Letters to Editor: Goff not weak on Afghanistan

Goff not weak on Afghanistan
I would like to correct Lindsay Schroder's suggestion (16/5/11) that Labour's policy on Afghanistan as articulated by Phil Goff is somehow an indication of weakness.
The Labour government committed New Zealand to support the United States militarily, immediately after the terrorist attack on the Twin Towers.
We were the first country to make such an offer and it resulted in our SAS troops being sent to Afghanistan in a fighting role.
Subsequently, the Labour government sent further support, in the form of a provincial reconstruction team.
Phil Goff, as Minister of Foreign Affairs, was central to the discussions with top United States government officials that resulted in these two military commitments. His role has been publicly acknowledged on many occasions.
One of Phil Goff's nephews died in Afghanistan, fighting as a volunteer member of the United States Army. As was reported at the time, the whole Goff family was deeply affected by this loss. It did not change Phil's support for New Zealand's role.
If Lindsay Schroeder wants to dredge up things that Phil Goff supposedly did in the 1970s, as a young student, he is free to do so. But they have absolutely nothing to do with Afghanistan or the Labour Party's policy on it in 2011. (abridged)
Bill Sutton, Napier
No conspiracy
Hurrah Leonard Poon for championing freedom of choice (Letters, May 9), something parents may not have much longer if the health select committee led by Nikki Turner and Dr Paul Hutchison have their way in six weeks' time. However, a couple of points made by Mr Poon require correction. His driving analogy is a poor one, failing to illustrate the permanence of vaccine damage after just one jab. One can always take a bus the next day.
Given the ease with which most healthy children navigate childhood diseases and the fact that less than 10 per cent of adverse reactions to vaccines are reported to CARM (Centre for Adverse Reaction Monitoring) I would say that Mr Poon's parents and Mr Poon himself have indeed gambled with their children's health.
As regards Dr Andrew Wakefield, Mr Poon should try to keep up with the news: on April 13 Dr Poul Thorsen, the man responsible for the studies which claimed to disprove the association between autism and thimerosal (mercury-derived vaccine preservative), was indicted on 13 counts of fraud and nine counts of money-laundering related to his work on said studies.
And I do think it is pretty rich that Mr Poon suggests Dr Wakefield's work may have been compromised by funding from "anti-vaccine" people, who stand to gain nothing but the truth from such work, as opposed to the vaccine industry which is expected to bring in $35 billion by the end of 2012.
There is no conspiracy here, Mr Poon, just bald financial facts, plain political manipulation and the sad theft of ordinary health intelligence that is (was) the inheritance of all human beings before the advent of privatised science.
Kate White, Hastings