HOW CAN YOU RUN WHEN YOU KNOW?

James Renner wrote an overall fine article about the very real likelihood of collusion and conspiracy at Kent State in 1970 ("The Kent State Conspiracies," May 3). As an eyewitness to the historic massacre, as well as one of the 13 students shot down by the 67 gunshots fired by the Ohio National Guard killers, I agree with Renner's investigation and general conclusions. However, I want to clarify a few points.

First, Renner is correct to reveal the clear probability that someone (Nixon's COINTELPRO agent-provocateurs?) burned the KSU ROTC building after several inept attempts by student anti-war radicals. However, it is inaccurate to say "hippies started burning down Kent." Aside from the mysterious ROTC fire which destroyed a decrepit old wooden barrack, symbolic KSU anti-war student violence mainly targeted bank windows in downtown Kent three nights before the fatal May 4 military gunfire on campus. Two days of symbolic anti-property violence by anti-war students was then followed by two days of anti-student violence by the Ohio National Guard. Students were slashed by bayonets on May 3 and gunned down by deadly M1 rifles on May 4.

Secondly, as my own memoir will reveal imminently, I was amidst the ineffective, amateurish student-arsonists on May 2, 1970, when the KSU ROTC building was assaulted by many students during the 90 minutes KSU police remained suspiciously absent. However, I say I was not "among the arsonists that night," as your article notes. In fact, no student has ever been identified or convicted as an arsonist after this suspicious incident. Renner correctly indicates the KSU ROTC building burned down in the dark night after anti-war students were finally tear-gassed and chased away.

I admire the determination of KSU grad James Renner, who even tracked down former FBI undercover informer Terry Norman "in the rural south." Terry Norman and other federal agents still conceal the truth about the 1970 Kent tragedy. Someday, hopefully, Renner and the Free Times can contribute further to the revelation of the many crimes committed by Terry Norman, Richard Nixon, James Rhodes and the Ohio National Guard officers who ordered the deadliest student massacre in American history.

Keep up the good work and inevitably one or more of the several 1970 Ohio National Guard Troop G triggermen still living in Northeast Ohio will come forward and admit exactly which National Guard officer gave the verbal command to shoot and kill unarmed students under the noonday sun at Kent State in 1970. This is the ultimate truth we seek. And only the truth can free these triggermen from the awesome burden of history while the blood of our martyrs remains on their hands.

Alan Canfora

Director, Kent May 4 Center

I appreciated your article on the Kent State shootings. I attended Kent State from 1972 to 1976. While at Kent I heard much about the shootings and had the opportunity to talk to several of the survivors. I'm convinced that the National Guardsmen who did the shooting were guilty of murder and attempted murder. Allison Krause was shot several times and Jeffrey Miller was shot fatally in the head. I believe that the Guard especially wanted those two dead. They tried to kill Alan Canfora, but he was hiding behind a tree and survived. There might have been others that they wanted to kill but were unable to do so because they were hiding behind trees or cars in the parking lot.

Whoever gave the order to shoot as well as those who did the shooting should have been in jail since then or executed. One day the shooters and their commanders will be judged by a higher court that saw everything and knows who they are. One day all will know who did what, and the truth will prevail. Judgment day is coming.

Larry Gembicki

Cleveland

WHAT MAKES YOU THINK WE AREN'T BEGGING ON A STREET CORNER?

If it weren't for Republicans selling out and the big-business beneficiaries ("Capitalists' Tools," May 3), you liberal beggars would be where you belong: on a street corner (near a megabank), with a tin cup in your hand! Too bad that can't be arranged!

Fred Taylor

Euclid

BACK TO THE GARDEN

I recently attended a dinner in which George Parras spoke about Rockefeller Park ("The Other Blossom Center," May 10) and the rich history it holds for us Clevelanders. We Serbians are in the process of raising the funds to build our garden. What interested me most was the idea to close MLK to motorized traffic on Sundays in August. What a wonderful idea! Just maybe we would leave our suburbs, pack a picnic basket and enjoy our heritage and celebrate what Cleveland is all about, its people!

Georgine Welo

Mayor, South Euclid

Good essay on Rockefeller Park and the Cultural Gardens. While you focused on the gardens, the entire park needs to be better utilized as Cleveland's living room. Cities around the world have discovered the magnetism of such parks. Why hasn't Cleveland?

