Letters To The Editor

Wed., April 15, 1998

SPOKANE MATTERS

Don’t divide community by hatred

Re: “Letter rips life on South Hill” (April 9).

To the anonymous letter writer: Why did you feel it necessary to write and distribute such a venomous, hate-filled, inaccurate, anonymous letter?

I grew up on the North Side and frequently made antiSouth Hill comments, but never in a serious or vindictive way. I presently live on the South Side; that is where my wife told me we were going to live. I have found many positive things throughout the Spokane area and I would like to keep building on the positive. Let’s not use hatred or jealously to divide our community any more than it already has been. Many of the people to whom you delivered your letter are solid, hard-working, caring and involved citizens who want the best for all members of our community - you included.

You ended your letter with a quote from George Orwell: “War is peace, ignorance is strength, freedom is slavery.” I can’t say I understand the quote, but it certainly isn’t the first thing I haven’t understood, nor will it probably be the last.

Orwell also said, “A man may take to drink because he feels himself to be a failure, and then fail all the more completely because he drinks. It is rather the same thing that is happening to the English language. It becomes ugly and inaccurate because our thoughts are foolish, but the slovenliness of our language makes it easier for us to have foolish thoughts.” Patrick W. Carroll Spokane

Arena strictly self-supporting

George Nachtsheim (Letters, April 8) gives well-deserved kudos to Kevin Twohig and Mike Kobluk, facilities managers for the city. However, the letter contains an error which must be corrected.

The Spokane Public Facilities District was created to build, own and operate the Spokane Arena and contracts with the city for management. From its inception in 1989, the board has adamantly maintained that this facility should at least be self-supporting. It was never “intended to be subsidized operationally,” as Nachtsheim suggests.

Because of strong support by our community, the Arena, now in its third year of operation, has been very successful, showing a profit each year. The SPFD has used those profits to fund capital improvements in the Arena. The city also receives not only Arena admission taxes but a share of the profit as well.

The SPFD board of directors thanks not only the city and its staff for our continued success but also the community which has made the Arena such a success. Trish McFarland, chairwoman Spokane Public Facilities District board

Car makeovers yield savings

Re: “Cops pick Crown Vic” (March 29).

I read with interest the article on extending the life of police cars. We proposed this to the city years ago but were outgunned by the threat of Ford Motor Co. getting to the city in a negative way.

Savings can be as much as 110 percent of purchasing new (Robert Lund, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Boston, Mass). The U.S. government is the world’s most proficient remanufacturer of high-cost durable goods. Look at UPS, the world’s most efficient parcel delivery service. Their delivery vans last them more than 25 years. I could go on and on. Jack H. Bunton, president RAM Engine, Spokane

GOVERNMENT AND POLITICS

Greedy pols biggest threat to democracy

A while back, House Speaker Newt Gingrich pledged on TV before the entire nation that he would pursue a vote on campaign finance reform. He plainly lied!

As knavishly as the Republican leadership is behaving - so contrary to the will of the American people - you and I won’t be hearing that any GOP politicians in Congress have resigned from their party out of conscience. And that includes our Sen. Slade Gorton, another recognized leader.

I do picture incumbent Gorton listening raptly to his constituents (that is, the special interests with millions of dollars behind them, not noncontributors like Mothers Against Drunk Driving) and afterward bringing about campaign finance reform - in the next millennium.

It’s been reported that MADD can’t get congressional leaders to hear activist members lobby for stricter drunk driving laws, yet those same leaders are out partying with well-paid lobbyists from the liquor and entertainment industry. What clearer evidence does one need that we live each day in a mirage called democracy, not the genuine article?

To voters still wearing blinders: No communists left anywhere in the world pose a threat to our forbears” dream - a government that listens to the people and acts accordingly - as dangerous as the buyers and sellers of influence so near in our Capitol, emblematic of the one “free market” that counts most. S.A. Johnston Spokane

Worse going on than peccadillos

Journalists tell us of a “decline” in our national character because Americans increasingly approve of President Clinton. It’s good to see their concern for at least one moral issue. However, I remember the biblical injunction against straining a gnat and swallowing a camel.

Another moral issue for their examination is the long history of Republicans, going back at least to Joe McCarthy and Richard Nixon’s early days, to tell unconscionable lies about their opponents. None of us takes pride in President Clinton’s sexual behavior. However, the bitterness of his attackers has exceeded all bounds. We are tired of it!

One reason we are tired of it is because it distracts us from the great moral issues that profoundly injure millions of people. First among these is the way American corporations have enslaved Third World workers, while discarding competent, hard-working U.S. workers. Clinton should be called to task for his part in this destructive change.

Moreover, why is there no national outrage over the recent spate of bank and insurance mergers? I thought that kind of mistake was what led to the crash of 1929.

If the Republican Party was indeed the loyal opposition, Republicans would be raising such substantive issues. The real problem we face is that corporate power has, with the Clinton presidency, co-opted the Democratic Party as well as its long-time hip-pocket residents, the Republican Party. At least Clinton has had the courage to take on the tobacco industry. We’ll see how Republicans handle that. Robert M. Stevenson Spokane

Vote principles, not party

When we vote for the lesser of two evils, what are we voting for? Evil. What a wasted vote.

Vote for good principles and principled candidates. That’s what the American Heritage Party, affiliate of the U.S. Taxpayers Party, stands for. No more donkey or elephant - soar like an eagle, the symbol of the American Heritage Party. Mary G. Gurtler Spokane

HEALTH AND SAFETY

Dangerous driver, consider this

This letter is directed to the female driver who smugly blew through the intersection of Washington and Boone on April 9 at 5:15 p.m.

I was waiting at a red light, chuckling to myself as the transit bus resumed its course as the light turned red, obviously illegally creeping through the intersection. As I started to cross the intersection, (remember, this is after the bus cleared the way!) you, in your dark green Taurus, nearly hit me on my driver’s side when you sped through a completely red light and only missed me because I slammed on my brakes so hard the rear seats flipped downward to the cargo-hold position. And you held your head so high through it all. Had I not seen you coming at that last second, something tragic could have happened.

What I really want to know is this: Would you have been able to explain to my toddler children what possible urgency possessed you to put their young mother’s life at risk? Do you have enough money to replace my new Saturn that has only seen 1,600 miles? Imagine you were my mother. How would you feel about someone putting your daughter’s life at risk the way you did mine?

I hope others can, like me, catch inconsiderate people like you before you cause harm. Danni Lee Spokane

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