DATE: Monday, April 28, 1997                TAG: 9704260021

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B6   EDITION: FINAL 

TYPE: Letter 

                                            LENGTH:  104 lines

LETTERS TO EDITOR -- THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT

TOBACCO

Death to Joe Camel

Yesterday my 3-year-old asked me who those men we just passed were. He was referring to a billboard depicting cartoon camels playing pool with cigarettes hanging from their mouths. The billboard in question was not 60 yards from a McDonald's Playland.

What the American tobacco cartel has spoonfed our children is beyond unethical. Pitching Joe Camel to children is immoral and unconscionable. It must stop.

It is time for Joe Camel to die an agonizing death, characterized by cancerous cells eating away his lung tissue and in panic over whether this breath is his last.

I know that jobs are at stake. I suggest that the state provide funding and education to tobacco farmers for converting their crops to something like hemp, or soybeans, or anything that has nothing to do with addicting our children to a substance that will kill them.

Connie Hanna

Norfolk, April 18, 1997

STATE CAMPAIGN

Beyer should step down

Campaign-finance reform is needed so badly. Here in Virginia, the Democrats opposed this reform. The power that politicans have to campaign while they are still in office is unbelievable - free mailings, the press wanting to have the camera on the politicians, and access to free office space, secretaries, etc.

Remember the law that Al Gore broke in using the White House to make phone calls for soliticing? Jim Gilmore is doing what is right by stepping down and giving up all of the perks that political officeholders have. Don Beyer refuses to do so. Isn't it typical?

Thank you, Jim Gilmore, for holding an open, honest campaign and not wasting my tax dollars on free phones, mailings and personnel. It is time Beyer steps down, too, and gives up the perks. Just think taxpayers - every time you see Don Beyer out campaigning, we will be paying his salary to be out doing so.

Niecie Garner

Suffolk, April 17, 1997

N.C.-VA.

Swap Water for F/A 18

With reference to the water and F/A 18 Hornet controversy between North Carolina and Virginia, we will send to Virginia 100 gallons of water per day for each F/A 18 Hornet stationed at Cherry Point.

Jack A. Henry

Kill Devil Hills, April 18, 1997

CAMPAIGN FUNDS

Reno should have

appointed a prosecutor

I believe you are wrong to say ``Janet Reno is right'' (editorial, April 17) in refusing to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate financing of President Clinton's re-election.

The record is full of credible evidence of illegal solicitation by the president, vice president and the Democratic National Committee - and illegal donations by foreign nationals. USC 44le(a) makes it ``unlawful . . . to solicit, accept or receive (political) contributions from a foreign national.''

Vice President Gore publicly confessed to using his White House office to raise funds - a direct violation of the law prohibiting ``solicitation of campaign funds from public buildings.''

The Pilot misleads readers in claiming Gore's violation was ``fuzzy'' because he used a DNC credit card. Nothing fuzzy about it!

Sure, Ms. Reno used a special prosecutor four times in the first Clinton term. They were needed; and one is needed now with the ``specific, credible evidence'' seen by all.

But Reno is the president's lawyer - just as Attorney General Griffin Bell admitted in protecting President Carter in 1978. Said Clinton adviser Dick Morris: If she appoints a special prosecutor, she's outta here!

I never doubted that a slick lawyer like Reno could obfuscate evidence perfectly clear to most of us, but I had hoped that the The Pilot would not join this travesty.

G. Russell Evans

Captain, U.S. Coast Guard (ret.)

Norfolk, April 18, 1997

VIRGINIA BEACH

Backyard bureaucracy

over a parking sticker

Recently I received a $25 parking ticket while parked in front of my residence, even though my sticker states 1996-1998. I removed the ticket and called the phone number on the back - ``not in service'' was what I heard. I called the parking office and was told that my sticker was invalid.

``But it states good until 1998,'' I said.

``It doesn't matter,'' was the reply.

I drove to the parking office, requested a ``valid'' sticker and two visitor parking permits.

``That will be $4,'' stated the clerk.

``All right, here's my money.''

``We don't take cash. We only take money order or personal checks.''

The grand poobah, Mr. Atkinson, wants to run this agency for another term. I have seen this type of bureaucracy and government up close before. A few years back I lived in the Washington, D.C., area, and people are leaving that city in droves.

Richard Allen

Virginia Beach, April 21, 1997

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