4 J«ist o u t • January 3.2003
Saddam and Gomorrah
To the E ditor :
KAREN M. 5 WEIGERT, MD
Obstetrics and Gynecology
Phone
5 0 3 274-9936
Eâx
5 0 3 274-2660
1130 N.W. 22nd, Suite 320, Portland, OR 97210
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n response to the decision by the National
Gay and Lesbian Task Force to join a coali
tion opposed to the prospective war against Sad
dam Hussein: It is hard to take seriously a claim
of patriotism hy people who habitually blame
the United States for everything.
Executive director Lorri Jean displays her
partisan motivation when she makes President
Rush sound like a greater threat to this country
than a man who has used poison gas against his
own citizens and who governs hy terror and har
bors terrorists. W hile 1 share some of her con
cerns about civil liberties, NGLTF’s history of
anti-American double standards gives it no
credibility as a messenger.
A n organization that decries racism while
excluding people from meetings based on race
makes a mockery of the progressive label. There
is nothing progressive about a dogmatic refusal
to acknowledge that there are criminals and
madmen in the world who will not he deterred
hy appeasement and who must he fought if our
freedoms are to he protected.
Saddam has violated 16 U.N. resolutions
and responded to the latest one with a blanket
denial believed hy no one. In an effort to wrap
his crimes in religion, he has built many
mosques, including the M other of All Battles
Mosque with minarets shaped like Scud missiles
and a Koran written in ink made from his own
blcxxJ. This is not a man who can he reasoned
with.
It is revealing that NGLTF cites the bound
lessly naive Jimmy Carter, who has seldom met
a hmtal dictator he didn’t like and who was
much harder on our closest Middle East ally,
Israel, than he was on her anti-demcKratic ene
mies. I respect and admire his humanitarian
efforts around the world, hut his judgment on
foreign policy is about as sound as Neville
Cham berlain’s.
In case the folks at NGLTF haven’t noticed,
the world has spent the past decade exhausting
every peaceful recourse. As to what America is
all about, I would remind the members of this
foolish coalition that this country was founded
hy people who had to fight for their liberty and,
in the words of the last stanza of our national
anthem , stood “between their loved homes and
the war’s desolation.” There is a price for liberty
that these folks refuse even to understand, much
less pay.
As was the case 12 years ago, most gay Amer
icans appear to agree with the vast majority of
their fellow citizens in supporting the president’s
position against Iraq. If there is any gay angle to
the war facing us, surely it is that tjie removal of
Saddam, which is not about to happen hy peace
ful means, would he the best thing that could
happen to gay people in that part of the world.
As the Stonewall rioters demonstrated 53 years
ago, sometimes you have to fight hack—and,
contrary to the perpetually alienated among us,
gays are citizens, ttxx
R ic h a r d J. R o s e n d a l l
Washington, D .C.
Private parts
To
E ditor :
(x:s it concern anyone else the cost we are
I , / paying for safety?
Since Sept. 11, 2001, the reaction to terror
ism has cost the American public not just our
budget surplus and an increase in defense spend
ing hut the loss of cherished personal privacy
and civil rights that many find dear. W ith the
Bush blueprint for national security, and the ter-
the
tr a n s itio n s
posed actors Jon Voight and Ricky Schroeder
and snapped a shot that was published in
Newsweek. But it would be the raw sensuality
and tender machismo captured in the photo
graph of young Richard Gere— rising star of
1980’s American Gigolo— that launched his
career.
Ritts later moved from fashion shtxits for
Harper’s Bazaar, Vogue and Elle to album covers
and music videos for M adonna, Elton John and
Cher. Two of his creations—Janet Jackson’s
"Live Will Never Do (W ithout You)” and Chris
Isaak’s “Wicked G am e”— won MTV awards in
1991.
Ritts is survived by his partner, entertain
ment attorney Erik Hyman; brother, Rory; sister,
Christy Thrasher; and mother, Shirley.
PHOTO BY HERB RITTS
Herb Hitts,
1952-2002
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/"'C elebrity photographer Herb Ritts died of
complications from pneumonia Dec. 26 in
Los Angeles. He was 50.
He was bom in Los Angeles in 1952. In
1970, he left California to study economics at
Bard (College.
Ritts later returned to West Hollywood and
worked for the family business selling rattan fur
niture, often to movie sets. This job allowed him
to travel and to pursue one of his interests, pho
tographing his friends.
R itts’ hobby soon became a self-taught
career. His first success as a photographer came
in 1978 on the set of The Champ. He quickly
Madonna mugs in 1987