When Urban Paradoxes was talking with Glenville residents last spring, we heard over and over again, "Let's make Superior Avenue between East 105th and West Boulevard the western gateway to Rockefeller Park." So far, this has fallen on deaf ears. Again, we need to ask: Why? And while we are at it, why not do the same with Superior from the east? Think Central Park. Think cafés overlooking the park, places to rent bikes, just to mention a few possibilities.

Why are we even having this conversation? It should have happened years ago.

Frank Mills

Urban Paradoxes

I enjoyed your article on the Cultural Gardens. These are, indeed, a special asset that most people in the metro area fail to appreciate, and I am disappointed that they are not given the due they deserve. I found it interesting that the question implicitly asked in the article — why don't more people stop and visit the gardens? — was also answered in the piece. It's not that there's a lack of parking, but rather, there's the perception (and in many cases, the reality) that the Gardens are still a dangerous place. Even people who aren't aware of the Gardens know that "Liberty Boulevard" (for old-timers) or MLK runs through some very sketchy neighborhoods and is certainly not a place to linger after dark. In fact, my wife, who attended Case Western, was told during her freshman initiation by university officials to avoid the place at all costs.

Closing the street to auto traffic, while an interesting idea, is not going to make the area more attractive to people who believe it's a no-go area. What would help? A stronger, more visible police presence, backed by an awareness campaign, would be a great start to encourage people to "get out of their cars." As long as the prevailing perception of the Cultural Gardens is that of a great place to get mugged rather than to enjoy tributes to Cleveland's rich cultural history, closing the street will accomplish little.

Bernie Thiel

Cleveland

CRAZY FOR FEELING THIS WAY

Carol Fisher is entitled under the First Amendment of the Constitution to freedom of speech ("You Have The Right To Remain Silent," City Chatter, May 3). She was putting up a poster announcing an upcoming anti-Bush concert. This arrest is simply an outrage to all citizens. We must speak up and stand behind Ms. Fisher in her actions against this current administration. I think we never, ever, should just "shut up" at the convenience of our government. The polls show that the current administration is down to 31 percent in the opinion polls; it's all the more reason to show our collective solidarity behind Ms. Fisher in her fight for free speech.

We elect our officials in the hopes that they will do the right thing. Obviously this is not the case here. Without the right to free speech, we are slowly turning into a fascist type of government.

Mary McKeon

Margaretville, New York

"REVISIONIST CHRISTIANITY IS A RECIPE FOR GRADUAL COLLECTIVE SUICIDE"

Dan Harkins's hatchet job "Biblical Proportions" (May 10) says the Institute on Religion and Democracy (IRD) wants to "tear left-leaning churches limb from limb." He quotes others saying IRD is "deliberately divisive and sometimes destructive." The IRD follows traditional Christian views. For instance, Christians have disagreed among themselves and with Jews and Moslems on innumerable issues for thousands of years, but they all agreed that homosexual acts were a sin. IRD also follows traditional Christian views in disapproving of most abortions and of the spread of pornography and the sexual coarsening of the media; and in supporting the traditional family. Why is it the traditionalists who are being divisive and not the revisionists who would alter settled Christian values to suit their own tastes? On all these issues most Christians side with the IRD.

Harkins also quotes charges that IRD wants to "increase military spending and foreign interventions, oppose environmental protection and neuter social welfare programs." The IRD's policies do not allude even vaguely to any such goals. Why didn't Harkins say so?

Harkins is right that traditionalists believe that Christianity is true. Why does he treat this as ominous? If, as the bumper sticker sported by liberal Kathryn Huey says, God is too big for any one religion, there's no reason to adhere to any particular religion. This is suggested by the fact, mentioned by Harkins, that membership in liberal churches is declining while membership in traditional churches is growing.

One sees where liberal, revisionist Christianity leads by looking at western Europe. Not only are churches empty, but populations are seriously declining (except as offset by the growing number of Moslems). Revisionist Christianity is a recipe for gradual collective suicide. Is it wrong for IRD and Christian traditionalists to resist this?

George W. Dent Jr.

Professor, Case Western Reserve School of Law