PUBLIC FORUM SELLING YOUR PRIVACY.

The California Public Utilities Commission has now given permission for Pacific Bell to give out your personal and private information from their reverse directory. They will gladly give your name and addresses to anyone who wants it for a 95-cent fee per call - stalkers, potential murderers, process servers, private detectives, gangs, you name it.

And Pacific Bell is going to come out ahead either way because as you know, if you don't want to be listed in their telephone books you already have to pay a fee for that. Now you are going to have to pay a fee not to be listed in their reverse directories as well. Anyone who values their privacy at all should contact the California Public Utilities Commission and raise hell, just as we had to do back when the banks and other financial institutions tried to get away with sharing your personal, financial and medical information with anyone who wanted it.

- Graydon Wayne

Santa Clarita 

Our urban forest

Re Dennis McCarthy's column ``Tree-bulations'' (Oct. 12):

Tree topping is akin to pouring motor oil down the sewer. This should have been the focus of McCarthy's column instead of Murray Kay's impatience and ignorance of the law.

The goal of Street Tree Division's notice to Kay is to protect our urban forest. Kay is only being asked to clean up and replant one tree he destroyed, a large public tree that will take a generation to regrow. I commend STD staffers for getting done their job in this situation. We all need to be more careful with our street trees, and beware the overzealous chain saws.

- Angela Liu

Los Angeles Community Forest Advisory Committee

Embarrassing

I always admired Hillary Clinton and I hope she wins her senatorial race. However, I disagree with her denunciation of our country not vetoing an anti-Israel resolution in the United Nations.

As an American, I am continually embarrassed by our presidents, Democrat or Republican, always helping Israel in the United Nations even against many of our friends in Europe or elsewhere. This has got to stop.

- John F. Mendez

Los Angeles

Only one choice

You have only one choice for president if you think government is too big. Reagan talked the good talk, and Clinton got re-elected by stealing the Republican Contract with America and promising the end of big government.

But government keeps getting bigger. Bush and Buchanan want to make it much bigger, while Gore and Nader want to make it much, much bigger. Harry Browne, the Libertarian candidate, wants to get government out of your life. He thinks you know best how to spend your own money. That you should be free to enjoy yourself, take care of yourself and defend yourself.

- Bruce K. Bell

Thousand Oaks

A good representative

I like Joe Lieberman. I think he's a pretty decent man. If he were running for president, I would probably consider voting for him. But he's not. I do not like Al Gore and like George Bush even less. It is extremely rare that I can say that I like a politician. Who really can these days?

I can, though, with complete sincerity, say that I like Ralph Nader. I am not on welfare or filthy rich so neither of the ``two'' parties really connects with me. I feel that Ralph Nader is a good representative and advocate for the average working American.

- Steve Medina

Canoga Park

Buchanan's objective

Re ``Provocation is Buchanan's only objective'' (Viewpoint, Oct. 15):

It was heartening to read that Pat Buchanan is trying to do something about America's immigration problem.

- Eileen Guthrie

Arleta

Bush's priorities

George W. Bush, when speaking of his Texas Patient Bill of Rights, forgot to mention that although the bill was passed twice by the Texas Legislature, he vetoed it. It became law the third time around by virtue of the pocket veto.

Secondly, although children desperately needed the Children's Health Insurance Protection plan, Gov. Bush did not think it important enough to meet in special session as he did when he opted for a big chunk of money to go to the Texas oil companies who were at that time experiencing a recession.

- Sydell Stokes

Valencia

Gore's character

I was very grateful for ``Gore may be tripped by his debater tricks'' by Thomas Sowell (Oct. 20). The article reports that Al Gore was caught lying in the first debate and he openly admits it. How can we trust a liar to be the leader of this nation?

You can determine the character of a man by his life. When Gore was in Congress, the National Taxpayers Union voted two times that he was the biggest spender in Congress. Would you like a liberal spender and sky-high taxes? I hope not.

- Bruce Arnestad

Tujunga

Yet another law

Another brilliant idea of Councilman Mike Feuer: First he wanted to fingerprint anyone purchasing ammunition in Los Angeles. Now I buy my ammunition by Internet, mail, phone, or fax. Now Feuer wants to fingerprint law-abiding citizens who purchase guns in Los Angeles.

I suppose the 15-day waiting period and federal background check are not sufficient. All those thousands of criminals supposedly already prevented from buying guns - but never prosecuted under existing laws - will now be taken care of by Feuer's latest brainstorm. This law was designed to do only two things: harass law-abiding gun owners and drive all gun sellers out of the city of Los Angeles.

- James F. Glass

Chatsworth

Just makes sense

Re Mike Feuer's proposal to fingerprint gun buyers:

Many banks now require a thumbprint from noncustomers to cash a check in order to prevent fraud and forgery. Banks understood how easily criminals obtain false identification to cash other people's checks. Statistics show that banks that require fingerprints have seen the number of bad checks drop by an average of 60 percent. Criminals don't want to leave a trail of evidence.

A criminal who uses false identification to obtain a firearm, puts people in danger of losing something far more valuable than money: their life. It just makes sense to fingerprint gun buyers to help prevent guns from into the wrong hands.

- Sheila Goldberg

Venice

Texas death penalty

I must take umbrage with a couple of letter writers responding to the well-written article on Bush's execution record in Texas: ``Bush unfazed by executions'' (Oct. 18). I believe they missed the point of the essay. It wasn't a bleeding-heart liberal response to the death penalty in general nor was it meant to pit victims' moms against the criminals' moms.

The issue was whether or not all legal means of defense were afforded the condemned, and the essay raised the question that it isn't always so in Texas. I thought this country was about ``innocent before proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt'' and that each human being in this country was due a fair, competent and zealous defense if accused. That is what is in question in Gov. Bush's ``compassionate conservative'' state of Texas.

- Glenda Chism-Tamblyn

Glendale

Isn't doing the job

Re ``Garcetti and Cooley trade barbs'' (Oct. 20):

The article stated that as Gil Garcetti defended his efforts to increase child-support payments from deadbeat parents, Steve Cooley said, ``The fact is Los Angeles County is 58th of 58 counties.''

This is outrageous and the public needs to know, loud and clear, that Garcetti isn't doing the job. L.A. simply cannot re-elect this man. Our children deserve better.

- Gayle Brennan

Woodland Hills