Fallbrook Democrats Are Speaking Out

Recently Published Letters to the Editor
(Some of these letters may not be from members of Fallbrook Democratic Club or even from Democrats at all)
They will be reproduced in reverse chronological order.

See email links to the local press at the bottom of the page.

Letter posted to Village News and North County Times

The Nazi swastika and pink triangles surface in our area

Scott Lively, Esq., known for his outspoken intolerance of gays, will speak at the Murrieta-Temecula Republican Assembly dinner on April 3 at the Temeku Hills Clubhouse. I saw the notice in a local community newspaper. The graphic accompanying the announcement immediately caught my eye, with its pink triangle, Nazi swastika and German iron eagle. These symbols of terror appear on the cover of the book which Lively co-authored, “The Pink Swastika”.

In his book Lively contends that German gays had deep roots in the birth of the Nazi movement. This is almost as irrational as saying that Jews had deep roots in the development of the movement. This is pure revisionist propaganda, of course, and I find it disturbing that area Republicans invited such a man to deliver this message of intolerance. It is well known that the Nazis imprisoned and murdered millions of Jews and homosexuals; and Jehovah’s Witnesses, who faithfully refused to pledge allegiance to Hitler. The Nazis tattooed numbers into the foreheads of their prisoners, and pink triangles on the foreheads of homosexuals.

Scott Lively makes a pseudo intellectual presentation in order to identify gays as Nazis at heart. Rabbi Bernard Mehlman, Emeritus Rabbi of Temple Israel of Brookline stated, "Homophobia and Anti-Semitism are part of the same disease." Lively is stricken with this disease and his sickness should not be propagated. Lively insults the intelligence and character of Republicans.

Postings in response to The Pink Swastika
Post your own responses here: http://www.thevillagenews.com/story/36578/:

8:48 pm Friday, March 20^th, 2009

Jon Monday says :

I am shocked that the Village News would run an announcement for this hate-filled propaganda. And I wonder how many Republicans embrace the idea of hosting this equivalent of the KKK at their gathering.

The very idea of the Nazi movement welcoming homosexuals is way beyond revisionist history - it's insane. It has all the moral authority and truth of Holocaust deniers.

Here is an excerpt from a Holocaust survivor website:

“After taking power in 1933, the Nazis persecuted homosexuals as part of their so-called moral crusade to racially and culturally purify Germany. This persecution ranged from dissolution of homosexual organizations to internment of thousands of individuals in concentration camps. Gay men, in particular, were subject to harassment, arrest, incarceration, and even castration. In Nazi eyes, gay men were weak and unfit to be soldiers, as well as unlikely to have children and thereby contribute to the racial struggle for Aryan dominance. Follow the links on this special focus page to learn more about the Nazi campaign against homosexuals in Germany.”

Author and historian Erik N. Jensen regards Scott Lively’s linkage of homosexuality and Nazism as the recurrence of a "pernicious myth", originating in the 1930s attacks on Nazism by Socialists and Communists and "long since dispelled" by "serious scholarship".

Where do true Christians stand on this outrage? Where do Republicans stand on this outrage? Where does the Village News stand on promoting this garbage?

12:26 pm Saturday, March 21^st, 2009

Anna Monday says :

Maybe someone is slandering the Murrieta-Temecula Republican Assembly by announcing that they are entertaining this preposterous topic? If not, this meeting fuses two of Republicans’ favorite things as of late: an irrational hatred of homosexuals and irresponsible, sloppily researched revisionist history. Maybe this is why higher education has been one of the casualties of the W. era; an uneducated population is defenseless against flimsily fabricated propaganda, no matter how absurd.

Congressman Issa, does my reality interfere with your philosophy?

Elaine May once said, “I much prefer a moral dilemma to a real one.” Our Congressman Darrell Issa is having a moral dilemma: any constructive plans to get the American people out the economic mess we’re now struggling with is rejected because it is contrary to Republican orthodox “philosophy.” We’ve seen the fruits of this philosophy, which consists of deregulation, trickledown, tax cuts for the wealthy, capital gains tax cuts, one-time handouts and more tax cuts. Given our recent experience, to say that his “philosophy” doesn’t work grossly overstates its efficacy.

On the other hand, most of the rest of us are having a real dilemma trying to stand firm on an economy that is quicksand. Congressman “Just Say No” Issa is wringing his hands because the Recovery Bill is imperfect. People who are paralyzed waiting for the perfect are likely to still be living in their mom’s basement at the age of 47. We need you to act, Congressman Issa!

BTW, did you catch Issa embarrassing himself on David Schuster’s show ranting about the Recovery Bill’s non-existent “Train to Sin City” project? A philosophy is not supposed to be a soothing intellectual construct signifying nothing. It’s an attempt to capture reality in a system of rational thought. When a philosophy demonstrably fails the real world test, it has to be scrapped. Otherwise it’s not a philosophy; it’s just blind faith.

