Letters

Afg

han warlord and opium cultivator Haji Bashar Noorzai could be an intelligence source the U.S. needs to combat terrorism, but he's sitting in jail on drug charges. He has offered to help, and as the wars on both drugs and terrorism rage on, readers debated the wisdom of his incarceration

Your article on Afghan warlord Haji Bashar Noorzai listed possible negative consequences of his arrest [Feb. 19]. Assured by a U.S. agent that the trip would be "like a vacation," Noorzai went to the U.S. to offer his cooperation against the resurgent Taliban. Now in jail, he can no longer supply intelligence, move his tribe away from the Taliban, persuade his followers to give up poppy farming or sway other warlords toward the political path. But worst of all, his 1 million tribespeople will now be convinced of U.S. perfidy, duplicity and treachery and therefore be converted into implacable enemies of the U.S. It's unlikely that Noorzai's arrest will save the life of even one drug addict on U.S. streets, though it will almost certainly cost the lives of many U.S. soldiers overseas.
Maurice O'Scanaill
Clifden, Ireland

The Noorzai case is a perfect example of this Administration's botched war on terrorism and the Drug Enforcement Administration's handling of the incredibly stupid war on drugs. Haji Bashar Noorzai could have been a real asset in rooting out the Taliban. Intelligence on the ground is a most valuable resource. Has Noorzai's arrest really made a difference in heroin production? U.S. taxpayers will now have to spend millions to prosecute and detain him. The U.S. could wipe out the drug trade tomorrow by legalization and taxation, which would take away the enormous profits earned in illicit trade and reduce theft by addicts who steal to support their habit. The huge sums reserved for incarceration and policing could be spent on health care and education.
William A. Ring
San Diego

TIME has done yet more to undermine the war on terrorism. I have not seen one positive story on either Afghanistan or Iraq, and now you've run the story about poor old Noorzai. The guy was obviously smart enough to reach out to the Americans before the war in an effort to maintain his power and keep the drugs flowing. When are we going to hear about American triumphs? Where are the stories about our brave warriors? I see nothing but reports about terrorists like poor duped warlord Noorzai.
Martin Robitz
Crete, Illinois, U.S.

Perhaps the question of whom to arrest and whom to send back into battle should be cast in different terms. Whom should we fear more: the terrorists bent on destroying a nation and an idea, or domestic addicts who owe their allegiance to a drug? We might do well to take the view of Winston Churchill, who said after Hitler invaded the U.S.S.R., "If Hitler invaded hell, I would make at least a favorable reference to the devil in the House of Commons." The terrorists are our Hitler, and the drug dealers are our U.S.S.R. We must assign a higher priority to our external enemies even as we care for the wounded from both wars.
Harry Puncec
Lakewood, Colorado, U.S.

You said that "The World Changed on Sept. 11, 2001." The world didn't change. Global warming is still here, the poor are poor, the rich are rich, Africans are dying of AIDS, and malaria kills millions of children every year. The "world" changed for a fraction of the earth's population, mostly Americans, their allies and those who have been suffering from their attacks. Please be less ethno- and egocentric. The U.S. is not the world.
Izabella Brodowska
Montreal

The case of Noorzai is just more evidence of the plague of groupthink that has struck U.S. decision makers, from the mishandling of pre-9/11 intelligence to the mistakes made in Iraq. Officials made contact with a valuable source, but then they just let him rot in jail with the crucial information he has. Such missteps have cost billions of taxpayers' dollars and thousands of soldiers' lives.
Winston Samson
Virginia Beach, Virginia, U.S.

Face to Face Re "Faces of Iran" [Feb. 26], in which you pictured Iranians from various walks of life: There ought to be a law that every major news outlet in the country must run features like this anytime the U.S. government openly contemplates a military action, police action or "freedom fight" abroad. If we think we understand enough about a nation to know what is best for it, then we ought to be able to look its ordinary citizens straight in the eyes before killing them for their own good. And please spare those people speeches about how it is only their government we hate, not them. If the whole world operated by that standard, Prime Minister Tony Blair's Britain and President George W. Bush's U.S. would have been invaded a good four years ago.
Alice Pfeifer
Hays, Kansas, U.S.

