Should Nixon Quit?

Sir / History has a way of clearing leaders like President Nixon after all the verbal and printed mud of trivialities sinks to the bottom of the pool and the clear water of truth and performance again appears at the top. My only disappointment in the President will come if he ever resigns, or permits impeachment, without a fight.

J.A. FENDT Haddonfield, N.J.

Sir / With all due respect, I must say that Richard Nixon has insulted our intelligence, destroyed our faith, curdled our spirit, and turned politics into pornography. The only great service he can perform for this country is to resign.

RICHARD RYNEN Madison, Wis.

Sir / By the time those chickens get around to impeaching the President, it will be so anticlimactic that I expect we'll hear about it in between sports and the weather.

JOAN MARGALITH Poland Spring, Me.

Sir / As I listen to and read the comments offered by the liberal and crypto-liberal television, newspaper and newsmagazine reporters, savoring every rumor, fact, suspicion and information from a reliable source with regard to the dilemma faced by the present Administration, it occurs to me that there has not been this much anticipatory chop licking since Daniel spent an uncomfortable afternoon in the lions' den.

(MRS.) MARION C. SCHNEIDER Dayton

Sir / It amazes me that people can blame the news media for Watergate. As long as there is more to be learned, only the President can be blamed for the strain on our country's health that Watergate has become. Nixon has not been willing to accept the responsibility for errors and wrongdoing within his organization. He is the one who has kept Watergate in the news.

KATHLEEN KRIDER Colby, Kans.

Sir / Take a good hard look at the picture of our dear President [Jan. 28]. and see how you are helping to destroy the life of a good man. If there are any Christians on your staff contributing to his dilemma, may God forgive them.

(MRS.) REBECCA BARRAGATO Farmington Hills, Mich.

Sir / Congress is faced with a simple fact: the 18-minute gap in the White House tape speaks more eloquently of the President's corruption than could the missing words themselves.

WILLIAM YOUNG Aachen, West Germany

Sir / I am stunned by the case of the Watergate tapes. How can ... expect us to believe that five separate ... wiping out important ... in the President's ... not the result of deliberate tampering? It's enough to make one ...

JEFFREY SMITH Mundelein, 111.

Left Hanging

Sir / I've got to know what was on that slip of paper burned by the Secretary of Hope in your Essay. "Sherlock Holmes: The Case of the Strange Erasures" [Jan. 28]. I examined every line, parsed every sentence, even looked for clues by using the first letter in consecutive words.

It isn't fair. Doyle would never have left us hanging in midair, slowly twisting in the wind! I'll never read Sherlock Holmes by Kanfer again.

SYBIL H. CLAYS Granger, Utah

Goldwater on Truman

Sir / I don't think Tim O'Brien of the Washington Post made the "blooper" that the Post had to retract [Jan. 28]. I am an admirer of Barry Goldwater, but he made the mistake. How he could think that Truman could have been a great President is ridiculous. It is apparent that the Eastern news media are trying to make Truman a hero, but Goldwater doesn't need to join them.

SUSAN MYRICK Syracuse, Ind.

Drink and Energy

Sir / Although I do not condone drinking, I disagree with Mrs. Tooze's statement that more people are turning to liquor because of the energy crisis [Jan. 28]. Those who now drink more at home are probably those who used to drink in quantity in public. If people have to drink, isn't it safer for the rest of us having them drink at home?

PEGGY DEPUY McLean, Va.

Sir / Energy crisis adding to the drinking problem? Maybe the NWCTU has the answer to both situations. By resuming Prohibition we could divert the surplus alcohol to fuel consumption.

LARRY PESA Madeira Beach, Fla.

Mental Detours

Sir / I run frantically over the University of Texas campus, consulting endless schedules while the tower clock marks precious time. Where in the hell is my Spanish exam being held ?

Then I wake. Thank you for striking another entry off my list of personal insanities with your article "Recurring Nightmares" [Jan. 28]. When you find that others share your mental detours, you become more convinced of your sanity but, alas, less convinced of your uniqueness.

SHARILYN JACKSON SCRIVNER South Bend, Ind.

Sir / I had no idea that Wellesley and Radcliffe girls dreamed my awful, recurring dream about the exam in a class for which I wasn't even enrolled. Fellow sufferers, "I'll see you in my dreams."

MRS. FRANK PICHEL Utica, Mich.

Billings Error

Sir / In your Jan. 21 article on Japanese advertising agencies, you reported the billings of Hakuhodo Inc. at less than $3 million. The correct figure is in fact about 100 times as much, or about $300 million.

Those who are knowledgeable about advertising in this country will immediately recognize the error. However, there are many readers not that familiar with the advertising industry here who have an interest in the Japanese market and in advertising in Japan.

SHIRO HORIE Senior Managing Director General Manager International Division Hakuhodo Inc. Tokyo -- TIME regrets the error.

Kissinger the Wasit

Sir / The success of the "Kissinger shuttle" [Jan. 28], to be followed by more significant moves, we hope, should come as no surprise to anthropologists familiar with the Middle East. Among Arabs the most favored device for the resolution of problems-be they family quarrels, ownership disputes, or even blood feuds-has always been the was-it (pronounced -was-eet), a go-between, intermediary, or mediator. Generally he is a man recognized by both parties for his wisdom, prestige and impartiality.

F.S. VIDAL Department of Anthropology Southern Methodist University Dallas

Justice's Gaping Jaws

Sir / This profligate, above-the-table jury-padding so shamelessly practiced by Christie and Schulman [Jan. 28] should leave the jaws of Justice so far agape at this brazen violation that they would relax no more until the scales slip from her hand and she slumps into an unattended death.

BEVILL PIERCE Silver Spring, Md.

Sir / We undergraduates at Douglass College in the '50s knew Jay Schulman was a maverick the minute we spotted him lumbering down the path in the academic procession the first day of school. The mortar board was hanging off the back of his huge, hairy head, and the black gown was drawn back like stage curtains. His tie was loose, his shirt was rumpled, and his socks looked as though they had melted and frozen just over the tops of his shoes. Yet he was a good prof: bright, probing, funny, involved, shy, mocking, shocking and demanding.

Those students who stretched themselves further than they had thought they could may have done so because they remembered some of his insightful, pointed, honest comments.

ANNETTE L. MARTINO Oldwick, N.J.

Business Almost As Usual

Sir / You ask "Oh Dear, What Can the Matter Be?" when writing about Britain's economy [Jan. 21]. May I assure you that it is certainly not as you report.

Far from having "laid off nearly half its 235,000-man work force," the British Steel Corp. has maintained its labor force virtually intact and is fulfilling its guaranteed work-week agreement with unions. Furthermore, although the corporation could do with more coal to get back to normal, we are producing steel at a rate greater than 70% of our precrisis output through the full cooperation of our work force, management and men.

H.M. FINNISTON Chairman British Steel Corp. London

Help Offshore

Sir / While Canadian Broadcaster Gordon Sinclair's pro-American sentiments [Jan. 21] may seem inspirational to some, his rhetoric leaves a bit to be desired by way of fact: "Can you name me even one time when someone else raced to the Americans in trouble?" If it had not been for the French fleet standing offshore during the battle of Yorktown in 1781, there might not be an America today.

PAUL F. PREUSS Boulder, Colo.

Sir / Mr. Sinclair has reminded us that we do have something to be proud of. He has shown that there is more to America and Americans than Watergate, the energy crisis and the dollar.

Americans are proud of that.

MAYNARD POGUE Lincoln, Neb.

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