Et Tu, Stephanopoulos?
It’s one thing for George Stephanopoulos to leave his job as a White House adviser because of stress and loss of trust in the president (“What I Saw,” National Affairs, March 15). It’s another for him then to make his living as a commentator, writing and speaking from a position of moral rectitude. The culmination is his new book, which you excerpted. Clinton’s repeated failings are apparently the result of personal weaknesses. Stephanopoulos’s tell-all-for-profit views are redolent of opportunism and expediency. His is the unkindest cut of all.
Yvonne Goulet Portland, Maine
NEWSWEEK’s decision to put George Stephanopoulos on its March 15 cover prompts the question “What is news?” The book excerpt was a mini-autobiography by a has-been Clinton aide. It’s not what I would call information worthy of printing in a major news publication. Stephanopoulos and NEWSWEEK have recklessly made public what should have been kept private–moments shared by the president and his wife in their home. I can only be grateful that Stephanopoulos was never a co-worker of mine or a guest in my home.
Cheryl Beth Howard Abilene, Texas
thank god someone in the white House has a conscience. I found George Stephanopoulos’s book excerpt to be most revealing of the character of this young man. I have felt for the last six years that surely someone working for the president would have to search his soul and finally say, “Enough!”
Elena Thompson Columbus, Miss.
When people enter government service, are they to serve the country or serve a man? The White House staff works for the American people, and that is where its loyalty should lie. If we had more people in government who had the moral courage to speak out like George Stephanopoulos, our country would be in better shape.
Larry Sweet Germantown, Wis.
I can’t be the only person sickened by the increasingly ubiquitous George Stephanopoulos as he peddles the equivalent of “kiss and tell” stories acquired behind the scenes in the White House through any medium that offers him an outlet. Here is an individual plucked from obscurity by the Clintons, who returns the favor by sharing their most intense and private moments with the entire world. This sounds familiar. Let’s see: someone who takes clearly intimate and personal communications and treacherously broadcasts them to the public for personal gain. Stephanopoulos is simply a diminutive Linda Tripp.
Jack Hourcade Boise, IdahoWhat’s Love Got to Do With it?
I have no objection to Shalmali Pal’s desire to be introduced to a prospective husband by her parents (“Looking for My Prince Charming,” My Turn, March 15). But she fails to mention that prior to any such meeting, potential husbands and wives are singled out according to caste, religion, geographical origin within India, ethnicity and family prestige. Such prerequisites are not benign standards of eligibility. For the majority of nubile Indians who are “in the market,” alliances outside their caste are strictly taboo. Some claim that marrying within the caste results in low divorce rates, compared with the notorious tenuousness of American “love” marriages. But they don’t realize that until recently, the concept of divorce was literally alien to many Indian families. The divorce rate among Indians is increasing, despite the supposed tenacity of arranged marriages.
Bindu Malieckal Greenville, S.C.
Shalmali Pal’s my turn brought back fond memories of my stint as a visiting professor at Bangalore University in south India almost 30 years ago. One of my courses was called “Family and Kinship.” When I told the students that a similar course offered in the United States was titled “Marriage and Family” and asked what this suggested about the difference between the two countries, they were hard put to respond. But my female students did have an opinion on arranged marriages. They maintained they were content to have their wiser and well-meaning parents select their husbands and leave them free to concentrate on their studies rather than catching a man. Love as a result of marriage was, to them, as reasonable a sequence as the other way around.
Helen Mayer Hacker New York, N.Y.
Shalmali Pal: Don’t let your parents look for the man of your dreams. Do it yourself. How could they possibly know what will be right for you if they haven’t walked in your shoes? Don’t believe the myth that only two people from the same culture are suited for each other. I’m American and my husband is from Iran, where arranged marriages are common. Nationality aside, we’re not very different. His family engages in the same kind of family drama as mine. We find humor in the same kinds of things. We share beliefs about how to raise our three children. Most important, we love each other. We’ve been married for 13 years and have a very strong relationship. We know several people who have arranged marriages and fell into the trap of thinking that a person from their own country would make the best spouse, without even getting to know each other first. They’re miserable. Open your horizons. You should marry someone you love, not just someone with a good resume.
Kate Higgs Khalilian Roanoke, Va.Perking Up Our Pages
I have been an avid reader of NEWSWEEK since my youth. I am 75 now, and in recent years I must acknowledge that your magazine has appealed to me less and less; I almost gave it up. But your Feb. 22 issue delighted me in both appearance and content. Congratulations on the good changes. Thank you for getting back on the right track and making the pages more inviting. I was amazed how your writing held me page after page. You have won me back, and I’m sorry that I was so fickle.
