Careful What You Suggest In Print Letter Of The Week: From Aug. 29, 1997

How ironic that on the eve of the trial of Barry Loukaitis, a young man accused of murders he planned based on something he read (a book by Stephen King), that you would print a tongue-not-so-firmly-in-cheek commentary by Russ Moritz (Roundtable, Aug. 24) recommending the murder of children.

Children? Yes, contrary to the stereotype perpetuated by your staff cartoonist, Milt Priggee, hunters are not bearded, beer-belly rednecks but are children. And they’re grandmothers, grandfathers, doctors, nurses, teachers, ministers and many other upstanding citizens of our communities.

It’s not so tongue-in-cheek when you picture a hunter who has been murdered in the woods and you see the face of a child.

But of course, animal rights activists would never take Moritz’s editorial seriously and murder a hunter, because these activists are all emotionally stable and extremely sane. That’s why they call them “extremists” (now that’s an example of tongue-in-cheek writing). No one in their right mind would read about murder and then go out and commit one - which is exactly what the Loukaitis defense will try to prove. Yet, his victims are no less dead.

Let’s all pray that history does not repeat itself in this situation. Brian P. Roth, M.D. Moses Lake

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