Not-so-thinly veiled attacks
My family moved to La Jolla last August from the Midwest, and my wife and I are regular readers of the Village News as a way to get to know our new community. We are shocked and upset at the number of letters sent in by readers that represent what appear to be thinly veiled attacks of the local Jewish community.
There are obviously controversial issues that happen to involve the Jewish community, namely the Eruv and the student center at Site 653, and in no way would I suggest that anything other than a respectful, open dialogue and debate is the way to address such issues. Many letters take just such an approach, on both sides of these issues.
Rather, I refer to comments in recent letters that refer to Orthodox Jews as “extremists,” or allege that the presence of a certain number of Jews will adversely impact home prices. Other examples castigate councilman Scott Peters for “pandering to the Jewish vote” and suggest that Jews are “amply represented.”
At best, these individuals are ignorant, at worst they are prejudiced. We can only hope that the number of such letters in the Village News is an effort on the part of your paper to present different points of view, even ones with a distasteful tone, rather than a representative sampling of public sentiment.
Part of the appeal of moving to California was to bring our kids up in an environment that was more diverse and representative of the “real world” than that we experienced in the Upper Midwest.
We remain optimistic that the choice of La Jolla as our home will allow our kids to experience the best of San Diego living while also preparing them for the realities of the world they will face in years ahead ” a world that will require open-mindedness, progressive thought and an ability to adapt to change.
Richard Effress, La Jolla

What’s the point?
I read the letter “Tribute to seal intelligence” published in the March 16, 2006 edition of the La Jolla Village News (page 8) and James Hudnall’s comments do not make any sense. First of all, Hudnall admits the paper that Trego refers to in his Guest Commentary makes the observation that harbor seals select isolated haul-out sites.
The Children’s Pool beach is not an isolated haul-out site. Secondly, Hudnall admits that harbor seals are used to the presence of people at the Children’s Pool, therefore, he is admitting that the harbor seals are domesticated to humans. So Hudnall is really admitting the Guest Commentary is correct in its content. What is the point of his letter?
Don Perry, La Jolla

Seal sanctuary needs community involvement
Florence Lambert’s articulate, compelling and well-researched guest editorial should be the last word on the La Jolla seal colony (“Coexistence with seals a privilege to cherish,” Village News, Feb. 23, page 8). The struggle of the seals to maintain their last sanctuary in Southern California is tangled up with our own loss of contact with nature and with the beauty and joy that make life truly worth living. The beach at Children’s Pool is so small that you can easily walk from one end to the other and back in 90 seconds. As Ms. Lambert teaches us, humans use the other 73 miles of San Diego beaches, yet a tiny but militant anti-seal group still cries that we must have this last 200 feet.
As Ms. Lambert suggests, please take action. Write or call your city council member, Mayor Sanders, the local media, the National Marine Fishery Service, and anyone else who can help. Only through such community involvement can we establish the needed seal sanctuary and enforce laws protecting these marine mammals.
Seals must give birth to and nurse their pups on land. Unlike whales and dolphins, seals need to spend considerable time out of the water resting and keeping warm in order to survive. There is nowhere else for these animals to go. If we drive them off the beach at Children’s Pool, they will die, and part of our spirit will certainly die with them.
Janice Stanger, Pacific Beach

Tillman does terrific job
Thank you very much for the wonderful article written by Adriane Tillman, “McCoy chronicles Journey of Music Warrior,” which was featured in your Jan. 19 newspaper (Village News, page B·1). She did a great job of presenting the new book, “Journey of a Music Warrior,” and also with documenting the book release event at the Surfside Bungalow at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. The book is available at Warwick’s in downtown La Jolla or on amazon.com.
It was a pleasure to read Adriane’s account of our interview. As an author, it is particularly pleasing to see another writer get specific facts correct and to use them in an engaging way. As she mentioned, more than 40 pictures in the book deal directly with La Jolla/San Diego people. I especially appreciated being able to thank the community for helping when one of their members was fighting cancer.
Newspapers have a wonderful way of getting into the homes of so many and I am grateful for the inpact that they have. Thank you for your efforts in keeping us informed.
Doris Lee McCoy, Ph.D., La Jolla

La Jollans against the Block Party
We live nearby, we do business and we shop in Pacific Beach; we are against allowing any kind of block parties in Pacific Beach.
In the last 20 years, Pacific Beach has changed for the worst. It used to be a mixed family-single oriented community and Garnet Avenue used to provide services to local residents. Providing too many alcohol licenses has deteriorated the neighborhood, and instead of enhancing the area for the locals and attracting tourism, Pacific Beach has became a losers’ paradise.
Experience showed us that to be successful in business in Garnet Avenue you have to sell alcohol, tattoos, or sex and unscrupulous landlords don’t mind renting to those tenants. Denying the permit for the city Block Party would be a first good step for San Diego City Council decision to clean the area.
Now that the city is short of funds it is quite unacceptable to let Pacific Beach go instead of cleaning Garnet Avenue and using the beach assets to invite tourism. We hope the city council persons can find a way to clean the area and change Pacific Beach to a clean and enjoyable community for all.
Mary & Al Prat, La Jolla

Newt Gingrich, an honest broker?
In the recent article "Soaring health costs: No. 1 national issue" (Village News, March 16, page B·1), Brian Moon states "Newt Gingrich is the only possible candidate honestly able to proclaim himself a proven hands-on expert on national health issues." Is he serious?
This looks like a desperate effort to once again elevate Gingrich to the status of reputable "leader and expert" while the record shows that his only expertise has been endless deception and self-promotion.
In the famous House Banking scandal, [when] many congressmen wrote rubber checks on government money, Gingrich bounced 22 himself, which almost cost him re-election in 1992. His vote for the secret House pay raise, and the chauffeur who drove him around Washington in a Lincoln Town Car didn’t help.
His political history is rife with sleazy deals and deception, using taxpayer subsidies for his partisan campaigns. Relentlessly pushing military spending as a big-time hawk, Gingrich avoided the Vietnam War through a combination of student and family deferments. While promoting family values he is well known for his abysmal treatment of his ailing wife and womanizing.
He was involved in a lucrative and questionable book deal with Rupert Murdoch in which he was forced to give up the $4.5 million advance for a still-lucrative deal based on royalties.
His best-known effort was a college course (titled "Renewing American Civilization") at a third-rate college that Gingrich nakedly used to recruit and organize conservative candidates, and to feed them his carefully constructed ideology and political slogans. He agreed to pay a $300,000 fine for misleading the committee during the investigation, and in the process dodged conviction on the actual charges.
It seems Gingrich is out to capitalize on the urgent need to for a national healthcare plan. His "CHOICES 2006" health proposal is as deceptive as it is unworkable. It promotes further privatization "do it yourself" ideas, instead of a comprehensive universal program. His solution of "electronically connected" monitoring hardly substitutes for individual, personal preventive and comprehensive care.
He decries soaring costs, but ignores the role of insurers, high tech treatment and pharmaceuticals in soaring costs. The fact is that other developed nations offer universal comprehensive care at a fraction of the price we pay. (How about diverting some of our military spending to health care?)
Finally, it is clear that Gingrich is back in politics to promote himself and to sell us his reactionary platform ” what we don’t want and don’t need.
Tanja Winter, La Jolla
” Ed. note: The actual quote from the story is “But, only one possible candidate will honestly be able to proclaim him or herself a proven hands-on expert in both vital issues,” referring to 2008 presidential campaign issues of both healthcare and balancing the federal budget. n