R. Bruce Bray Spokane, Wash.
A disturbing trend in your pages started with the introduction of “The Buzz” in your periscope section and is exacerbated by the “Storyboard” in the March 1 issue. These features appear to be pandering blatantly to a new demographic. They’re a form of pure marketing that detracts from the superior content I’m used to from NEWSWEEK. I read your magazine for deep, hard-hitting coverage of a broad range of important issues, not for pop entertainment, cute one-liners and distracting graphics. Please refocus, and avoid participation in the dumbing down of America.
David Bergeron Asheville, N.C.A Knotty Question
How interesting to discover that the Cambridge University trendsetters have chosen as their favorite “new” style a method of tying ties I have used since 1963, when my father first taught me to tie a tie (“It’s Not Easy to Teach an Old Tie New Tricks,” Science & Technology, March 15). I don’t remember whether he taught me this method or whether I developed it myself as an improvement on the lopsided half-Windsor. In any case, it is by no means new. As proof, you can see hanging in my closet any number of dusty paisley ties from the ’70s still tied in that fashion. It’s nice to discover I was so far ahead of my time.
John Fromwiller Portland, Ore.The Price of Perfection
In your story “Baby Boom: the $50,000 Egg” (Society, March 15), the idea of paying thousands of dollars for an egg whose donor has specific “desirable” traits is an abomination. Natural selection has produced the likes of Plato, Mozart, Edison, Einstein, and the list goes on. The $50,000 egg? What a terrible idea, born of snobbish conceit.
Stanley C. Kocher Jr. Easton, Pa.Anguish in Alabama
Your story about the murder of Billy Jack Gaither in Sylacauga, Ala., quotes an acquaintance of his who said the victim didn’t look or act gay and wasn’t given to sexual advances (“A Quiet Man’s Tragic Rendezvous With Hate,” Society, March 15). You go on to say, “If so, Gaither’s murder was unprovoked–a hate crime just like the homicides of Matthew Shepard in Wyoming and James Byrd Jr. in Texas.” If Gaither had acted, looked or talked gay, or–heaven forbid–tried to flirt, would he have provoked his own murder? By this logic, Byrd provoked his brutal murder by looking African-American, and the openly gay Shepard provoked his, too. Gay men and women should not have to hide their identities to save their lives.
Mary Boo Minneapolis, Minn.
Editor’s note: NEWSWEEK did not mean to suggest that Gaither’s slaying was justified under any circumstances. The point of our reporting was that, as his acquaintance notes in the story, Gaither was aware of the possibility of surrounding prejudices and would not have purposefully stirred them up.
How dare you portray Sylacauga as a small town where everyone has chickens and a dog! Sylacauga is not a backwater, hillbilly town or a farming community. Those of us who have lived here most of our lives are disgusted with the tragedy of Billy Jack Gaither’s murder. But we also don’t like to be depicted as a bunch of Southern rednecks. Sylacauga is home to several large industrial concerns, including textile mills and two marble quarries with mining operations and processing plants.
Bill Lewis Sylacauga, Ala.Unspeakable Acts
I wish to commend you for the article on the recent massacre in Uganda’s Bwindi Impenetrable Forest National Park (“Death March,” International, March 15). I worked in the park for two years as a Peace Corps volunteer, helping to develop the mountain-gorilla program that had attracted the tourists who were slain, and found your account of the incident the most thoughtful and accurate one I have come across. Most important, you gave proper consideration not only to the tourist casualties but also to warden Paul Ross Wagaba and the three park rangers killed in the attack. I have followed this story closely and find most coverage fails even to mention the loss of Ugandan lives. This reflects an insidious prejudice in the Western media and in the policy decisions of our governments. It allows us to lavish attention on finding peace in the Balkans while ignoring similar conflicts in more than a dozen African nations. And it allowed the international community to turn a blind eye in 1994, when Rwanda’s Hutu Interahamwe militias slaughtered hundreds of thousands of their countrymen. In part because of our inaction, those same militias are still active today, carrying out frequent raids like the one that killed 12 in Bwindi park. We must strive for equity in our media coverage and in foreign policy, for as the tragedy in Uganda demonstrates all too well, indifference in the face of suffering will inevitably affect us all.
Thor Hanson Burlington, Vt.
