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New Republic
1220 19th Street, NW
Washington, DC 20036

To the editors:

	Frank Sysyn asks about the National Council of Churches acceptance
of Soviet claims of religious freedom, ``Is the problem merely one of
lack of information?'', but he doesn't quite answer it.  In my opinion
the answer is no.  The problem is extreme partisanship in American
politics that leads to the attitude that the enemy of my enemy is
my friend.  To oversimplify somewhat, they hate Reagan so much that
they'll take almost anything from Gorbachev.

	This attitude is the classical precursor of treason, e.g. Ezra
Pound hated Roosevelt, although very few take the final step.  The
cause of the doom of the Britons was one side calling in the Danes
to gain an advantage in a local war.