To the editor:

If the Journal-World plans to publish more apologies for the Bush administration in its editorial column you would do well to consider using some concrete examples of how and why you think this president is “honest, genuine and committed to doing what he thinks is in the best interests of the country.” Simply tossing out these sorts of statements without offering anything to back them up isn’t much of a service to your readers, especially when some pretty reputable groups and organizations are making news in other sections of this paper contradicting your editorial.

Here are a couple of articles I read in your paper over the last week: One concerned a group of ambassadors and career foreign service officials, many of whom served under President Reagan and the elder Bush, who charge that the president manipulated intelligence on Iraq to lead the United States into an “ill-planned and costly war from which exit is uncertain.” Another reported that the 9-11 commission reconfirmed what U.S. intelligence agencies have long known: that there was no collaboration between Iraq and al-Qaida. The administration, as reported in this paper many times, has subtly and not so subtly tried to suggest to the American public otherwise.

Some criticism of the administration certainly has a partisan edge to it, but is that all there is to it? Voters are going to get a lot of hot air this election year but I think it’s fair to expect a higher standard from our local paper.

Doug Nickel,

Lawrence