Letters To The Editor

Thu., Dec. 21, 1995

SPOKANE MATTERS

Front and center, Park Board

After attending the Nov. 9 Park Board meeting, at which the Pacific Science Center proposal was being reconsidered, I learned volumes about the true state of our pavilion. I have many suggestions, most of which revolve around what I heard there.

Put the Park Board out front and center when discussing this issue. This knowledgeable, committed group of stewards of our park can speak to the following:

1. Inner financial status of the park, i.e., the Carousel gift shop in the pavilion ran over $100,000 in the red in 1994.

2. History of the park, i.e., the pavilion was designed to be a temporary structure for the world expo in 1974.

3. Efforts that have already gone into securing a future for our pavilion. The Pacific Science Center was an answer that generations of Park Board members had been searching for.

The Park Board took the high road during the fall campaign’s mud slinging. It’s time now for the board to take a high-profile, very public role educating our community about what is at stake.

Let The Spokesman-Review take leadership here in providing this forum.

The city was robbed of an opportunity to save our pavilion and enrich our youth. We must educate and communicate from a base of facts, not emotional rhetoric. The science center is not about Seattle elitism, it is about doing the right thing in our community for its future. Susan Hammond Spokane

Hoop-jumping demands intolerable

When is enough enough?

Is it enough when a city building inspector finds eight disability rails in four new toilets to be -inch too low? They were dismantled and raised the -inch. Cost: $1,000.

Is it enough that a city building inspector requires a skilled electrician to dig for two days to uncover underground electrical conduit the inspector had missed on previous trips?

Is it enough when the city building official requires $40,000 worth of earthquake strengthening of a 100-year-old downtown brick building, thus bringing it to a higher standard than the soaring Spokane County Courthouse?

No wonder that with such Little Caesars of authority given control over construction, costs soar sky-high, as in the now-$3 billion tab for a north-south freeway.

The cure is easy. The City Council should instruct City Manager Roger Crum either to demand a return to common-sense granting of waivers or Crum should be replaced. John E. Sonneland Spokane

Meter bad but court wasn’t

A few weeks ago we parked on Spokane Falls Boulevard at about 5:20 p.m. Knowing the meters were active until 6 p.m., we made sure we had change to pay for the time we intended to stay. I found the meter was not functioning properly.

I knew I would get a ticket but thought with an honest explanation the court would not keep my fine. Sure enough, when we returned from dinner a ticket was on my windshield.

Since I had to leave town and couldn’t make a court appointment, I sent the amount of the fine and an explanation about the malfunctioning meter to Spokane County District Court. Within two weeks my check was returned with a nice thank you letter for letting them know the meter was out of order. Tom Berg Spokane

Trolley buses travel light

This being the busiest shopping season of the year, I find it odd that the new trolley buses never seem to be filled with more than three or four people (including the driver).

Eventually, these hundred-thousand-dollar buses will need replacing. I propose they be replaced with green Yugos. The purchase price is lower and they get much better gas mileage. They also carry the same number of passengers.

I will even donate the bell from my daughter’s bicycle for that authentic trolley sound. Conrad Pratt Spokane

THE MEDIA

Man of the year pick predictable

So why are people surprised that Newt Gingrich was selected for Time’s Man of the Year feature? After all, Hitler and Khomeini were selected in their day.

Time’s consistent love affair with the far right of anybody’s political spectrum is only amusing when compared to the equally consistent conservative anti-media tirade.

Does this mean that Rush Limbaugh, Gordon Liddy, etc., will have to say something nice about Time-Warner? And if they do, will they lose supporters? Is it all part of a deeper conspiracy? Michael A. Carter Spokane

Review misses a key point

I’m constantly amazed at The Spokesman-Review’s capacity to spin stories to further corporate agendas. It’s common knowledge that big corporations run the government, yet the Spokesman’s series on the militia avoided citizen anger toward big corporations, focusing instead on attacking “onerous federal regulations.”

Strange how anger the Spokesman focuses on coincides with what benefits corporations.

As a committed environmentalist, my natural allies include independent loggers. We share a need for sustainable communities and ecosystems. We also share a hatred of pervasive corporate-government collusion. We’ve both seen big corporations destroy things we love - our homes and livelihoods.

Recently, a long series of conversations with a timber worker culminated in him saying, “We have far more in common than either has with Republicans, Democrats or big corporations.

Corporations use newspapers to keep us apart, because when workers and environmentalists come together, companies won’t be able to exploit workers or forests. I’ve encountered that sentiment often, yet the Spokesman ignores it.

Independent loggers I’ve spoken with, who resent Plum Creek and Boise Cascade even more than I, feel as I do that environmental regulations don’t protect forests. The big companies, they say, ignore regulations or get their pet senators to write laws exempting them. The Spokesman ignores this sentiment.

