As a LIBERAL (and proud of it), I would like to respond to the letter by Lee Price (Collegian, Feb. 21) in which he accuses "liberals" of being hypocritical because they support Eastern Europe's attempts to become democratic but do not support the Contras in Nicaragua.

Although I can't speak for all liberals, I would like to offer my views on this matter.

As of this writing, political elections in Nicaragua are just a few days away. The last elections were held in 1984.

In this election, the Sandinista party won the presidency and 61 out of 96 seats in the General Assembly. The Communist party only won two seats in the Assembly.

According to most reports, this election was not fraudulent. My reason for opposing our attempts to overthrow the government of Nicaragua is that I believe the Sandinistas were freely-elected by the citizens.

My political position is self-determination. I believe the people of every nation must be allowed to choose the type of government they want: socialist, capitalist, communist or whatever.

The type of government I prefer is irrelevant to this issue. By believing in self-determination I am not being hypocritical if I support Marxists in one country and Capitalists in a second country.

Other people support democracy when the citizens elect capitalists, but try to overthrow the government if socialists are elected. As far as democracy is concerned, this is the hypocritical position.