KEN LAYNE POINTS TO this letter from Tom Waits about corporate use of rock and roll. Waits’ letter is good, though I don’t really agree, but what struck me was another letter further down:

On NPR’s This American Life, a recruit aboard a naval aircraft carrier told Ira Glass she’d enlisted because of a Navy commercial, with a heavy-metal soundtrack by Godsmack, depicting Navy life at sea. Did Godsmack realize that because of their art young men and women signed up for the military? I’ll take the integrity of Densmore and Krieger any day.

PAUL MANN

Give ’em a break, Paul. It’s not like they’ve lured anyone into a life of drugs and degradation or anything.