READERS WRITE

An election season without negative ads?

What if, in the 2012 presidential election season, all the television networks refused to air negative campaign ads? What if the networks agreed to air only positive ads?

The candidates could only brag about themselves and tell what they would do for the country. Television viewers would hear only good things from the candidates. Network factcheckers would keep the campaigns honest.

By election day, voters would believe they had two outstanding candidates for president. After election day, voters whose candidate did not win would have little reason to fear the winner. And winner and loser and their political parties could work together for they would have little reason to hate each other.

Inauguration day 2013 would be very different from inauguration day 2009, when much of the public will view our new president with fear and hatred, remembering what the negative campaigns have taught them.

BETTY JEAN CRAIGE

Craige is director of the Willson Center for Humanities and Arts and professor of comparative literature at the University of Georgia.

VOTER REGISTRATION

Don’t insult our intelligence about fraud

A recent column by Cynthia Tucker (“Don’t buy frenzy over voter fraud,” @issue, Oct. 19) and a recent letter (“Voter fraud not illegal registration,” @issue, Oct. 20) try to make light of voter registration fraud by saying that Mickey Mouse can’t show up to vote.

The whole point of registering hundreds of thousands of non-existent voters is to get them on the rolls (in the database). They don’t have to show up at the polls for unscrupulous election officials to throw the weight of their “votes” into the totals after the polls are closed.

This has been a practice of “machine politics” in places like Chicago; Gary, Indiana; and Detroit for decades. So please don’t insult our intelligence by saying we should just be amused by the misguided activities of a few volunteers at ACORN. This is a well-planned, concerted effort to cheat.

GRANT ESSEX

Milton

Dead people’s votes are problematic

Those who claim that Mickey Mouse isn’t going to show up and vote despite ACORN’s best efforts are probably correct. Whether the dead people who are so registered will have their representatives show up to vote is substantially more problematical.

Use of fake names or those of the deceased is not fiction and is, in fact, given substantial credit for John Fitzgerald Kennedy’s win in 1960 due to the efforts of the regime of the late Mayor Daley in Chicago.

The AJC is obsessed with the concept of Republican voter suppression but is adamantly opposed to any effort to limit the vote to those legally entitled to do so. Allowing the dilution of the legitimate vote with the illegitimate is no less a sin than voter suppression.

TIM HEWETT

Tucker

Lewis right about McCain campaign

U.S. Rep. John Lewis spoke the truth about the John McCain campaign inciting fear and hatred. Colin Powell addressed this, somewhat more tactfully, in his remarks endorsing Barack Obama for president.

Sunday I was at a public library where someone insulted a veiled Muslim woman for her faith. This is in the wake of a presidential campaign, not 9/11.

What difference does it make whether a candidate is a Christian, Jew, Muslim or atheist? There is no religious test for public office in our republic. As far as I am concerned, we are all children of the same God.

ROBERT BROWN

Atlanta

Public support for foster kids is rare

I am a social worker in Carrollton. The program I direct provides supervised visitation for families with children in state custody. We are Division of Family and Children Services contractors and work closely with child protective services and the foster care unit. It is shocking how little public support there is for our most vulnerable children, foster children.

At the moment, our county DFCS office has no copy paper and no money to buy any office supplies. For the most part, the workers are young and inexperienced and even the most highly motivated leave after only a few months because of the pressure and workload. I can only think of one or two workers who have been there more than 10 years.

Out here in the trenches, the situation is as grim as anyone can imagine. We must raise public awareness about this issue and not allow innocent children to be victimized for the sake of anyone’s budget. I can think of plenty of places at the top where I’m sure budget cuts would be appropriate.

KATHY LOWRY

Carrollton