When did Saddam go from good guy to bad?

When did Saddam go from good guy to bad?
EDITOR:
For years I've been reading and hearing about what a terrible person Saddam Hussein has been, and will continue to be, if something is not done. He has committed mass murder against his own people and the Kuwaitis, suspected of helping to fund terrorist activities over the globe, and is supposedly building weapons of mass destruction.
The United States must not have thought Mr. Hussein too terrible when we armed him and his army against his war with Iran. Unless, of course, we considered him the lesser evil. Then again, we've been known to arm both sides of a Middle Eastern conflict and numerous other ruthless dictator. It's no wonder people over there hate Americans.
As far as I'm concerned, history tells us we have skeletons in our own closet. What have we done to the American Indians, the African Americans, or the Japanese Americans, to name a few? Where is our government's claim of "freedom and democracy for all" when these atrocities continue to occur. Anyone who would allow these types of things to continue and do nothing, are as terrible as Saddam Hussein. The United States is supposed to be an intelligent, moral, religious, and civilized country with a Constitution and a Bill of Rights which guarantees freedom, liberty, the pursuit of happiness, and justice for all. Talk about hypocrisy! Racism, discrimination, and profiling are alive and well in America, sadly to say.
We have built and deployed our own weapons of mass destruction. So what justifies our invading Iraq? If the Bush administration truly wants to avoid a war with Iraq, which would save taxpayers billions of dollars and thousands of lives, it needs to get our foreign policy back on track. Starting with minding and correcting our own country's affairs.
Then it could start a picture and video propaganda program showing what we did when we leveled two Japanese cities at the end of World War II with our own weapons of mass destruction. I'm sure after the Iraqi people are reminded of the level of death and destruction we inflicted, they might take care of Hussein themselves.
It is really quite simple. You leave us alone in our internal politics, peace, and trade, and we will, in turn, leave you and yours alone. If not, you'll get the mushroom cloud! There will be no progressive discipline!
DAVID P. GAILIS Sr.
New Castle, Pa.
Self determination isthe right of all nations
EDITOR:
Everyone wants freedom and economic justice. Yet millions have been thwarted for generations in their efforts to support a socialist form of government which might help them out of their exploited and subjugated condition.
France, Russia, China and other nations fought for socialism when they were desperately poor. Socialism helped them to survive. Now those countries have further improved their standard of living by adopting democratic and free market policies. Even in our country, in the 1930s, when millions of families were desperately poor and jobless our government adopted socialistic programs that provided work and pay for all able bodied workers. Everyone benefited from that government effort.
In our enlightened times the poor of the world surely should have the right to choose their form of government without interference. U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan warned us of a possible tragedy such as 9-11 when he said, "We ignore the plight of the poor at our peril."
JIM HERREN
Canfield