Conniff on dems.

As always, I appreciate the analysis from Ruth Conniff, this time on Democratic election potential ("Fading Passion," August issue). However, the situation for the Democrats is worse than she suggests.

The Democratic Party, in its quest for a middle ground and in order to offend no one, has surrendered most of what it ever stood for in my lifetime.

Once it was the party of the working people, supporting the common people over corporate money.

Once it would have supported civil rights against all attacks.

Once it was a friend of environmentalists.

While it has a mixed reputation in regard to militarism, it once was a place where voices of pacifists and those supporting international law at least could be heard.

All that has been abandoned as Democrats help Republicans dismantle social protections, support Republican efforts to attack the Bill of Rights, remain mostly silent on environmental issues, and become just as militaristic and xenophobic.

Probably Democrats have fallen into political mediocrity because they have sold themselves to the same powers that control Republicans: corporate money and lust for partisan political power at the expense of truth. If the Democratic Party is once again be to a political power, it must return to abandoned ideals and free itself from its current masters.

Barry N. Bishop

Lewisburg, Pennsylvania