October 18, 2007 Issue
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Classified Chestnut Hill Local Don't Miss an Issue, Tell us what you see or Winner of Two |
From our readersI’m not one of “those guys” “Why don’t you guys get together and decide on one person to run against Donna Reed Miller?” is the question I get asked most frequently. The answer is that I’m not one of “those guys” running as independents. I am registered and running on the Green Party ticket, which is also running Jacinth Brown Roberts for City Council-at-large and Lewis Harris Jr. for City Commissioner. I filed my nomination papers before the spring election while the Democratic candidates were still duking it out. I believe in and promote the Green Party values of participatory democracy, social justice, non-violence and environmental activism both within and outside of the Green Party. My work on these issues, like the many Green Party officeholders and candidates across the country, took on renewed earnest at the advent of the Iraq war which has starved our cities of needed resources, the publication of scientific evidence of global warming and reports of the widening gap between rich and poor. My campaign continues beyond the Nov. 6 election. Brian Rudnick
Saturday’s sea of purple As one of the more than 200 people who participated in Saturday’s two-mile Walk Against Domestic Violence, I am writing to thank the Lutheran Settlement House for organizing this important event. The beautiful autumn morning began with a press conference that featured deeply moving testimony from two amazing women: one of them a survivor of domestic violence; the other whose daughter, killed by her boyfriend, was a victim of domestic violence. It was so inspiring to see the sea of purple shirts and balloons as we all walked down Germantown Avenue. Forty years ago, domestic violence was a tragedy without a name. Today, thanks to the vital work of organizations like the Lutheran Settlement House, there is help for the many women and children who face domestic violence every day in every community. If you need help, call the Lutheran Settlement House 24-hour hotline at 1-866-SAFE-014 or the National Clearinghouse for the Defense of Battered Women at 215-351-0010. Noreen Spota
Café would keep my business here I hope the parties of The Treehouse Play Café and the various Chestnut Hill committees involved can work through their differences and bring this type of facility to the hill. Currently I am spending a few hundred dollars to send my son to four months of Gymboree classes. The Gymboree is located in Wynnewood, Delaware County, a 40-minute drive away. I would much rather spend my time (and money!) in Chestnut Hill, however I know of no other quality indoor facility in the area. We need more facilities like The Treehouse Play Café and shops that cater to the everyday needs of the many young families in Chestnut Hill, Mt. Airy and beyond. Current shop owners should consider creating ramps alongside their steps to allow access to their shops by the many parents with strollers and wheelchair handicapped shoppers. For example, I have passed by B Monogram shop probably a few hundred times since it opened a few years ago. Though I often stop outside and admire their window display, I have never considered going in because there is no ramp access for my son in his stroller. I realize this would be a costly venture for the shop owners, but I can only imagine what the cost is to not have stroller or handicap access. Though I live just a few blocks away, my money is being spent elsewhere. Jennifer Follo
“Bad rap” dogs The letter by the person concerned with placement of rescued “Bad Rap” dogs [Local, Oct. 11] was well intentioned but very misguided. It is true that some of these dogs can be placed in a military setting when they are under professional handlers and the dogs are strictly supervised. The statement that these dogs can be unconditionally made into family pets is what I find disturbing. These dogs have been breed for their aggressive tendencies for a thousand years and cannot be made into lap dogs in a short time. This is especially true when the dogs have not been socialized with human contact. Homes for these dogs must be carefully chosen to be free of small children and adults with infirmities. It is a false assertion that these dogs are only dog aggressive and not people aggressive. They often have displaced aggression behavior because they are not allowed to exhibit aggression with their “pack leader.” When they are let loose or escape, they often attack people and other animals. Last year, a Mt. Airy resident sent out an e-mail concerning a “Bad Rap” breed of dog that had bitten her husband and the child who he rescued from this dog. The dog was an intact male with a collar and no tags. They had to wait for 10 days to see if the families would need rabies vaccine. For this reason the SPCA will not adopt out dogs of these breeds. People who own these dogs claim that the “Bad Rap” is undeserved and that people are liars who say they have been attacked by dogs. No one makes up reports of attacks by dogs and it is only people who refuse to believe that their dogs can cause harm who are irresponsible and uncaring about other park users. Carmella Clark
Sounds like a very disagreeable person Bravo to Lewis Palmer for his letter [Local, Oct. 11] about Jimmy Pack’s articles. I have never met Mr. Pack and do not care to, but he sounds like a very disagreeable person. He is very good at saying terrible things about people he doesn’t even know, based on a few seconds of observation. The young people in Washington, D.C., whom he found to be so obnoxious were probably just behaving normally, the way you would expect kids to behave on vacation. No matter what anyone does, it’s not good enough for Mr. Pack, who liberally uses words like “idiots” and “morons.” Is that the kind of adolescent language a skillful writer uses? Ann Coulter is the only other writer I know of who employs such crude, unprofessional language to refer to almost anyone who does not agree with her, just like Mr. Pack. I can only wonder what all the people he trashes think of him. It’s a shame they don’t have a megaphone, like Mr. Pack does. I shudder to think what they would say about the Local’s misanthrope. Rebecca Randall
