Letters To The Editor

SPOKANE MATTERS

Say no to Hot Network

Starting Aug. 1, AT&T Cable Services plans to market to the Spokane area its hard-core pornography channel, Hot Network. This X-rated product is so graphic that other cable operators like Time Warner, which is no paragon of virtue, refuse to carry it!

Coincidentally, Spokane has begun a marketing effort to change its negative reputation. The perception exists that Spokane is another refuge for serial sex offenders, to whom pornography use fuels violence toward women and children. In my opinion, pornography is an addictive behavior that requires increasing levels of graphic content to satisfy the consumer.

This city is home to more than 1,400 registered sex offenders. Even for noncriminal consumption pornography invites unrealistic and false expectations, thus negatively impacts families and relationships. It is said to be kin to adding an outside sexual partner, competing with spouses within their own homes.

Spokane must not allow the bar to be lowered in a city which struggles with so many other problems: drugs, anemic economy, crime and high levels of felons in the population. It is only smart business to tell the world Spokane is working to improve the environment for businesses, workers and their families.

Tell the City Council and county commissioners you believe the community is not legally obligated to allow obscenity from AT&T to further degrade our community, thus endangering our families, women and children. Mike Carpenter Spokane

Group’s core value is censorship

Penny Lancaster’s group, Citizens for Community Values, should change its name to Citizens for Censorship of Community Values. It’s a much more apt, honest, truthful and fitting name for what this group’s agenda really wants to accomplish. Dennis Adams Spokane

Time to get out grudge mode

So, let me see if I get this right. The city of Spokane will pay up to $560,000 in legal fees to fight the River Park Square garage funding. What will the citizen of Spokane receive for that expense? If those funds had been applied to the garage funding issue would we be in the mess that we are in? (I fully realize that the city’s obligations are far higher.) Would our bond ratings have fallen had we applied the same money to the garage? Could we have avoided litigation by the developer? (The developer certainly carries some of the blame in this mess and could be more altruistic in its role.)

Current City Council members may not like what transpired during prior terms but isn’t that a part of politics?

Constructive politics is far more beneficial that the deconstructive politics the current council members seem bent on. Will Spokane voters continue to endure this kind of politics? Since the new council members took office, how many times would the old Steve Eugster have sued the new Steve Eugster by now?

City Council, it’s time to take a leadership role in this city and get on with the important issues and business facing this community. River Park Square is built. Get over it! Move on! Peter Sanburn Spokane

Odd that West runs for mayor here

As a confirmed Democrat I wholeheartedly support Jim West in his quest for a mayor’s seat.

However, in seeking reasons for him to run for the mayoral position in Spokane, I can’t find much to justify this run. But I’ll keep looking.

West seems to have done more for the Seattle area and that is where I would support his efforts. The Seattle area owes him greatly for the new athletic stadium, that multi-million-dollar structure its billionaire owner “couldn’t afford” to pay for himself. But good-hearted West didn’t let him down.

Spokane and Cheney have good reason to want West on the other side of the state, especially since his Senate bill (in 1998) to have Washington State University take over Eastern Washington University. Hey, maybe he could run for the mayor’s job in Pullman, as he certainly did his best to expand its school into Spokane.

It did seem rather funny, as WSU’s and EWU’s curriculums are not compatible. WSU deals more with architectural, veterinarian and pharmaceutical training and a minority of its students are from the Spokane area, while EWU is more business oriented and has a large radio and TV school, and its student body is over 60 percent from the Spokane area. I’ll bet they’ll be out in full support of their favorite senator this fall.

I’d really like to list a lot of help that West has given to us here in Spokane but, hard as I try, I can’t seem to find anything.. Andy Kelly Spokane

GOVERNMENT AND POLITICS Bush label is false advertising

Until this political campaign got under way I don’t think I’d ever seen a perfect example of use of the word “oxymoron.” Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary defines it as “a combination of contradictory or incongruous words (as cruel kindness).”

George W. Bush is trying to pawn himself off on the American electorate as a “compassionate conservative.” Webster’s definition of “compassion”: sympathetic consciousness of others’ distress together with a desire to alleviate it. If we examine Bush’s and other conservatives’ political positions we should be able to find the compassion if this term is not an oxymoron.

Is it compassionate to cut social programs for the poor, the elderly and the young in order to give the extremely wealthy a huge tax cut? Is it compassionate to force a young woman to bear a child resulting from incest or rape?

Where’s the compassion in the state putting people to death before DNA evidence has been fully examined? Is it an act of compassion to force elderly people to choose between buying food or overpriced prescription medicines?

