Two pieces of similar tenor in the Sun Journal Aug. 2 caught my attention: one by columnist Rich Lowry and one by letter to the editor writer John Wheeler of Bethel.

The Lowry column was a nearly complete misinterpretation of Sen. Kerry’s convention speech.

The truth is that Sen. Kerry would have us work on a basis of real strength in concert with other nations, eschewing completely the go-it-alone belligerent policy of the Bush administration, correctly characterized as “mad-cowboy disease.”

Mr. Wheeler chants the old GOP mantra that tries to make “liberal” as a pejorative; attacks a “redistribution of wealth” incorrectly, since that “wealth” really goes to the top-income 1 percent and the cost of war and weapons is part of irresponsible “borrow-and-spend” fiscal policy.

Neither writer grasps the fact that we and our descendants will be paying the costs of that fiscal policy, that having been made abundantly clear by Sen. Edwards, also.

Richard D. Sampson, Lewiston