Time passes and all the indications are that my Open Letter has failed to
find a sympathetic editor in the US. This is hardly surprising. As two of
the 3 replies I received put it - their letters page exists to air the
views of their community, not those of "out of towners" (and Perth, Western
Australia is a long way out of most towns). The 3rd advised me that it only
published letters written exclusively for its pages.
In summary:
I posted to 242 newspapers
70 with AOL addresses bounced
I had a response (as detailed above) from 3 papers.
I wrote to the list some days ago predicting that a one letter
campaign was unlikely to succeed and suggesting that a concerted effort, by
5% of this list, targeted at specific newspapers, might improve the chances
of some letters being printed.
No one has responded to that suggestion in any way at all, which
leaves it stillborn.
All in all a less than successful outcome. At least writing the open letter
served to get some things off my chest.
If anyone can use the text of the letter to further the cause in any way
please feel free to do so. I shall now return to hoeing my own row. As
regards the subject of foreign involvement in US domestic politics for me at
least, "the rest is silence".
Dennis
