Decisions at Justice

Re “Former aide contradicts Gonzales,” March 30

The occupants of the White House have proved that they are incompetent. Other recent presidents have been caught in untruths and paid a price for it. The members of the Bush administration, including the president, keep trying to tell the media and the American people things that are not quite true, and they keep being exposed -- most recently for the firing of federal prosecutors. They haven’t learned that if they told the truth, the subject would disappear from the public consciousness instead of taking on a life of its own. People who do not learn from the past and from their mistakes are incompetent and unqualified for their job.

IRVING LEEMON

Northridge

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Re “Scandal, scandalous,” editorial, March 29

The Times seems oblivious to the fact that illegal immigration is the most insidious threat to the United States since World War II and that most citizens want it stopped now. If the president calls for aggressive prosecution of those violating current immigration laws, maverick attorneys should be fired for prioritizing their own noncompliant agenda.

DAVID CONLON

Palos Verdes

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Re “At Justice, life-and-death frictions,” March 26

While the number of death sentences in the United States has dropped dramatically since President Bush entered office, the number of federal death-penalty trials has increased in the corresponding period. How foolish of our recent attorney generals (John Ashcroft and Alberto Gonzales) to increasingly pursue capital cases and ignore the empirical evidence that shows the death penalty does not deter crime, is more expensive than life in prison without parole and is arbitrary with regard to race and to possible actual innocence.

SAM WEINER

San Francisco