Undercover Racist?

I picked up a copy of the August 19 Reader today. It’s well known within the African-American community that the Reader is very adverse to and against having black faces in your paper, but to see your cover — “I Don’t Know What They Told You, But This Is Called Hip Hop” — and to not have a black person on the cover. I know hip-hop has crossed over many different genres or crossed over many different boundaries, but we know the origin, and the driving force behind hip-hop is the African-American community. And to not have an African-American face on your cover, it says more plainly than ever, the Reader is a quasi–undercover racist little paper. If you look through it, you don’t see any black faces in advertisements or you’re hard-pressed to find a black face. What do you have against black faces, man? What have black people done against the Reader? So that right there, by you having other than an African-American face on your cover, it just shows that you’re a little undercover racist kind of group, you know? And you need to take that into consideration because the African-American community has noticed that a long time ago.

Name Withheld
via voice mail

Reality By Don Bauder

“Get Used to Unemployment” (“City Lights,” August 19) by Don Bauder is reality. We need to address the reality of our economy to be able to improve it and cope with it. Unfortunately, our politicians are not especially good at this. We need to identify the recent economic problems and address them. Below are some items that should be addressed.

1. The dot-com boom of the late ’90s was exaggerated and produced a bubble.
2. The housing boom between 2000 and 2007 was stimulated by fraudulent loans, and it produced a bubble.
3. Businesses have sent manufacturing and other American jobs out of the country.
4. We now live in a competitive global economy that is no longer dominated by the U.S.

There isn’t much we could have done about number one. If people want to throw their money at speculative businesses, who’s to stop them. I invested in some speculative businesses and can only blame myself for the losses.

There is something we can do about number two. Loans were made to people who could not repay them. Income and assets were not verified, and loans were sold off to others. This one is easy. Anyone making loans should be required to retain 51 percent of the loans they make on a random basis. Then they would have a vested interest in making more secure loans.

There is also something we can do about number three. Not only were jobs sent out of the country, sophisticated equipment and expertise have also been sent abroad. We are in danger of losing our ability to manufacture goods. The government should give tax breaks to companies who retain jobs in the U.S. Unemployment and other government subsidies will cost more.

While there is no quick fix to number four, we need to revamp our educational systems. While everyone should have an opportunity to go to college, not everyone needs to. Students who do not have the academic skills to become doctors or engineers should be directed to trade schools by tenth grade. There is nothing wrong with being a plumber, electrician, or health-field tech. These are honorable professions that will always be needed and cannot be outsourced. This will help to provide direction to young people and to reduce educational costs.

The last and most important is to restore hope for the American worker. This will require politicians to work together for the common good of America. This will require corporations to invest in America and its workers, as opposed to focusing only on short-term profits. Unfortunately, I have no quick fix for this dilemma.

Ronald Harris
via email

Crap Writer?

The article “Look of Death” (“Minor Second”) by Elizabeth Salaam published August 19 about the Spreckels Organ was neither informative, uplifting, or a credit to your publication. It doesn’t take a talented writer to tear down people and make them look bad. Elizabeth Salaam is a “shock jock” wannabe. What about the real story of those people who on a stipend virtually dedicate time from their lives to continue a San Diego great historical tradition for residents and tourists alike every Sunday at 2:00 p.m.? I wonder how Elizabeth Salaam sleeps at night after her hurtful and negative wording. The Reader will not make friends with articles like this. Can your publication continue to support such a crap writer? I suppose since your publication is free people can expect to get what they pay for. Elizabeth didn’t even get the names of the music right!

Kerry Bell
via email

Slaves Of Sin

Letter writer John Pertle (August 19) was correct in saying that the total depravity of mankind did not originate with John Calvin. This non-biblical idea was invented by Augustine of Hippo around AD 400. Calvin only repeated it.

Jesus taught us in Matthew chapter 18 that all children are born into this world in innocence and humility. The Lord said in chapter 7 of Isaiah that it is when a child grows older that he begins to learn evil ways.

If all descendants of Adam are totally depraved, then what about Jesus? We know that He was without sin, yet through His mother Mary, He was the direct descendant of Adam, as were His ancestors David, Jacob, and Abraham. Jesus, as the Seed of Abraham, disproves this doctrine.

It is in Pertle’s own reference to chapter 6 of Romans that Paul told us we have a choice. We can choose to practice righteous obedience, or we can choose to be slaves of sin.

