Letter: Writer right on about president

Wednesday, June 27, 2001 | 9:16 a.m.

As a longtime follower of presidential press conferences, my only memory of correspondent Helen Thomas was that the first question at the conference was always accorded to Thomas because of her seniority. Her first questions never impressed me.

Now that the Sun is carrying her column I have gained respect for her writings. She has provided some of the more lucid articles about President Bush's pro-rich and feeble nonrich policies (witness the tax cuts). An example of the Bush agenda on this theme is the president's plan to privatize Social Security. Thomas points out that investment firms are primed to spend $20 million in ads to drum up support for President Bush's effort to privatize Social Security.

Thomas says: "Why not? They figure on reaping $86 billion in security investments if Social Security recipients are allowed to voluntarily set aside 2 percent of their payroll tax for private accounts in 2002." Furthermore, according to Thomas, "Bush has stacked the deck by creating the Commission to Strengthen Social Security and packing it with members who favor privatizing the system. He has left nothing to chance. Now, that is what I call chutzpah."

I like Thomas's straight talk. She is one of the few writers who point out that Bush's policies favor only the very rich. And that his spin talk that his policies help the nonrich too is only hypocrisy.

ORVILLE GOPLEN