California’s overcrowded prisons may indeed be appalling, but Gulags they surely are not (“Gulags in the Sun,” August 15, 2009). First of all, the plural is wrong. At any one place or time, there can be but only one Gulag. More important, the very association of California’s thirty-three prisons, where recent riots made everyone aware of the dreadful overcrowding, with a Gulag is incongruous. Although inmates of Stalin’s prison system included criminals of all descriptions, the notoriety of the system has to do with prisoners of conscience rather than sundry thieves and murderers. And it is safe to bet that California’s “Gulags” can boast of not a single prisoner of conscience. Not one. So, keep your English straight. Strong words have their uses, but they must not be squandered thoughtlessly for the entertainment of the many. For words have a power all their own.