The current scandal dates back to theft of information that began in 1970. The Bush administration was made aware of Chinese spying and came to the conclusion that nuclear security was not an issue. The story was largely ignored by the media in 1990, and only now is it coming to further light.

I would go so far as to say that the only reason the scandal is generating so much interest on Capitol Hill now is that conservatives, still stung by the fact that they could not remove Clinton from office, are attempting to lay the current scandal at Clinton's feet with an eye on campaign 2000.

Wouldn't it be nice if Horowitz and conservatives could actually view current and future crises of U.S. policy objectively? Of course it would be much harder to find solutions to security leaks over the last 30 years than to point fingers and lay all blame where only a small fraction of it belongs.

-- Kevin Barry

I remember commiserating with a brother over the first term of the Clinton presidency as the '96 elections drew near. We both thought the last four years had been pretty disastrous; I told him that the next election was crucial to our future, saying, "The reelection of President Clinton will indicate that God is through with us as a nation."

I did not know how prescient my comment was. What has been revealed as the work of this president is nothing less than the dismantling of this country. It is obvious that the president and the Democratic Party broke the law to win reelection (the Democrat vote of illegal immigrants allowed in days before and during the election, etc.).

But also, America repeatedly has shown the power to renew herself. Freedom does that to a people. With such exposés as Horowitz has written, I still have hope.

-- J. T. Wheeler

I'm horrified to see that there are still people like David Horowitz, who seem to believe it is possible to prevail in a nuclear war. True, at some point it may be possible to build an effective defense against ballistic missiles. But developing an "edge" in the form of "more sophisticated warheads and more accurate missiles" merely ensures that everyone loses, not that one side can win.

It is immoral to view the deaths of hundreds of millions of people, on either side, as an acceptable outcome. It is irresponsible to suggest that one side of such a conflict might survive, since it makes the use of nuclear weapons more likely.

Now, China's distribution of this technology to other nations is troubling. But, like cryptography or computers, what has been discovered once can be reinvented elsewhere -- keeping technology secret is not a long-term solution to preventing its use. We must find ways of ensuring stability that do not depend on a nuclear oligopoly; we shall be forced to do so in the long term anyway.

-- Mark Gritter

DAVID HOROWITZ RESPONDS ...

It's true, as Kevin Barry points out, that there were security leaks before the Clinton administration. But there was not a wholesale dismantling of security controls by previous administrations, nor a systematic coverup of the leaks, nor a massive cash flow into the coffers of the administration party by people associated with the intelligence and military of the spying power. Timelines printed on Rep. Curt Weldon's Web site show the damage that took place specifically in the Clinton years, as a result of the Clinton policy.

As for Mark Gritter's outrage, it is simply misplaced. Nowhere did I say or imply that the United States or any other nation could prevail in a nuclear war.

Adventures in the skin trade
BY ROLF POTTS
(06/22/99)

Rolf Potts' pious refusal to have sex with a Phnom Penh hooker is pretty funny considering that by publishing his piece in a widely read magazine in a rich country he will probably be responsible for drawing hundreds, perhaps thousands of wealthy, voracious sex tourists to Cambodia. He's not willing to patronize the industry but he'll gladly do PR for it. Your travel section has recently devoted a lot of space to publicizing discount third-world sex opportunities. Recent pieces by male writers who carefully deny that they would ever patronize a prostitute -- and in fact devote much of their articles to smarmy agonizing about it -- strike me as the very familiar American blend of piety and leering voyeurism.

-- Marcus Stanley

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