Your article “Why Iran Is Driving Oil Up” blames high oil prices on the leaders of Iran (May 15/May 22). But it is not Iran that has been destroying Iraq. It is not Iran that is threatening war. If America would keep its hands off the Middle East and if Israel would return lands stolen from the Palestinians, things would be much more stable in the region and oil would flow more easily. It is U.S. aggression that is keeping oil prices high. George W. Bush and Co. are known to have good relations with Big Oil.

Willy Van Damme

Dendermonde-Grembergen, Belgium

I find the tone of your piece “why Iran Is Driving Oil Up” inappropriate. Talking about Iran’s addiction to oil money, and likening the regime to a drug pusher who makes the people believe he cares about them, is particularly inappropriate after President Bush confronted the American people about their own addiction to cheap oil. Who is the more addicted? America, which has enjoyed its fix for decades, or Iran, which has seen its oil revenues rise for the first time in a long while?

Claude Richli

Nairobi, Kenya

Your authors state, “Tehran could calm jitters by toning down its nuclear rhetoric.” Are you kidding? Iran has time and again stated that its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes, to generate electricity. It seems to me all the negative rhetoric about Iran’s nuclear program is coming from the West, spearheaded by America. As long as the IAEA has unrestricted access to their facilities for inspections, we must allow the Iranians to pursue their “inalienable right” under the Non-Proliferation Treaty. It is the IAEA’s job to keep countries honest with-in the parameters of the treaty. Was it not George W. Bush who labeled Iran one of the countries of the “Axis of Evil” and then invaded the countries to the left and right of it? Though President Mahmoud Ahmadi-nejad has made statements that make people nervous, it is America’s actions, not just words, that have been the more threatening. The Iranian government may have deceived us before, but this American administration has no more credibility than Iran. Such a negative, contradictory approach will only make Iran more defiant.

Ivan Went

Kuwait

Articles such as this one will just accelerate the process of rising oil prices. If the U.S. is willing to negotiate with oil-rich countries and manage the existing oil-price situation, it doesn’t help to call legitimate leaders or representatives of those countries “reigning princes,” “dictators” or “populists.” And it is strange to hear that other countries must invest in oil production because of growing demand in the States, China or India. Why should anyone take his own money from social-welfare programs and invest it to cut down the price of oil? Oil reserves are limited by definition. The right approach would be to decrease demand or negotiate with the producers constructively.

Roman Yarilov

Almaty, Kazakhstan

In the past several months, the world media have focused on the leader of Iran. But this will only help him to bask further in his self-aggrandizement. Armed with a vast reserve of oil and its skyrocketing price, he seems to be encouraged to indulge his game of nuclear intimidation. But the West seems to be playing into his hands instead of mitigating the influence of oil by ignoring his rhetoric. If we manage to find feasible alternative energy sources, who cares if oil hits $100?

Zi Zenn

Sydney, Australia

Instead of worrying ourselves sick with doomsday prices and predictions of their political fallout, the United States should educate and wean us off our oil dependency. The price of oil wouldn’t matter if America’s fleet were powered by alternative fuel sources. Without the power of oil, Hugo Chávez wouldn’t have an upper hand with which to slap us around, and we could negotiate with Tehran. Alternative energy could make America self-sufficient.

Daniel Benjamin

Jacaltenango, Guatemala

The subhead on yet another of your Good Life features (“Going Places,” May 15/May 22) asks us to ponder whether certain rich individuals with international lifestyles are “citizens of the world.” Since “citizen” implies community participation and service, my answer is an emphatic no. Indeed, throughout the article the word “private” is repeated, since these new rich live a life that is far from the realities of anyplace through which their paths may pass. To assume that a behind-closed-doors attitude to life implies meaningful citizenship in the world is mistaken. Aside from the obligatory puff piece on philanthropy, the image emerges of a class so shielded from reality by their wealth that regardless of their travels, they never seem to leave home.

Matthew Barison

Targu Mures, Romania

Millionaires who globe-trot and feel at home literally anywhere are the order of the day. Spending obscene amounts of money on lifestyles has become a status symbol. It’s sad that today one is not respected for one’s character or conduct, but revered for wealth and how one flaunts it.

K. Chidanand Kumar

Bangalore, India

Your special report is informative but it seems you are unwittingly glorifying wealth. Yes, the rich can jet around to go places, live in posh buildings, have access to luxuries the poor would never even have a chance to gape at. They form private clubs, organize extravagant parties and are oblivious to the mundane outside world. In short, they are a special caste by themselves, praying to the money god. To get rich in the right way is of course illustrious. Unfortunately, that is often not the case.

Tan Boon Tee

Kemaman, Malaysia

I’ve been subscribing to NEWSWEEK for 10 years and never thought I’d stop. But your cover story about the “New Jet Set” and how the millionaires squander cash without paying taxes is making me reconsider this assumption. This is the lowest point you ever reached (and I thought your special “The Good Life” a year ago had already earned that title). I don’t want to waste my time and money reading how good your “new global nomads” have it. I want informative, balanced journalism. Another of your “specials” on the “good life” and I’ll find myself another magazine to read.

Camillo Beretta

Berlin, Germany

Your July 3/July 10 article “Islam in Office” states, “Since 2001, Islamist parties have made strong showings or won elections in 10 Arab countries (Morocco, Jordan, Lebanon, Turkey, Iraq, Iran, Bahrain, Egypt, Kuwait and Pakistan) and the Palestinian Authority.” You should know that Turkey, Iran and Pakistan are not Arab countries and Iraq can’t be called an “Arab” country even though it is mostly Arab because it has a large Kurdish minority that is not Arab. Turkey is populated by Turkish-speaking non-Arab Turks, Iran by Farsi-speaking non-Arab Iranians and Pakistan is populated by non-Arab, mostly Urdu-speaking Pakistanis. Americans may refer indiscriminately to all Muslims as Arabs, but a majority of the world’s Muslim population, as found in countries like Indonesia, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Iran, etc., is not Arab. And a very large part of the total population, even in the greater Middle East, is not Arab.

Jim Brumby

Via Internet

In “Signs Of Stress: Malaysia Fights Corruption,” (July 3/July 10), your reporter has me saying, with respect to Malaysia’s New Economic Policy, that “the model is a fraud.” The quotation is false. I said no such thing about the NEP and believe no such thing. My conversations with your reporter concerned the narratives of history, race and religion on which Malaysian politics is based, and which I pointed out were often falsely essentialized.

John Pang

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Olivier Roy is among the few French intellectuals with balanced, incisive and progressive views of the “French sclerosis,” (“Seen on the Streets,” April 10/April 17). France’s current malaise could have been predicted years ago by a perceptive observer. As the political, business and intellectual elites indulge in ideological and cultural fetishism, they also incite people to seek refuge in the “Gallic village.” France’s yearning for Descartes’ “tabula rasa” as its ethos is a far cry from the drivers of globalization–liberalism, cosmopolitanism and the English language.

Samad Ramolygrand Bay, Mauritius

Anyone who reads Boris Johnson’s book “The Dream of Rome” (“The Lessons of History,” March 20) should read Jeremy Rifkin’s “The European Dream.” They’ll find out that the EU has a “great idea to sell of what it means to be European.” The European Dream can’t be built in a decade after centuries of internecine strife. To create a political and economic entity out of 25 sovereign nations is not easy. Europeans are looking to the future, unlike Johnson.

Jef Westing

Isle Sur La Sorgue, France