PUBLIC FORUM COUNT THIS.

Of the mind-boggling 6 million people (two Chicagos) that Southern California is scheduled to add by just 2025, legal foreign migration (``immigration'') would account for about 2.4 million. Well, that profuse 2.4 million is equivalent to 3-plus San Franciscos, or - get this - almost 15 (yes, 15) city of Los Angeles ``planning areas'' the size of Canoga Park, West Hills, Winnetka and Woodland Hills.

So, to our elected members of Congress everywhere who may be reading this: You can go back to sleep now, and try not to dream too much of impending campaign finance reform. Because, like being doused with a bucket of ice water, it could just jolt your sense of job security so much you'll finally have to wake up to your grass-roots voters' demands and actually sponsor, plus actively support, reduced immigration legislation.

- Harvey Pearson

Los Feliz

Negative spin

Re ``Guns, not roads'' (Feb. 5):

Why is it, when there are pros and cons to a story, the negative aspects take precedence over the positives? ``Guns, not roads'' leads the reader to think that our federal government wants to take away road funding and buy guns. Why put the proposal in such a bad light?

We as a country are at war and it is necessary to divert funding from various projects to fund the war effort. It is defense and military spending, not ``guns.'' Why not print the positive aspects first, such as all the jobs that will be created from all this ``gun'' spending? Our roads can wait; our freedom and way of life cannot.

- Bill Stephens

Sierra Madre

Enron disclosure

The General Accounting Office wants President George W. Bush's administration to disclose the discussions held between Enron and the vice president regarding the country's energy plan.

This is the same GAO that published the details of the dam structures and nuclear power plants in the United States among other sensitive subjects. Included in the information the GAO published were their vulnerability to attack, their escape routes, their problems, their load factors and so on and so forth. Not on our watch, GAO, or more to the point, over our dead bodies.

- Francis Jansen

Northridge

Whose agenda?

Jerry Pennington's letter of Feb. 1 (``Eight great years'') says it all. While I applauded President Bush's State of the Union speech, ``strong military,'' ``patients' bill of rights,'' ``prescription drugs for seniors,'' ``protecting workers' retirement funds,'' etc., sounds more like a Democrat.

- Stanley Gold

Van Nuys

Right of return

Re Sol Taylor's ``Palestinian anger'' (Public Forum, Feb. 6):

Taylor's proposal is based on the premise that it's only the Palestinians that wish to drive Israel into the sea. In fact, the entire Islamic world has expressed that as its No. 1 goal. Secondly, it puts the onus on Israel to give up something that's tangible, the real estate that provides a buffer zone against her multiple enemies, in exchange for a mere promise on a piece of paper to end their belligerence.

But the Palestinians also have demanded the right of return for the Palestinian masses that abandoned their homes in Israel proper during the 1948 War of Independence, which would affect the demographics on the ground so dramatically that sooner or later due to the uneven birth rates the Jewish state would effectively dissolve from within.

- Leonard C. Snebold

Simi Valley

Threat to America

Recently enacted in response to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the USA- Patriot Act poses more of a threat to our personal liberty than to terrorists. It is an assault on our individual freedom and on the checks and balances of our federalist system. It expands federal powers of surveillance, search and arrest.

This legislation limits judicial oversight in the gathering of evidence and diminishes the distinction between the gathering of foreign intelligence and domestic law enforcement. It allows these provisions to be applied against American citizens who may be deemed a threat. Has anyone noticed? Does anyone care?

- Ron Cabrera Jr.

Mission Hills

Would have been fun

The Los Angeles Department of Street Maintenance has just finished its improvements on the major intersections along Van Nuys Boulevard. First, the smooth street surfaces were replaced with a cobblestone-type surface, which was then painted with a primer coat of checkerboard green and black.

Now the bricklike intersections sport an earthenware shade of red. But they missed the boat. People are always asking directions to the courthouses, the police station, the library or whatever. How much fun it would be to tell them, ``Follow the yellow brick road.''

- Rick Rofman

Van Nuys

Doesn't look right

Do the people and companies contributing to Mayor Hahn's campaign against the Valley really agree with Hahn or are they giving money so they will keep getting the contracts and permits they need from City Hall? Mayor Hahn's fund-raising practice looks like a quid pro quo to me.

- Tanny Wiggins

Sherman Oaks

Baca's poor judgment

I just finished reading ``The Final Days'' by Barbara Olson. Sadly, this marvelous writer's life ended Sept. 11 in the airplane that terrorists crashed into the Pentagon. Toward the end of the book, she chronicles the events that led to President Clinton's pardon of convicted drug trafficker Carlos Vignali, and how his father`s campaign contributions helped secure this unjustified pardon. One of the players was our own Sheriff Lee Baca, who received $10,000 from the elder Vignali.

As Olson`s tragic death underscores, the terrorist threat to America requires the best leadership possible in our law enforcement agencies. Yet, the Vignali scandal poses serious questions about Sheriff Baca`s judgment. Surely we can do better.

- David C. Wilcox

La Canada Flintridge

Do something

Re ``Smog causes asthma'' (Feb. 1):

Did we really need an expensive ``landmark'' study to tell us that choking smog causes lung problems? Do we need more ``landmark'' studies to tell us that it causes emphysema, promotes cardiovascular disease and probably cancer? Why are there not some things that we can just know and use money better to try to do something about them?

- Ron Presson

North Hollywood

When life begins

This is regarding the Daily News Feb. 1 article on President George W. Bush wanting to expand the definition of a child to include a fetus.

I think it all goes back to trying to decide when life begins. But did they ever consider the fact that ``you'' always were alive? That nothing comes from something that's dead? That is to say that for ``you'' to be alive right now, you had to be conceived from a live female egg and a live male sperm. Hence, ``you'' always were alive.

- Loyal Bruno

West Hills

War's inconvenience

So people think they are inconvenienced today after the tragic Sept. 11 attack in New York? Hark back to the days following Pearl Harbor and World War II. Gas was rationed, tires were rationed, sugar and meat were rationed and silk stockings were nonexistent.

My mother was gladly inconvenienced to become a member of the ``gallon club'' at the local blood bank. I was inconvenienced living on specks of islands in the Pacific and flying a liberator bomber on 600 hours of combat missions. Wars are inconvenient, but when fanatics and power-hungry rulers attack us, we can't just sit on our hands and wait for them to gobble up our great free society.

So tighten up your belts, people. The next time we are free of those who hate us, feel proud that your inconvenience has paid off.

- Rubert Ford

Burbank

Power plants

Mary Rasmussen wrote in the Feb. 2 Public Forum asking Gov. Gray Davis to name the locations of 11 power plants in his TV commercial for re- election.

The plants are as follows: Sunrise, 320 megawatts, Kern County; Sutter 540 megawatts, Sutter County; Los Medanos, 555 megawatts, Contra Costa County; Wildflower Larkspur, 135 megawatts, San Diego; Wildflower Indigo, 90 megawatts, San Diego; Alliance Drews, 40 megawatts, San Bernardino; Alliance Century, 40 megawatts, San Bernardino; GWF Hanford, 95 megawatts, Kings County; Gilroy, 135 megawatts, Santa Clara; CalPeak Enterprise, 49 megawatts, San Diego; CalPeak Border, 49 megawatts, San Diego. Additional information is available at www.energy.ca.gov.

- Claudia Chandler

Assistant executive director

California Energy Commission