Pertle was also correct to point out Tim Tiffany’s hypocrisy (“Sheep and Goats,” August 5) when Tiffany studiously ignored the biblical passages that describe hell. Yet, Pertle is guilty of the very same hypocrisy by ignoring all the Scriptures that contradict his own particular doctrine.

Yes, belief in Jesus Christ saves us by the grace of God. But to imply that faith is the only thing required of us misrepresents the Word.

The Hebrew writer said in chapter 5 that Jesus provides eternal salvation to those who obey Him. John told us in chapter 20 of Revelation that we will all be judged by our works.

Jesus Himself said in Matthew chapter 7 that those who just say “Lord, Lord” will not enter the kingdom of heaven. We must actually do the will of the Father to enter.

What is the will of the Father? One of His requirements is, again, in Pertle’s reference to Romans chapter 6: we must be freed from sin by being buried into the death of Jesus Christ through baptism.

Jim Crooks
Oceanside

Disgusting Face

I’m in Del Mar for the meet, and somebody here picked up this paper, and I just think that it is disturbing and disgusting that you would glorify this murderer (“I Have a Habit of Having Things in My Hand,” Cover Story, August 12). I just think it’s actually disturbing. I mean, I cut off the front cover of it because I didn’t want to look at his face. I just think it’s disgusting.

Name Withheld by Request
via voice mail

Wonderful Meth Article

I’m calling in reference to your August 12 issue, “I Have a Habit of Having Things in My Hand.” I read some of the comments by your readers (Letters, August 19). First of all, I don’t think this is a paper for children per se, so I don’t know…you know, even the cover had a guy who looked really scary — I wouldn’t let my kids pick that up and read it.

Anyway, thank you for being so frank and to the point. I’ve been in an abusive relationship with a person who was addicted to meth for five and a half years and just recently had the courage to get out of it. Anybody who’s never dealt with someone who’s addicted to meth has no idea what they’re capable of. This article was wonderful because it does show that. They’re not people anymore when they do that drug; they’re animals, and they usually resort to animal behavior. So I just thank you for bringing the frankness and reality of methamphetamine, or any drug, for that matter, to light.

Carol
via voice mail

Here’s The Solution

This is regarding illegal nuisances described in “Oh, the Language! Oh, the Noise!” July 21 (“City Lights”) and also previous articles about Rock Church.

A segment of SDPD’s neighborhood watch classes used to outline how to enforce one’s legal right to the quiet enjoyment of their property. I’m not sure if Bob Heider’s Safe Streets Now program is still active, but anyone can implement the procedures.

First, gather the aggrieved. Second, appoint a contact person. Third, instruct all aggrieved persons to create a log of every disturbance, detailing the incident, date, time and, importantly, the consequence: how it affected the person, how it made them feel. Fourth, armed with these grievances, the representative informs the offender of them, at this stage naming no names. The representative asks for cessation and informs the offender how many people he or she represents. The rep states that if the problems aren’t cured, each of the grievants is entitled to whatever the maximum is for small claims court — I forget — and notes that each disturbed occupant of a household can sue for that maximum amount. Additionally, the more detailed the aggrieved is (i.e., I was awakened, I couldn’t go back to sleep; I was mad, my blood pressure went up; I was worried and weary at work the next day), the better detailed it is, the more likely the judge will award the maximum in damages. That is, if going to court is necessary. Oftentimes, this approach is sufficient in itself. Only if it’s not do the claimants have to lose their anonymity to file suit.

Other options prevail upon elected representatives, namely your district’s councilman and your San Diego Police Department community relations officer, also entreating the entire city council at one of their meetings during public comments agenda items. There is something about the glitter of television that produces results.

Good luck! Sorry for your pain. Kudos to the Reader for exposing these untenable situations.

Name Withheld
via voice mail

Ahead Of Kepler? Please!

Sunday, August 15, I went to the La Jolla Village to see the movie Agora, which was reviewed by Duncan Shepherd. I quite agree with his statement that the film involved “historical rewriting” when it portrayed Hypatia as trying to understand the Earth’s orbit. The purpose of this letter is to elaborate on this somewhat further, since before my retirement I taught, in addition to physics, the History and Philosophy of Science.