Sleazy photo I have been reading the Local for more years than I care to remember, and I think you have generally maintained very high standards, but occasionally you slip up. In the current issue is a review of the play, “Sunshine,” about a woman who works in one of those sleazy sex shops downtown. The review makes it quite clear what is going on in the play. Did you really have to have such a sleazy, explicit photo of the scantily-dressed woman to go with the article? Can’t we use our imagination? The Inquirer did not use a photo to go with their review of the play. I expect to see this kind of filth in those citywide weekly tabloids but not in the Local. Please keep in mind that the Local is a family paper and there are children in the area who see it. Delores Saunders
Thanks for support on Uganda project I wanted to say thanks for your support of this project in Bududa, Uganda and the school I have been working on for the last five years. The sale went well and besides having fun and meeting the neighbors, we made $504.10. I plan to use it to send boxes of books to Bududa and buy scissors for the tailoring class and also to see if I can buy a second hand laptop for the director. If anyone has a good one they would like to donate or sell cheaply to me, I would be most appreciative. Because of the article that Len Lear so kindly wrote about me [Local, Oct. 11], a neighbor came to my house after the sale with a check for $1,000 from an acquaintance who had read the article in the Local. So really you could say I made $1,504.10. Thank-you all for you support and interest. I will try to keep you posted. Remember, if anyone is interested, the best storytellers in the area, Ed Stivender and Quiet Riot — the Mettler Brothers, will be telling stories for Bududa as a benefit this coming Saturady at 7:30 p.m. in the Polley Auditorium at Germantown Friends School. Besides storytelling, Kozee Mbhele willing be singing. Please come! Barbara Wybar
Riley is terrific I thought the article by Paula Riley [Local, Oct. 4] was terrific. Thank you for doing such a great job and working so hard to get it just right. This whole process of the article about the book and the trunk show has been a wonderful experience, thanks to Paula Riley’s graciousness and professionalism. Betsy Otter Thompson
Genocide of 1915 recognized As an Armenian-American and recent resident of Chestnut Hill, I take this opportunity to express my joy at the news that the House Foreign Relations Committee of the United States Congress has passed a resolution condemning the mass killings of Armenians in Turkey in World War I as an act of Genocide. My parents personally witnessed some of the acts attributed [to], but long denied, by the Ottoman Turks, and the word “Genocide” would have carried little meaning. They knew only that friends and relatives were being killed for the simple fact of their Christian beliefs. My father escaped from the vilayet (village) of Khulu and arrived in the United States in 1916; he soon joined the United States Army and was subsequently wounded in the Battle of the Argonne. My mother left Kharpoot, a small village in the Anatolian plateau, and arrived in the United States in 1921. I would be remiss in not stating her means of survival: she was taken in by a kind Turkish family whose secondary motivation was that she should convert from Christianity to Islam. She held firmly to the former. The figure of 1 million Armenians killed in the Genocide of 1915 is insignificant; one person killed in the name of religious fanaticism is one too many! The fact that 21 members of the House voted against the Resolution (while 27 voted in the affirmative) and the President of the United States campaigned actively against it (citing the red herring of security concerns) is a disaster! The best news now is that the full House of Representatives will adopt the resolution. Alex Bedrosian
Carter should have been executed Word is that credulous crackpot, Jimmy Carter, has declared Vice President Dick Cheney “a disaster” for the country. Next thing you know Mumia Abu Jamal will be calling Pope Benedict XVI a cold-blooded cop killer. That Carter, the oft-outfoxed, in-way-over-his-head, preternaturally naïve, surpassingly gullible, Peter Principle exemplar extraordinaire should be identifying anyone other than himself as a disaster for the United States would be merely risible were it not for the fact that this chidrule’s comments — the more inane and anti-American the better — are gleefully and widely disseminated by the Bush-hating, left-of-Castro, anti-American, let’s-surrender-to-the-jihadists, Vietnam-draft-dodger-helmed American mainstream media outlets for the express purpose of edifying and encouraging this nation’s enemies. Please recall this moron’s response to the Iranian hostage crisis. Instead of ordering US warships to the Gulf and sending in the United States Marines to rescue our hostages and execute the hostage takers, like, for example, every other president in the history of the United States [excepting Clinton, of course] would have done, Carter turned off the lights on the National Christmas Tree and boycotted the Olympics. That really showed them. Fortunately, the country returned to its senses and threw this execrable bum out of office, a punishment that was way too lenient. He should have been court-martialed for dereliction of duty and executed by a firing squad. Can’t we at least pull this senescent simpleton’s passport? Joseph A. Ferry
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