given that we received a New Philistine publicity packet in the mail not long ago, we suspect that Wenclas' problem with us isn't so much that we don't pay the proper attention to zines?a spurious claim to make, as it turns out?but rather that we haven't paid the proper attention to his zine. Presumably he assumed that we'd immediately publish a long article about the bold literary scene he's orchestrating in Philadelphia, put his picture on our cover or else?intimidated into silence by the splendor of his artistry as well as by his brave oppositional politics?simply admit that we were beaten, and turn editorship of New York Press over to him wholesale.

Wenclas' citation of our "failure to give attention to the legitimate print underground (sometimes known as zines)" is silly. We do pay attention to zines, and always have. Our production manager Jeff Koyen, for example, came to our attention as the publisher of Crank. Similarly, we discovered our writer Spike Vrusho through Murtaugh, his baseball zine. Former New York Press columnist and current contributor Paul Lukas is the man responsible for Beer Frame. Occasional contributor Jim Goad published ANSWER Me!, while our contributor and former art department assistant Queen Itchie produced both Everything I Touch Turns to Shit and Garbage and Spice Rack. Indeed, the issue of New York Press you're holding contains an article by Jim Knipfel (who used to work for Factsheet Five) about a Queens-based zine he admires called The Eclectic.

Should we continue, Karl, or would you rather call it a day and try to attack us again some other time?

Down Beast It's stomach turning that any woman living in the 21st century?even if only an airhead from Cape Elizabeth, ME?could write such a ridiculous ass-kissing letter as the one you published in the 5/17 "The Mail" under the title "Stumpfig on Naming."

Perhaps the salty air of Maine has corroded the woman's brain. Why else would she denounce Donna Hanover after her husband publicly repudiated their marriage? The lady from Maine is also entirely uninformed about the lives and activities of Eleanor Roosevelt and Jacqueline Kennedy, both of whom were politicians and manipulators par excellence.

We need more, many more, powerful women to run the world.

Theresa Gordon, Brooklyn

Ella: Bill's a Helluva Swell Fella George Szamuely's 5/17 "Taki's Top Drawer" article about the Clintons is based on personal bias rather than on the Clintons' years as public servants, activists against the Vietnam War and advocates on behalf of child welfare.

Bill Clinton, as president, has brought to the United States the strongest economy of the last 35 years, the lowest unemployment rate (3.9 percent) in the last 50 years and the creation of millions of jobs. Furthermore, Clinton's work has resulted in a balanced budget and a budget surplus that is beginning to reduce the debt created by the prior Republican administrations.

Hillary Clinton is an example of the American Dream. In her effort to help the people of America, she tried to bring health insurance for every citizen. Now she is running as a New York state senatorial candidate.

The Clintons' accomplishments can be felt not only in the United States, but around the world. Mr. Szamuely might avoid the Clintons by moving out of New York this summer, but he will have to move out of this galaxy in order to avoid the Clinton legacy.

Ella E. Guzman, Manhattan

Ill Liberal I just cleared out some old New York Press issues and I feel the need to commend Christopher Caldwell, because he seems to recognize that both George W. Bush and Al Gore are full of shit. (Meanwhile, MUGGER continues his desperate attempts to convince us that Bush Is Great! and I can't fathom why.) But I must also disagree with Caldwell, because somewhere he wrote that Clinton is a leftist, which had me coughing up my breakfast.

Clinton is a right-wing doofus by all accounts.

Was killing those people at Waco "left-wing"?

Is bombing innocent civilians around the globe "left-wing"?

Is refusing to recognize the states that legalized marijuana for medicinal purposes and threatening doctors with arrest "left-wing"?

Would a left-winger hire a military goon to be "czar" for drug policy?

Would a left-winger push that unconstitutional communications bill, which had all kinds of illegal censorship restrictions, for the Internet?

Would a left-winger abuse campaign finance laws? (It's a right-wing philosophy that money regulations are bad. We left-wingers think money regulations are good.)

