Madam, - There can be little doubt that many Irish people believe President Bush is a warmonger and a threat to the global environment. It is likely they will make their views known when he visits this country in June.
The central point of your Editorial of March 3rd suggests that if people must protest they should do so quietly, in case US business sentiment is upset. This tendency to elevate profit above principle is not new in Ireland.
In 1973 an Irish Government decided not to protest to Libya over its shipments of arms to the IRA in case it would threaten potential business deals.
Similarly, in 1988, another Irish Government was happy to do business with Saddam Hussein's administration despite the knowledge that he had murdered thousands of his own citizens using chemical weapons.
To paraphrase St Augustine: Lord, make me a principled defender of human rights, but not just yet, not while there's a profit to be made. - Yours, etc.,
ANTHONY SHERIDAN, Carraig Eoin, Cobh, Co Cork.