Adele Ferguson - Columnist responds to letters on Bush, Palin

“HEY, ADELE, I loooove your wonderful column in the Chronicle every week,” writes Barbi Hill of I’m not sure where, Centralia where the Chronicle is published or Seattle where her letter was postmarked..

“How much do they pay you to spew your hate? You are the biggest racist I’ve ever seen, and a big old bigot. How much our president spends on trips to Asia, etc., is none of your business.

“Why drag the Clintons into your wonderful trash very week? I’m a taxpayer too. You aren’t the only one. I find it strange you seem to forget about your Golden Boy, lil’ George Bush. That was the biggest mistake ever to go on eight years yet!

“Oh, that’s right. You’re Republican so he did everything right. He went on the most vacations. Remember that, Sweetie? 9/11 was a joke. He couldn’t even move. What a moron. Why don’t you move to Crawford, Texas, so you can be with lil’ George day and night?

“He spent billions of our tax dollars but I guess that’s OK with you. Two wars under his watch. Unwelcome wars, yet. Grow up, do something with that hair style. You look like a man in that photo. I am a proud Democrat and I’d vote again for Obama, at least he’s intelligent.”

I DON’T RECALL being an ardent admirer of George Bush’s presidency. I wrote many times of my disappointment when he allowed his Republican majority to grab all the earmarks they had been denied during the 40 years the Democrats were in power. He didn’t veto a bill for years until stem cells came up. So far in the many interviews he has granted since his book was published, I haven’t heard anyone ask him why he did that. I don’t have the book yet so I don’t know if he wrote about it.

Actually, he didn’t spend billions of dollars. He asked Congress to spend billions of dollars and Congress obeyed.

I ALSO DON’T know if he took more vacation time than the Clintons. Obama hasn’t been in office long enough for a comparison there. I do know that most of his vacation time was in Crawford, Texas, which couldn’t have cost as much as the jaunts all over the world the Clintons took and Obama appears to be following in their footsteps.

I don’t argue that Obama is intelligent. What he isn’t is competent. He was in way over his head when he was in the Illinois state legislature and voted “present” on most of the tough bills instead of yes or no, and the U.S. Senate, where his peers report today he was bored stiff. His most desired attribute is that he is black. If he started fading like Michael Jackson. he’d lose a lot of followers.

“Well, it’s out now. Sarah Palin not only is considering a run for president but thinks she can beat Obama,” writes Bill Manchester of Spokane. “Do you? And would you support her?”

No, I don’t think Sarah Palin could be elected whether she runs against Obama or some other Democrat. I would have an uneasy feeling during the reign of a President Palin that she couldn’t stand up to the pressures of the job. I’m not sure she wouldn’t be carried out of there in a straight jacket. She ditched the office of governor for reasons not entirely clear. I hope she doesn’t run, but if she should be the Republican nominee, I would support her if it’s a race with the incumbent. I fear more a bankrupt U.S. under a President Obama than I fear a President Palin.

(Adele Ferguson can be reached at P.O. Box 69, Hansville, Wa., 98340.)