I JUST HOPE and pray that some child waiting in line at the grocery checkout doesn’t say, “Mommy, what does ‘mofo’ mean?” What were y’all thinking?
JOY MARTIN
San Antonio

JUST BECAUSE Governor Rick Perry got away with the comment does not mean we should have to relive this obscenity.
NATHAN DAY
Bedford

Oh, Ricky, You’re So Fine

WHEN YOU WRITE a piece so slanted for Rick Perry, you should label it an editorial endorsement (“Capture the Flag,” July 2006). Obviously, your one-hour sit-down at the Austin restaurant with Perry’s handlers did the job: Perry was mentioned in your piece twice as many times as Kinky Friedman and Carole Keeton Strayhorn.
MATT BIERSMITH
Austin

On the Fence

I AM CONFUSED by the story “My Life as an Illegal” (July 2006). As a U.S. citizen, born in Texas, who pays taxes and follows the laws, why am I supposed to care about how hard someone’s life is who has entered my country illegally? Why don’t we hear about how hard a thief’s life is having to break into homes for money? Because what thieves do is illegal—nothing different from coming into this country illegally.
GRAHAM BRIZENDINE
via e-mail

YOUR STORY TOLD by Immigrant X was nothing short of beautiful, poignant, and honest. I am so glad to hear this side of the immigration story. Hopefully, more people will realize that this “debate” is much more than a platform or an agenda item.
LAURA CALVILLO NEILL
El Paso

Pop Tarts

THANKS FOR TELLING me about the Septien Entertainment Group (“School of Pop,” July 2006). Now I know where to vent when I turn on my radio and hear nothing but this drivel. America’s next, enduring music greats will be found in roadhouses, bars, and garage bands, places where the suits in the music biz don’t hang out.
STEVEN V. BEHM
Burbank, California

Glory Days

I ENJOYED JAN Reid’s piece on the “forgotten” Wichita Falls football dynasty (“Seems Like Old Times,” July 2006). As a graduate of Irving High School (class of ’64), I know all too well how dominating the Coyotes were in the late fifties and early sixties. The universe shifted in 1962, however, in a game to which Reid, understandably, makes only a passing reference, when the Irving Tigers held on for an improbable victory. Reid refers to the “shock and indignity” of losing that game. I was a junior on the Irving team and would agree with half of that characterization. There was ample shock, but surely there was no indignity.
GARY NEWSOM
San Antonio

History in the Remaking

AS A HISTORIAN I commend Michael Ennis for exposing T. R. Fehrenbach’s Lone Star for what it is: history as redneck Texas would like it to be (“T. R. Fehrenbach Is History,” July 2006). I further commend Ennis for introducing Texas Monthly readers to professor Randolph B. Campbell’s excellent work Gone to Texas. It is Texas history at its best, written with accuracy, balance, and fine interpretation.
BILL LEDBETTER
Gainesville

Points of Contention

PAUL BURKA’S ten steps for saving Bush’s presidency are typical liberal BS (Reporter, Topic A, “Operation Rescue,” July 2006). Here are some points for Burka: 1. Fire the achievers and the successful people (and tax them). 2. Liberals had two chances to put bin Laden’s head on a stick and blew it. 3. Spying on “millions” of Americans—a pure and outright lie. 4. Making fun of a potentially serious accident by the VP is a typical liberal solution—no substance in the arena of ideas. 5. Let the GOP deal with immigration before the Dems do (remember how successful the Dems have been with black voters). The GOP will back up any promises made. 6. Selling the petro reserves is pure stupidity. The market will find solutions, not the government. 7. Upgrade the levees only after the corrupt guys in New Orleans are gone. Otherwise, you’ll get a repeat. (And, oh, yeah, those corrupt guys who allowed the first failures were all libs and Dems. Hmmm.) 8. Invade Dubai? Why? P.S. We are winning big in Iraq—unless you read the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, or Texas Monthly. 9. I’d like to see what Burka writes after the GOP wins big in November.
LOU MARINOS
Seabrook

Everyone’s a Critic

THE JULY 2006 article “Shooting Blanks” left me wanting to shoot myself (Reporter, Hollywood, TX). Every movie I’ve watched left me thinking either “I loved it” or “I hated it” or “It was okay.” Not one movie in forty-plus years has led me to the conclusion that it was “a stolid and heavy object that begs to be regarded with sober reflection.” What does that mean exactly? Why don’t critics just fast-forward through the useless hyperbole and get straight to thumbs up or thumbs down?
STEPHEN DUEBOAY
Cleburne

Remember the Kinkster

AS A SEVENTH-GENERATION Texan and Son of the Republic, I must protest your statement that an asteroid would have to crush all of the Kinkster’s opponents for him to win the governorship (Editor’s Letter, “Independent’s Day,” July 2006). Remember, Sam Houston was an opium-addicted drunkard. If he can be governor and twice president of the Republic, I can see no reason why Kinky should not be governor. And don’t forget that Mirabeau B. Lamar, the third president of the Republic, was elected only after his opponent, Peter Grayson, committed suicide and then his replacement, Chief Justice James Collinsworth, after a week-long drinking binge, either fell or jumped from a boat in Galveston Bay and drowned shortly before the election. History shows that there are many ways, not just an asteroid collision, that Kinky could be elected. On Election Day, the fine people of Texas should remember the Alamo and the Kinkster too.
RANDAL NEWHOUSE
Dallas

Editor’s Note: In the July 2006 story “Capture the Flag,” we incorrectly stated that therevenue raised by the new business tax fell $4.5 million short of the amount spent by the Legislature for property tax cuts and new educational spending. The correct figure was $4.5 billion. We regret this inadvertent proofreading error.