October 6, 2011Dear Sir,Once more you publish the rants of Polly Sawyer. While I applaud the concept of freedom of speech and am pleased that you provide a forum the expression of differing opinions. It is offensive when a person like “Polly” sits on a perch in Southampton, accuses the Progressive Labour Party of arrogance and assumes that they will get away with it because their black supporters will continue to vote for their inability to solve “any of our problems”. Further she says the support will occur simply because they are black. She goes on to assert that the PLP is a party that will never change and will be defined by racial policy, incompetence and lack of leadership and every one of the Ewart Brown “Boys” gets a safe seat. Considering the age requirement of MPs it is telling that to her, they are “boys”. I try to temper my reaction by taking note of the nom de-plume. Why “Polly Sawyer”?Polly Sawyer is a fictional character, the aunt of Tom Sawyer written in the 1870s by Mark Twain. The story is set in the Deep South shortly after emancipation. Polly was a white woman who subscribed to the theory of white superiority and the concept of racial equality was anathema to her. It is perhaps a Freudian slip that led to the selection of that pen-name, or maybe Polly just wants a cracker!I am a PLP member and will continue to support the PLP, not because of ethnicity, but on principle. I am 73 years of age. I have never attended a school or club that excluded any racial group. Can “Polly” make a similar claim? Rightly or wrongly, in 1963 the PLP abandoned a long-serving black parliamentarian (Russell Levi Pearman) who advocated for civil rights and instead ran a white woman (Dorothy Thompson) in what was considered a safe seat. She was embraced by blacks and rebuffed by those with whom she formerly socialised.The PLP attempts to appeal to all. If “Polly” thinks they rely on blacks for support, perhaps she should ask why is it that since 1963 such an extraordinarily high percentage of a particular segment of the population always vote for the party that is not PLP while another segment evaluates platforms and ideologies, and if they choose the PLP they are accused of emotionalism. Her rant is devoid of logic and perhaps distorted by emotion.FAIR COMMENTSandys