PUBLIC FORUM TERROR AND HORROR.

Re ``Bracing for terror,'' (July 23):

Terror indeed. The terror you depict on your front page article is a church picnic compared with the horrors experienced by millions of the powerless for whose sakes these demonstrations will take place. The panic of a parent with a sick child and no medical insurance or money; the despair of an abandoned wife and mother left with no money or job skills; the anxiety accompanying DWB (Driving While Black or Brown); the dread of a senior citizen facing being placed in a nursing home; the disillusionment, especially by the young, of a once-vaunted democratic government now operating as a corrupt plutocracy.

No doubt you can add to the list of horrors.

Frederick Douglass wrote, ``Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet deprecate agitation . . . want crops without plowing up the ground; they want rain, without thunder and lightning. Power never concedes anything without a demand; it never has and it never will.''

- Jan Holle North Hollywood < Knife control

Another vicious stabbing, how many does that make now in the last few months? (20 or more). What we meed is a ``knife control bill.'' Anyone that buys a knife over one-quarter-inch-long should have to have a five-day waiting period for an FBI check, a thumb print, psychological background, a felony record, etc.

Think of the votes that this will get me when I run for councilman.

Let's stop the stabbing.

- Sam Troutman Los Angeles < Wake up

Recently, five children and two adults lost their lives in a violent way. In Pico Rivera, a father and three of his children were stabbed to death. The mother was severely wounded. In Glendale, two teen-age boys were bludgeoned to death. And in Rialto, a 72-year-old woman was clubbed to death. In all of these terrible slayings, a gun was not used. How can this be? The media and anti-gun groups are telling us that the problem is guns.

They refuse to admit that the problem is much bigger than that. It's a lot easier to blame the gun than face the reality that society is becoming more and more violent. Wake up America. It's not the gun.

- Daryl DeCrow Moorpark < Campaign finance game

Campaign finance corruption contributes to voter apathy. State lotteries raise enormous sums. Reality programming grabs huge television audiences. Let's change the election system accordingly. No more voting. Conduct the campaign on regularly scheduled telethons during which candidates and celebrities pitch for dollars. Winners are those who raise the most money.

Every contributor gets an entry number, with frequent drawings for cash prizes. The benefits: Politicians no longer have to pretend that they haven't been bought and paid for. And, a giant upsurge in participation - everyone can win and watch winners in the grandest game show of all time.

- Ira Skutch Sherman Oaks < Estate tax

Stephen Oakey (July 28, Public Forum) can insult me by inferring people like me are the reason President Clinton got elected, but that only negates their arguments. People who have valid arguments do not need insults, as their ideas stand by themselves. If he had done any research he would know that only 3,000 families will benefit from ending the estate tax.

The majority of these people do not pay any taxes during their lifetime because of special tax shelters, the best lawyers and accountants - and last, the ability to buy politicians. Are you one of these families, Oakey? If so, then I can understand why ending the estate tax is good for you.

- Marjorie Eisenberg West Hills < Another misreading 

Dick Denne (``Man's stupidity,'' July 28) presents another misreading of history. If man created God it was to justify ethical behavior to a people who are not inherently good. Hitler and the Nazis were Christian by ``race'' only. The Nazi movement was in no way Christian. The Nazis and the Communists were indeed run by dictators.

It may be that they were not ``secular movements,'' but they were run by people who lacked the belief that there was a higher power to which they had to answer. Only a person who has no one to answer to has the freedom to kill millions. It is not man's stupidity. You must be brilliant to engineer such evil. But you must first be evil.

- Neil Barembaum Burbank < Fails to support

Re ``Man's stupidity,'' by Dick Denne (Public Forum, July 28):

Denne concludes that man created God in man's image to rationalize man's superstitions. He, however, fails to support his alleged ``historical fact.'' The United States is one nation under the ``laws of nature and nature's God.'' The founders were influenced by John Locke, who stated `` . . . those are not to be tolerated who deny the being of God. Promises, covenants and oaths, which are the bonds of human society, can have no hold on an atheist.'' The great lies of socialism, both National and Soviet, confirm this.

Referring to Nazis as Christians is a gross distortion. Their credo was expressed by Gen. Erich Ludendorff: ``I decline Christianity because it is Jewish, because it is international and because, in cowardly fashion, it preaches Peace on Earth.''

- Gary Inbinder Woodland Hills < Research shows

Thank you, thank you, thank you, for printing the disgusting truth, ``Pain may make preemies more sensitive,'' July 28. A study using painful trauma on newborn rats by National Institutes of Health researcher M.A. Ruda reveals many painful procedures, including countless needle sticks, breathing tubes and even surgery, show that ``These animals later were more sensitive and had a greater response to pain.''

Sticking a newborn rat with a needle is comparative with sticking a human baby with pencils or pool cues - now add countless times. Being educated on what humans do to animals, I have come to the conclusion that humans don't deserve a cure.

- K.Z. Konar Granada Hills < Abortion ruling

There is no doubt that the human fetus is alive and growing from the moment of conception, yet the U.S. Supreme Court passed abortion until the day of birth. Can we really pledge that we are ``one nation under God'' when his commandment says, ``Thou shalt not kill!''

Thank God for George W. Bush and Dick Cheney!

- Lorna Limpke North Hollywood < Valley voiceless

I was outraged to read that Los Angeles Superintendent Roy Romer was planning to hire Howard Miller and Ramon Cortines as consultants at $300 per hour each. Correct me if I'm wrong, but, when Romer was hired, they said he was so well connected with politicians in Sacramento, ``If anybody could turn the Los Angeles School District around, it would be him.''

So, why does this miracle worker need help from two overpaid former administrators, who will be laughing all the way to the bank? Why don't we have Caprice Young pay their enormous fee from her pocket, for the smooth transition? Once again, we, the taxpayers, will not get a voice in the matter.

- Ventura Alcantar Sylmar < The backup plan

Gov. Gray Davis is telling us to vote against school vouchers. I'm sure the governor and his advisers have a backup plan in the event private school families begin sending their children to public schools; draft college grads to resolve the teacher shortage, build more Belmonts and conscript book publishers to fill the textbook shortage.

- Richard Promen Tarzana < Unsafe headlights

Re story on tinted windows:

The police safety crackdown should not only be limited to tinted windows, but also include the new blue-bright headlights.

Not only are the extra-dark window tints dangerous to law enforcement, but disconcerting to other drivers. The new blue-bright headlights are blinding to oncoming traffic, and should be recalled and made illegal, too.

- C. Ljungberg Woodland Hills