Anna Monday

Issa for Bush - Again

Congress recently voted on a bipartisan basis 311-104 to authorize funding for the next five years for Amtrak. Issa was among the minority that voted against said funding, a bill that Bush has said he would veto. As gas prices have soared above $4 per gallon nationally, Amtrak ridership in May was the highest recorded in its 37-year history. Some of the money is budgeted for matching grants to help states set up or expand rail service. Yet Issa once again stood lock-step with Bush policies rather than with constituents who would like to see improved alternatives to expensive and tedious travel on packed freeways.

We have an opportunity in November to elect a representative who has not and will not support failed Bush policies. Check the web site http://roberthamiltonforcongress.wordpress.com/ for information about Robert Hamilton, a candidate with a vision for the people in the 49'Th Congressional District, not just for special interests and the party line.

Jim Dooley

The enemy is following our troops home

By Joe Crews

War pundits keep repeating the mantra, "If our troops pull out, the enemy will follow them home." What they say is true. It is already following them home, and we are now finding out how sinister and bedeviling is this enemy combatant that is surreptitiously slipping into our homeland.

Rep. Bob Filner of San Diego, the new Democratic chairman of the Veterans Affairs Committee, spoke at a community forum in Fallbrook on July 5 about this terrible enemy that is following our troops back home. It is an enemy that lodges in the brains of our injured troops, generally with no external signs of visible injury, yet it kills and can maim for life. It wreaks its damage not only on the soldiers and Marines, but on their families and the homeland as well.

The signature wound of the Bush war is not the bullet through the brain; it is the percussive blast of the IED (improvised explosive device), which reverberates upward between the soldier's skull and his helmet. Filner revealed that 30 percent of troops who have engaged in combat may be affected by such brain injuries, a figure corroborated by a recent report by a group of neurologists, stating that hundreds of thousands suffer such brain injuries. Many troops still do not understand that invisible brain damage is responsible for debilitations that bedevil them. The military, as in past wars, again denies a shrouded illness. To its dishonor, Congress has for the past four years adamantly refused to prepare for this growing crisis, cutting off even minimal funding for treatment while ardently embracing funding for the combat surge.

That is beginning to change, largely through the efforts of Bob Filner. In the first six months as chairman, veterans' health funding has already been increased a record 30 percent. Filner unabashedly wears the label of liberal, especially when it comes to matters of war and health care.

"We must distinguish between the war and the warrior," stated Filner. The military press praises his liberal leadership, and carries details of his battles for them in Congress, details not found in any other media.

Filner is bitterly opposed by the former chairman, Rep. Steve Buyer, R-Ind., who suggested that Democrats want liberal health care for all veterans as a precursor to a national universal health system. But Filner does not back off, pointing out that 1.8 million veterans have no health insurance and receive no VA care. An additional 3.8 million family members living with these veterans also lack health coverage.

Filner stated a fact familiar to veterans: More than 200,000 Vietnam veterans are homeless across America. He stated that we will see many more wounded vets from the Iraq war in North County. For every troop killed in Vietnam, only three survived with injuries. In the Bush War, 17 wounded soldiers survive for every one killed, according to Filner. That means that for the 3,620 killed, we have 61,540 injured, a figure that corresponds almost exactly with that just released by Veterans for Peace.

It is true. The enemy is following our troops home, but he is more sinister than we ever feared.

-- J. Howard Crews lives in Fallbrook.

North County Times Community Forum

May 2, 2007

Rainbow Water delivers a victory

By: Michele Bain
a Commentary

North County Times : Community Forum

Aug. 21, 2006

Why this poll worker distrusts Diebold

By: JIM DOOLEY - Commentary

This report is written in response to the letter by Bernie Swaim published in the San Diego Union-Tribune on July 26. My wife and I were each poll workers in the June election for the first time. Like Mr. Swaim, we were not attracted by the very long hours for practically minimum wage, but responded to an appeal that there was a shortage of poll workers in our community.

I am puzzled that Mr. Swaim says he received two days of training. My wife was precinct captain, and I was assigned to administer the new Diebold electronic voting machines. We each received about four hours of training for our respective functions. My reaction at the end of my training was that it was not adequate for setting up a poorly designed machine that appeared prone to malfunction. My opinion proved accurate since three of four machines at my location, which included two precincts and two trained poll workers including myself, did not go into service until about an hour after the polls opened. We called technicians, who were dispatched to our site to get the machines working. As part of the process they removed the tamper-proof seals prior to making the fixes, then installed new seals.

We were told as part of the training that the primary was a limited test of the Diebold machines, and they were to be used only by visually impaired voters.

Paper ballots and Scantron counters were to be used for all other voters. But the plan was that in November the Diebold electronic machines would be used for all voting. Based on my experience, I think that would be a serious mistake

I am disappointed that there has been no inquiry from the registrar of voters office as to how the process worked for the poll workers. I found the Diebold machines to be subject to malfunctions such as paper jams, and the supposedly verifiable paper trail fails in its purpose. For a total of three test votes on my Diebold machine, the resulting paper tape was some 10 feet of confusing data that was meaningless to me. I doubt that anyone could or would verify a proper vote count if that paper roll were hundreds of feet long. My suspicion is that is the intent.

