Bob Mason had an interesting column April 10. He asserted that "Its (our government's) main interest is not our prosperity and liberty." He cited as proof, "the crowning event -- the president fires the CEO, and General Motors becomes Government Motors."

You hear such concerns echoed in the community. They should be, they affect us directly.

If you attended a Government 101 class last week, you could have heard about lost revenues at the airport since the corporate jets from The Big Three are no longer coming through. You would have understood the frustration of the Convention and Visitors Bureau with the administration for shining a light on corporate excess that makes businesses leery of sending executives to prestigious resorts like Pinehurst.

We feel the economic issues of the day very keenly here.

But we're being short-sighted.

Only the most strident alarmists imagine that our government wants to be in the auto business. It's no exaggeration to say that without government intervention, there's no General Motors, no Chrysler, no Citigroup, no A.I.G. and no hope of any of that lost business returning any time soon.

The complete failure of these companies and the resulting job losses would bring about a depression that the Rev. Mr. Mason's "little group of patriots in the middle" would be powerless to do anything about.

Nobody cared about excesses when corporations were paying their own way. No one will care about corporate excesses when those who accept government money remove their hands from taxpayers' pockets.

As distasteful as it is to us (and should be) for government to step into car companies and banks, if those companies go under they'll take the country down with them. There wouldn't be much of a middle left for Mason's "patriots."

Kevin Smith

Aberdeen