Although all of Hypatia’s writings have been lost, there are references to her work in the writings of others, in particular, her editing the then-existing Almagest of Ptolemy, the greatest work on astronomy of that time, which, however, taught that the Earth was at rest in the center of the universe and the heavenly bodies revolved around it in a complicated scheme of circles on circles known as “epicycles,” designed to handle the apparent looping motion planets make against the stellar background when followed night after night.

This could have been easily illustrated in the film, but it wasn’t. There is not the slightest evidence in the references to her work that have survived that she rejected the Ptolemaic or geocentric scheme in favor of that of Aristarchus of Samos, who flourished in the Third Century BCE, about 700 years before her, and seems to have been the first to propose that the Earth and other planets circled the sun, which eliminated the apparent looping or retrograde motion of the planets.

The movie goes even further than making her an early Copernicus and has her combining her knowledge of the ellipse (a conic section, and she had indeed written a commentary of Apollonius’s treatise on Conics) to anticipate Kepler’s work of the 17th Century that proposed that the Earth and other planets traveled on elliptical orbits about the sun.

Although Hypatia was a truly remarkable woman, a philosopher, mathematician, and astronomer, the movie is going overboard when it has her 1200 years ahead of Kepler. Certainly we want to encourage women to enter science and to hail their achievements in this domain, but since the purpose of science is the finding of truth, the film’s approach is self-defeating.

To be honest, it should have pointed out that in those days, unlike the present, astronomers were also astrologers and that Ptolemy was even more famous as an astrologer than an astronomer. So it is very likely Hypatia was an astrologer as well and may have even cast horoscopes, as did Kepler. But that, of course, would not fit in with the rewriting of history the motion picture industry is so adept at doing.

The movie fails to bring out another talent for which Hypatia was famous — her speaking ability! Many times I could not understand what Rachel Weisz, who played Hypatia, was saying because she was mumbling rather than speaking, ignoring, as it were, the cautionary advice Hamlet gave to the players about “mouthing their words.”

Too much time in the film spent on irate mobs killing one another, when one killing would have been enough: that horrid assassination of Hypatia, which even that they couldn’t do honestly.

Despite all its impressive computer-generated scenes of ancient Alexandria, what the movie finally says is: to hell with history, what we prefer to have been, was.

Frank R. Tangherlini
via email

Thanks For Sewage!

Thanks to the Reader and Bill Owen for presenting “Secret Sewage” (Letters, July 15). Maybe the Reader and Mr. Owen could expand that letter to a story on San Diego’s number one or number two physical issue after sunshine?

This guy thinks water works should be largely implemented by private enterprise with government acting in a regulatory capacity, not more. And in Bill Owen’s worthy, thoughtful letter, he has already presented the proposed story title — imagine, if you will, a cover lead-in proclaiming “San Diego Waterworks — How Long Are We Going to Sit on the Pot of Apathy?”

Name Withheld
Downtown

Eeeeeeek!

Just want to say Chad Deal wrote a very thorough story (“That’s OK, Sir, I Am Authorized to Offer a 50% Discount,” Cover Story, July 8) about current USA health costs for the uninsured. Very good report, and ummmm, it scared the piss out of me! Because I am one of those who is not covered or can’t afford health insurance just now.

President Obama’s health-care plan is years away still for uninsured folks like me (2014). But I have to do something and now! So-o-o-o-o, today I purchased a MexSalud discount card for the MexSalud medical clinic in Tijuana. I kid you not! The offer was $75 for 50 percent discount, and I went for it. What else am I supposed to do, gotta do something!!! Cuz I sure can’t pay the costs that Chad Deal detailed in his informative report. Just no way can I pay those USA prices!

Maybe you could send Chad Deal south of the border to investigate the experience for Americans like me. If Chad could do some cost comparisons like in the previous report, that would help folks like me who are fleeing this unbelievable USA health-care situation. I know they have good doctors in Mexico, and I had to do it today. But what am I in for now?

Thanks, Chad Deal, and thanks to the Reader editors.

Name Withheld
via email

Oh, He’s So Good!

Always passing your paper by — I did pick it up one day and was beyond amazed to read one of the finest writers! I’m very aware of good poets and writers, and I felt I’d found a treasure, hidden in the Reader. So every week I’d anxiously wait. As I still do — but haven’t found John Brizzolara lately and, knowing his story, feel concerned. What a talent!

Also enjoy the “Diary of a Diva” a lot. Amongst all the ads, etc., a good publication. Especially John. Please let him know.

Joyce Huscher
Poway