To the editor:

Beset by falling approval ratings, his State of the Union address makes it obvious that President Bush has decided that the only way he can preserve his power and push his policies is to keep Americans constantly afraid of more terrorist attacks such as 9-11. He and his cronies use the long-honored tactic of constantly repeating the dire warning until people believe it is true.

The centerpiece of this strategy is the illegal program of spying on American citizens without the approval of the court that was established to monitor precisely that. If the majority of Americans conclude that Bush is justified in this, he will have achieved the goal of terrifying us so thoroughly that we let him destroy our liberties and civil rights as a way of “protecting” us.

To be sure, there are terrorists out there who wish to do us harm. But we need to recall Franklin Roosevelt’s words, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” Our parents and grandparents had the courage to overcome fear then. May this generation have the courage to overcome it now.