Please help with my LTTE on postponing elections.

[Killarney]

OK, I just wrote this up. It's a little long. Do you think I should cut some of it? Please let me know any comments, mistakes, any way I could make it better. Thanks. :)
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The Bush administration is preparing contingency plans to postpone the election in the event of a terror attack. No US presidential election has ever been postponed before, not even during the Civil War with battles raging all across our country. It may be reasonable to delay elections in a local area effected by a terrorist attack, but there is no justification for delaying the elections nationwide.

The administration and the media keep warning us that terrorists might strike near or during election day in an attempt to disrupt the election in the same way they did in Spain. They keep saying that the terrorists “won” in Spain by changing the outcome of the election. That’s not true. What changed the outcome of the election was that the incumbent administration lied, incorrectly blaming the attack on Basque separatists instead of Al Queda. When the truth came out and the people of Spain (who were largely against the Iraq War to begin with) were faced with the fact that their administration misled them, they did what was right. They ousted that administration. The terrorists did not win, the people of Spain did.

I believe that the Bush administration would like to postpone national elections in the face of a terrorist attack so that Bush could have a couple weeks of rally cries, tough guy speeches, and 70% approval ratings like he did after 9/11. They claim that the terrorists would like to disrupt our democratic process, but isn’t postponing the election nationwide a disruption of our democratic process? If that occurred, then the terrorists have really won.

Abe Lincoln was urged by some in his party to postpone the election of 1864 during the Civil War, but he refused. He said, “The election is a necessity. We cannot have a free government without elections; and if the rebellion could force us to forgo, or postpone, a national election, it might fairly claim to have already conquered us."

I agree.

[R3dD0g]

1. Word count is 327.

My local paper restricts to 250 or less. So, you should consider quite a bit of blue pencil.

You might mention that in July of 1864, the Confederates got within 5 miles of DC.

July -- Confederate Troops Approach Washington, D.C.
Confederate General Jubal Early led his forces into Maryland to relieve the pressure on Lee's army. Early got within five miles of Washington, D.C., but on July 13, he was driven back to Virginia.

cite: http://americancivilwar.com/tl/tl1864.html

[Killarney]

2. Mine says 250 or less, too.

But I don't know what to cut. It all seems important to me. I really don't want to cut the paragraph about Spain. :(

[R3dD0g]

3. No, the Spain comments are really the heart of the letter

IMNSHO. The repukes have already drummed into the heads of a large percentage that the terrorists won with the Spain action, when the real truth is that the gov't lost because of their lies.

[oldcoot]

4. Send the original to your U.S. Senators and Representative

Check your newspaper's policy and if your letter is too long, you can edit it but save the original. You can send the original (which is very good) to your U.S. Senators and Representative.

[City Lights]

5. Change postpone to disrupt

when speaking of bush's intention. Is a postponement not a disruption? Make this point loud and clear.

In a nutshell, bush wants to disrupt the election to prevent the terrorists from disrupting the election.

Great letter, but it is long. Rules may say 250 words, but letters have a better chance of getting printed if they're shorter.