We who care about our community know that communal and ecological sustainability can only be achieved when distant forces, such as big corporations, are no longer allowed to exploit us. Derrick Jensen Spokane

PEACEKEEPING MISSION

Bosnia not worth sacrifices

President Clinton has decided, despite the objections of the people, to send 20,000 American troops to Bosnia at an estimated cost of $2 billion.

For what? A “peacekeeping mission” to support a treaty reluctantly signed by the three parties involved and probably sweetened by secret promises of future U.S. aid.

He tells the nation that we can’t stand by and watch countless atrocities taking place in Bosnia - children dying of starvation, killing in the streets, etc. These are the same atrocities the factions involved have been committing for centuries.

If he had approved lifting the arms embargo two years ago, some of the more recent atrocities might have been avoided.

President Clinton, I suggest that you look out the White House window at the District of Columbia slums and those of New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, etc. Children are hungry and abused. There is killing in the streets. Lives are being lost to drugs, disease and despair. We have a higher percentage of our population in prison than any nation on Earth, and crime is at an all-time high. If we are going to spend $2 billion we don’t have, let’s spend it at home.

Bosnia is not a threat to our security or this country. It is not worth a single American life. Mark Lou Prentiss Coeur d’Alene

U.S. too broke to promote peace

According to figures available at the local library, an American born today will have to pay out almost $190,000 during his or her lifetime just to finance the government debt. Last year we paid out an average of $800 per person just to finance the interest on the national debt.

The 1994 elections swept into office a majority of Republican candidates who promised to reduce the size of the federal government, balance the budget and return power to state and local governments. President Clinton and the Democratic Party’s approval rating was at an all-time low.

President Clinton decided to divert attention to a “crisis” in another part of the world, knowing that Americans historically support their troops. Now he is sending 20,000 American troops to support the Bosnians’ fight with the Serbs.

We cannot afford to send troops to Bosnia. We cannot afford to have 27,000 American troops in Japan. We cannot afford to have our young men all over the doggone world for any reason, because the United States is up to its eyeballs in debt.

We have troops all over the world to “promote peace,” but we cannot afford it.

Let’s put our own house in order first. For instance, let’s rebuild the inner cities of Detroit, Chicago, Pittsburgh, etc., before we move across the oceans. Donald B. Morrison Spokane

GOVERNMENT AND POLITICS

Speak up for world’s children

On Dec. 11, UNICEF released its State of the World’s Children 1996 Report, marking its 50th anniversary.

This remarkable organization was originally created to help children in the ruins of World War II. Half a century later, UNICEF focuses again on the plight of children caught in war throughout the world, emphasizing the need to give them protection and priority in these situations.

Congress has also acknowledged the importance of the welfare of children. During a time when Congress has cut the foreign aid budget by over $1.5 billion, it has protected funding for lifesaving child health programs, including child survival and UNICEF. These investments will save millions of children’s lives and protect the health of tens of millions more.

If you also support these efforts, contact your congressional representatives and senators to ensure that these commitments to children are fulfilled in 1996. Andrew W. Lee Walla Walla

Shutdown just smoke and mirrors

I read in The Spokesman-Review where the government is going to shut down again and furlough 260,000 workers. Why are they pulling that stuff on us?

The last time the government furloughed workers it still paid them. So what is it going to do this time, give them a paid Christmas vacation? I resent that. I wish the American people would wake up and I wish the news media would help us. Anthony A. Di Biase Spokane

Seek a Southern view of history

A fellow Southerner brought my attention to your cartoonist’s drawing of Dec. 15. Having learned long ago to not be affected by the misinformation set forth by biased elitists of the media, I do feel compelled to respond in this case.

It is quite popular of late to depict the Southern Cross, known more commonly as the Confederate Battle Flag, as an emblem of racism and hatred. Presently in the South all things Southern are under attack by the politically correct forces of Washington, D.C., and their unofficial propaganda agency, the media, as evil symbols of oppression. The South has even been likened to Nazi Germany and has been vilified by liberals since 1860.

What else is one to think when the only history available on the War for Southern Independence (Civil War) was written by non-Southerners or reconstructed Southerners?

Those who still believe Southerners are hateful beings whose ancestors fought 134 years ago to preserve slavery, please assume an objective stance and read books such as “The South was Right!” by James and Walter Kennedy, or view such videos as “The South Speaks Out” by Charles Lunsford.

As you have heard only one side of the story, these will give you a Southern viewpoint to enable you to reach a more impartial understanding of what really caused the Civil War and the results that have brought us all to where we are today - under control of a centralized government bent on destroying the middle class. Jeff L. Rice Spokane