I was interested to see the portraits of Iranians by Paolo Woods. I am an 11-year-old whose only images of Middle East life have been of people fighting or working at low-paying jobs. I was pleased to see that Iranians do much the same as we do in the West. They have jobs as dentists and teachers, and they engage in leisure activities like swimming. The illustrations were particularly helpful in changing my views.
Nikhita Moudgil
Telford, England

A Case of Omission One of the most exciting findings in brain science is that different kinds of thoughts can be tied to different patterns of activity in the brain. A sidebar to my article "The Mystery of Consciousness" [Jan. 29] showed colorful brain scans that revealed different hot spots when people saw a face and when they saw a place—and the same brain areas lit up when the people merely thought about faces and places. Unfortunately, my former colleagues who performed this important study, Kathleen O'Craven of the University of Toronto and Nancy Kanwisher of M.I.T., were not credited.
Steven Pinker
Professor of Psychology
Harvard University
Cambridge, Massachusetts, U.S.

The Thaksin Effect Shame on your interview with Thaksin Shinawatra [Feb. 12]. TIME allowed Thaksin to tell lies. Thaksin has the audacity to say that the Thai press printed "groundless information" about him and that he "never intervened" in Thai media activities or closed them down. Let the truth be told. Before he came to power, the Thai press was considered one of the freest in the world, ranking 29th in the survey done by Freedom House in 2000. During Thaksin's reign until the Sept. 19 coup, the Thai press fell to 107th last year. Similar conclusions can be found on indexes and reports by the Committee to Protect Journalists and Reporters Without Borders. Thaksin constantly interfered with Thailand's printed and broadcast media using advertising revenues and stock acquisitions as key strategies. He shut down community radio, websites and TV programs critical of him. Political power was used to intimidate the media, particularly the broadcast media, which are largely owned by the state. Management of these outlets came under tremendous government pressure to put him in a positive light, while those who failed to conform or attempted to expose corruption faced the risk of being intimidated through various means, including the threat of lawsuits. We are opposed to all kinds of media interference, intervention or intimidation, and have protested strongly against signs of such actions by the leaders of the Sept. 19 coup. But the truth is, so far, no Thai leaders have messed up Thailand's media as much as Thaksin did.
Sopit Wangvivatana
Executive Director, Thai Broadcast Journalists Association
Bangkok

Five years of progress under Thaksin has been ruined by five months of the junta's incompetence. This fact alone engraves Thaksin permanently in millions of Thai hearts, regardless of censorship and the prejudices of the local media.
Varodom Toochinda
Bangkok

Taking the Sunday Collection Re the article about Roman Catholic clergy stealing from parishioners [Feb. 26]: You reported that, after the discovery of embezzlement, a bishop decreed biennial audits for every parish. That hardly inspires confidence. Anything short of an annual audit shouldn't be sanctioned. No publicly held company would be allowed that practice. Why should parishioners' gifts be treated any differently? Sounds like the same ol' cover-up to me.
(The Rev.) Matthew Ernst
Ocean Isle Beach, North Carolina, U.S.

You missed the mark with the title "Pilfering Priests"—it should have been "Plundering Priests." My wife and I left the Roman Catholic Church after its hypocritical handling of the sexual-abuse scandals. We were tired of wondering to which lawsuits our contributions were being directed as a payout to another victim. Now it comes to light that priests, as you describe, are "living as hedonistically as Renaissance Popes" by stealing the contributions made by their hardworking parishioners. It makes one wonder when the leadership of the church will wake up and allow priests to marry, so they can enjoy life with a companion as God and nature intend.
Bill O'Brien
Port Republic, Virginia, U.S.

Let's Hope It's Not Contagious Re "Gaffes to the Rescue" [Feb. 19]: i wonder whether Michael Kinsley's imagined description of ABC executives' using "a crack of the whip" on the gaffe-prone African-American actor Isaiah Washington was simply an unfortunate use of a cliché or evidence that even those who take it upon themselves to analyze gaffes are still subject to perpetrating them. I agree with Kinsley that we should all be able to shrug off the stupid things people say (or write), but I found his use of a potent image of slavery in this context to be ironic, to say the least.
Michael Zimmer
Los Angeles

Winner of Races—and Hearts Zoher abdoolcarim's essay on the retirement of the racehorse Silent Witness was a poignant ode to an obviously splendid beast [Feb. 19]. Having never heard of this particular animal, I was doubly moved by the prose of the author and the wonder that Silent Witness must have elicited from admiring crowds. Much as poverty and despair prevail on earth, it is satisfying to see that animals are sometimes recognized for the unknowing yet vast reach they have on us.
Karl Germann
Kwa-Zulu Natal, South Africa