Where’s the compassion in always taking the side of the polluters and despoilers of our environment, instead of those seeking to protect our Earth for future generations? What compassion causes the GOP to side with the HMOs and the insurance industry instead of the sick, the elderly, the low-paid workers with no health insurance?

We must conclude that “compassionate conservative” is an oxymoron, at least as practiced by the Republican Party. Greed, selfishness and disregard for the weakest in our society aren’t compassionate. Gail Parke Jr. Post Falls

Assessment of Nader faulty

Fresh from the Association of State Green Parties convention in Denver, I read your July 18 Thomas Oliphant article, “Behold, a Green and faulty premise,” and I disagree.

Oliphant says, correctly, that Ralph Nader claims there is no difference between George Bush and Al Gore. Oliphant then quotes Democrat Barney Frank, listing differences between the two on abortion, gays and guns, and says Nader never mentioned those issues. Wrong. At the convention, before and since, Nader has said he is pro-choice, for equal rights for all and for addressing why our society is prone to violence.

His belief that it makes no difference whether Bush or Gore is elected is based on the refusal of either man to acknowledge and reject the impact of money on the basic structure of our society. Both apparently believe what’s good for big business is good for America and for them.

But too many Americans have no or inadequate health care; too many of us are in jail; too many parents have lost control of their children to commercialization or to drugs; too many are working more and earning less.

Too much government spending goes to weaponry when the world no longer has room for war, to components of a police state when crime is steadily decreasing, and to corporations that no longer provide service and goods for the benefit of customers but exist only to maximize their own profits.

Nader sees these as problems big business is causing and democracy should solve. Lynn Olson Northport, Wash.

Clinton thinks we’re all `too rich’

President Clinton this week stated that he will have to veto the Republican proposed tax cut for married couples as “it favored the rich!” For you readers, I have a simple quiz: Since 1993, The IRS has defined “the rich” as any couple earning more than: A, $32,000 per year; B, $64,000 per year; C, $96,000 per year; or D, $128,000 per year?

Thanks to the Democratic tax increase in 1993, which Clinton later admitted was “too much,” any couple earning more than $32,000 per year must again pay tax on their Social Security as they are “too rich!”

It’s a fact - check it out. How absurd! Pat Kilpatrick Post Falls

Congress should investigate incident

Charles Pope’s July 26 letter about the U.S.S. Liberty incident and Defense Intelligence Agency secrecy is correct. Pope attributes the secrecy to the DIA. However, there is more information that Pope omits.

Apparently, U.S. aircraft were launched from carriers in the vicinity but were recalled before they reached the Liberty. For over 17 hours the Liberty received no assistance from U.S. forces. What official ordered the recall? Why? There’s a lot of information about the USS Liberty incident at http://www.arlingtoncemetery.com/ wlmcgon.htm.

This affair sounds like a lingering scandal that Israel and the U.S. governments are covering up. A Congressional hearing is way overdue. Norman C. Samish Spokane

OVER THE LINE

Wallace image worries not paramount

Re: “Superfund label worries Washington,” (July 21).

Not all citizens feel concern for only their pocketbooks. Many of us are concerned for our health and the health of future generations. Spokane needs to organize and demand that Idaho and the EPA allow their voices to be heard. Our water and land are too big a price to pay for economics’ sake.

Superfund has been successful in many areas of the nation. The Bunker Hill area already was in trouble job-wise because silver prices dropped. That is not the fault of EPA or Superfund. The state of Idaho allowed this mess to happen. We cannot trust it with Washington state interests to clean it up correctly by itself. We need the EPA and the authority it offers under Superfund!

Bill Dire, a Wallace City Council member, said, “Mining built mansions and office buildings in Spokane, yet activists in Washington state are complaining about metals levels in the river that meet drinking water standards.” That’s an example of what Washington needs to address. Should we allow our homes and schools to be contaminated just because this area once benefited from industry? I should say not.

Wallace now has a resolution saying in effect that despite its having a long list of costly Superfund cleanup sites within its city limits, it wants the luxury of not being designated. I’ve got news for Wallace: Your city is already a Superfund site, according to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. Tina Paddock Wallace

Trail neighbors acting selfishly

Re: “Neighbors file petition against trail” (July 25).

The rails to trails plan makes this important and beautiful right of way available to the entire public. Individual landowners who want to grab the right of way land are not thinking of the greater public good. I grew up in Mullan and a safe bike trail to Wallace and beyond will probably take me back to my childhood home for many bike rides. I will be spending precious tourist dollars on each visit. Jonathon Gill Spokane