Sex on the Soaps
Your article on the soaps (PEOPLE, June 14) was too much. If you don't like something on TV, you should take two fingers and twist the dial.
Patricia G. Beagle
Glen Allen, Va.
What really irks me is how the soaps' critics keep telling us to change the channels if we don't like this trash. All the channels have the same trash. These programs should use their sponsors' soap to clean up their acts. On the other hand, I guess laundries make a lot of money washing all those sheets.
Maure Lee Talley
Whitehaven, Tenn.
Douglas Powell
Perhaps it goes without saying, but it wasn't brought out in the Hinckley article: The time to establish a trusting relationship with one's children is long before the preteen years. It's much harder to correct problems than it is to prevent them. I also wish that Dr. Powell had mentioned the relationship between John Hinckley's parents. The marital relationship is often central to a child's problems. Sometimes, instead of taking their child to a psychologist, parents should take themselves.
M. Elena MacCauley
Albuquerque
Gerry Cooney
Your article made Gerry Cooney look like a kindly gentleman and Holmes like a crude character who was unworthy of the heavyweight title. Holmes proved himself on June 11. People should start admitting that Holmes is a great fighter and forget about how long it's been since a white man had the title.
Pamela Jones
Dayton, Ohio
I was one of the lucky ones who caught the Holmes-Cooney fight at Caesars Palace. There was no doubt that Holmes won the fight because of his experience. Cooney wasn't ready, but going 13 rounds with Holmes is an accomplishment. Cooney won many fans that night because he proved that he has the heart of a champion. When he was close to tears during the press conference afterward, I knew that he had fought not just for $10 million but for himself and his fans.
Andrea Rubino
Las Vegas
John Ehrlichman
Your Watergate story was misleading and inaccurate in its account of my attitudes and experiences. As to my "chums," I met Allen Ginsberg (with his mother and father) at a lunch here. That was about five years ago, for about an hour. I spent a few hours at Brando's home about six years ago and haven't seen him since. Bob Woodward and I spent four or five hours in Paris one day—that's all. I enjoyed talking to those men briefly, but they are not my pals. What's the matter with the journalism at PEOPLE?
John Ehrlichman
Santa Fe
Phoebe Cates
After reading your story on Phoebe Cates, I'm completely turned off by her. She claims that her film Paradise is a "rip-off," but she apparently didn't hesitate to cash the checks she received for her performance. Also, since she had no previous acting experience, she has a lot of nerve insinuating that a veteran like Willie Aames cannot act. Instead of sounding honest, she comes across as a spoiled brat. She's lost track of the fact that there are hundreds of actors who have starved for their craft and would have killed to get that part.
Shanna Ingalsbee
Portage, Mich.
As I sat in the theater, I felt embarrassed for the makers of Paradise because it was so blatantly obvious that it was not just a copy of The Blue Lagoon, but a poor copy. Phoebe Cates realized that Paradise was a "rip-off." Good for her!
Donna Birkbeck
Colorado Springs
Sam Donaldson
I'm in complete agreement with Sam Donaldson's press colleagues when they describe him as "boorish," "obdurate," "contentious" and "petulant," but I'm at a loss as to why they omitted the one word that best defines his news reporting: biased. Because of his obviously negative attitude toward the White House, I no longer watch any news show in which he takes part. A great number of the viewing public prefer their news reporting straight, factual and fair rather than filtered through such media-made celebrities as Donaldson, Rather and Wallace.
Stanley M. Bell Jr.
Owings Mills, Md.
Thanks for the article on my favorite newscaster, Sam Donaldson. I've always been impressed by his direct and aggressive manner. Those who find his style too flamboyant belong to the past when the media were too polite to question politicians. I applaud Sam's no-holds-barred technique.
Dee Lentz
Royal Oak, Mich.
As a Vietnam veteran, I was disturbed by Sam Donaldson's reference to the Falkland Islands action as a "half-ass war, or whatever it is." He did a great disservice to all the participants. War is dirty, bloody, stinking, but it is never half-ass. It can be fought half-ass, as it was in Vietnam, but death, injuries and the dehumanization of the young of two nations deserve a better adjective.
Harry M. Mitchell
Shippensburg, Pa.
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