The Editor, Sir:

This is a response to last Thursday's John Rapley column.

Mr Rapley,

Your recent column on the topic of "The new medievalism" was quite fascinating, disturbing and frightening in its analytical accuracy, courageous and sobering. Perhaps your position as a columnist, however, prohibits you from offering solutions or proposals.

As a concerned reader and citizen, I felt deprived that your brilliant insights were not accompanied by any criticism of the State's capacity - or lack thereof - or inclination to respond to such a depressing dynamic.

While revealing and enlightening, your column conveyed a sense of inevitability about the emergence of this new political regime. Is this the case? Are we truly as helpless as a people, community and government as it appears?

I am, etc.,

MARK BARNES

Silver Spring, MD