Would a left-winger cheat on his wife with every woman he meets? (It's a right-wing philosophy that you screw your secretary while your wife takes care of the kids. The left-wing philosophy is that you don't get married and you swing all you want. And the left wing stands for political correctness, remember? Raping woman and exposing yourself to them is not politically correct. Rape is an old boy/king of the mountain/might-makes-right philosophy.)

On top of all this, I just saw Holly Hughes' show at P.S. 122 (she's the lesbian performance artist who was attacked by Jesse Helms and friends for getting an NEA grant), and she pointed out that after she beat the right-wingers in federal court and the appellate courts, too (on First Amendment grounds), it was the Clinton administration that appealed to the Supreme Court and got these wins overturned.

"Leftist" my ass.

Clinton is a right-wing scumbag. Period.

James Carpio, Manhattan

Low-Post Boxout MUGGER: As a longtime reader of the New York Post, I am in total agreement with your ongoing comments about the paper.

When the Post came out in support of John McCain, it was so out of left field given what they'd stood for previously. And Andrea Peyser's columns have made me realize that one of the few remaining mainstream conservative press outlets has been compromised.

I look forward to more from you.

Paul Phillips, Royersford, PA

Powers, Mad MUGGER: To my knowledge, one of the most telling facts about the power-mad Hillary Clinton has never been addressed by anyone at New York Press or, for that matter, by any of the other news media. It seems she has never appeared on any of the obligatory Sunday morning tv programs.

Why? It's obvious. They refuse to give her the questions in advance?which , of course, she demands. Rudy Giuliani does them, and her new Senate opponent, Rick Lazio, immediately did five of them on the same Sunday.

We all know she has a lot to hide, and as a speaker she must be scripted and well-coached, but why doesn't she just do them and smile and lie, the modus operandi for both her and her husband?

David Powers, Manhattan

Too Rich for Us MUGGER: As usual, it's good to see you and Taki rip another asshole in that tortured soul and phony Frank Rich (5/24). He is a poster boy for the iniquity of the meritocracy.

Can you believe he told Brian Lamb on Washington Journal that one of his major influences was H.L. Mencken? Can you imagine what Mencken would think of a clown like Rich? I can hear the laughter on Hollins St.

A few months ago Rich wrote a demented article about Matt Damon and The Talented Mr. Ripley. The premise of the multi-thousand-word essay was that this movie symbolized everything about what it meant to be an American man today. Thus, we are all Ripley.

I don't know about you, Mr. Rich, but I'm not a twisted psychopath with a sexual identity crisis. But if Rich really wants to write something interesting it should be about his obvious Drudge-envy, rather than another Dowd-Collins imitatio.

Tom Phillips, Manhattan

Bessette Hounds MUGGER: I'm not actually predicting this (I am just a common cavewoman, and no prognosticator), but I want to share my thoughts with someone.

1) If Hillary begins to think she cannot win this thing, something is going to "happen" that will render her both sympathetic and incapable of running for Senate. She'll need a hysterectomy or something, or Chelsea will become bulimic and Hillary will need to leave the race to "mother" her.

2) If Hillary does leave the race, she will not be replaced by Nita Lowey, who deserves it. She'll be replaced by...

3) Caroline Kennedy, the notoriously private woman who's suddenly all over the place.

You heard it here first, folks.

Everything happens for a reason. It is no accident that Caroline is suddenly doing televised interviews and People covers. I suspect some of it is just Kennedy family p.r. meant to offset the effects of the lawsuit brought against them by the Bessettes. (It's also p.r. for that stupid dunderhead Patrick, who roughed up that airport security guard.) But I think there is also a deeper motive.

I've never really believed that Rudy would finish the race. I have never really believed that Hillary would, either. I just can't see her in the Senate, one of 100, can you?

Nope. There will be an October Surprise.

And she will be unstoppable!

My prediction, anyway!

Dana Anne MacKenzie, Smithtown, NY