The forgotten generation

Re “Just give me the keys,” Opinion, Oct. 13

There is one generational difference between John McCain and Barack Obama that Russell Baker didn’t mention. McCain offers the last chance to elect a member of a forgotten generation -- mine -- to the presidency.

We went straight from the generation of World War II leaders (Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman, Dwight Eisenhower) and the generation that fought the war (John F. Kennedy, George H. W. Bush) to the baby boom generation (Bill Clinton, George W. Bush), skipping over the Depression babies and World War II children.

We were the generation of the baby boom’s cultural icons (Elvis) and the generation that built and traveled on the spacecraft that went to the moon, but we never had a president who was one of us.

Now, if Obama wins, we will have a president too young to remember Kennedy.

Jim Mentzer

Los Angeles

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With all due respect to Baker, Sarah Palin is not the next Richard Nixon. President Nixon at least had a solid grasp of foreign policy and the workings of government. Palin is more reminiscent of another obscure governor with limited experience and questionable ethics. Sarah Palin is the next Spiro Agnew.

Imozelle McVeigh

Chula Vista