U.S. NOT VERY POPULAR OVERSEAS

Instead of promoting life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness for all
people, our leaders have waged war against civilians at home and abroad.

In his Sept. 28 letter The unspeakable truth, Arnold Harris says that the
United States has been the cause of much misery and suffering in the
underdeveloped world. I lived 30 years outside of the United States. Person
to person, Americans are reasonably acceptable overseas, but the U.S.
government and its institutions are universally detested and despised. Our
allies wonder at our gullibility.

Foreign- and military-aid recipients marvel at the ease with which we are
conned out of money and materiel, much of which is diverted from the
intended goals.

We are reaping the wrongs of what we have sown.

Instead of promoting life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness for all
people, our leaders have waged war against civilians at home and abroad.
Lawmakers continue to legislate morality, which they then must enforce with
the barrel of a gun. The war on drugs has turned our protectors into
enforcers with warrantless searches, confiscation, mandatory sentencing and
dumping herbicides on crops and civilians.

In her Sept. 28 letter, Cut off this terrorist-money source, too, Ginger
Warbis makes a most sensible case to legalize drugs, stop the inane war on
drugs and deprive terrorists and organized crime of funds. Maybe this would
curb some of the law-enforcement excesses.

BOBBY R. LANG
Col. U.S. Army (Ret.)
Miami