By contrast, I found the Scantron system to be straightforward and verifiable. In that case a clearly marked paper ballot, which can be easily hand counted to verify the computer tally, is saved. In elections where the results are contested, this should be done quickly and as a part of the process to remove any doubt of the integrity of the election. Besides that advantage, the Scantron utilizes cardboard boxes for voting stations, as compared to the custom-made, expensive and complex Diebold electronic machines. In this case simpler is better.

I have not felt that any criticism of the process was directed at me as incompetent or possibly dishonest, as apparently Mr. Swaim did. I think criticism that the Diebold voting machines are inadequate, and that they are subject to manipulation by dishonest persons within the current process, are totally valid.

My recommendation is to stay with the Scantron voting machines. I would like to see more responsive post-election verification than we have seen in the 50th Congressional District.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Fallbrook resident Jim Dooley served as a poll worker at Fallbrook United Methodist Church.

See the statement and comments.

Village News

Letter to the editor - Pub. July 27, 2006

Appeasing the Base

After 5 ½ years in office, President Bush vetoed his first bill.

It seems that no amount of pork-barrel spending, a significant portion of the ballooning deficit, was enough to earn his veto. But the bill to use federal dollars for stem-cell research was too much for Bush to tolerate - despite pleas from Nancy Reagan and Republican Senate Majority Leader Dr. Bill Frist, and almost the entire scientific community. The bill was passed with bi-partisan support - but tragically, not quite enough to override Bush's veto.

When Press Secretary Tony Snow was asked why Bush vetoed the bill, he said that President Bush would not support federal spending to take human life. Leaving aside such details as the fact that the cells could lead to advances which could save thousands of lives, that the cells will be destroyed anyway, and the question of a fertilized egg being considered "human", there's the question of why Bush executed 155 fully grown humans as Governor of Texas (more than any other governor, at any time in our country's history).

Bush repeatedly denied requests for delaying the executions to allow DNA testing to prove the guilt or innocence of those about to be executed. In the US, from 1976 until last year, over 200 death-row prisoners were exonerated by physical evidence (including DNA testing). Given the total number of death-row inmates, and the number of prisoners Bush executed, we can extrapolate that Bush executed at least 9 innocent people. The blocking of DNA testing after the executions serves only one purpose: hide the fact that some innocent people were murdered.

Another fact that doesn't square with Bush's stated belief system is that all the compassionate concern over the protection of embryos (or pre-embryonic cells) seems to end once the child is actually born. The US ranks 34th in infant mortality rates - behind all developed Western countries and such underdeveloped nations as Cyprus, Czech Republic, Slovenia, Malta, Croatia, Cuba, and Estonia.

I'm left to think that the veto had more to do with election year politics than any moral or ethical belief.

JON MONDAY

Fallbrook

North County Times

Letter to the editor - Pub. June 1, 2006

Hot-button election issue

As election time approaches, the right wing, as in the past, has pushed divisive hot-button issues front and center as is their wont to do in times when it is needed to divert the uninformed away from the most pressing issues of the day.

The usual suspects have included trial lawyers (scum), ACLU (communists), blacks and Mexicans (criminals), welfare mothers (driving Cadillacs), gays (marriage sanctity) and smearing candidates and others with vicious lies. Case in point, Francine Busby, outing Valerie Plame, firing Mary McCarthy and always, President Clinton.

This election is more important because it will decide if the Bush administration can be held accountable for the disaster of our economy and lying us into a winless war; therefore, immigration is front and center. After the election nothing will be settled. Immigration will be again placed on the back burner because farm and corporation interest desire to keep wages low.

What happened to the pledge of 300 Republicans on the Capitol steps (Contract With America), a promise to bring integrity back to the White House and to wrest power from special interests?

HARLAN FEICHT

Fallbrook

North County Times

Letter to the editor - Pub. June 4, 2006

End the reign of Bush's absolute power

English historian Lord Acton penned the epic warning, “Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” Although he died in 1902, his words have been proven true many times since then, and again seem appropriate in light of the abuses of power that have been documented in the last few years.

The list is too long to fully enumerate, but includes local Congressman Randall Cunningham's bribery conviction, “Kenny Boy” Lay's conviction for fraud and conspiracy at Enron, Congressman Tom DeLay's indictment for felony conspiracy, and Scooter Libby's indictments for obstruction of justice and perjury. Other symptoms of an arrogance that lacks constraint are: “mission accomplished” and “bring ‘em on,” followed by the further loss of some 2,100 members to date of our armed services in Iraq; “Brownie, you're doing a heck of a job,” after the devastation of New Orleans; the torture and prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib; and imprisonment of detainees without charges for some five years at Guantanamo Bay.

The voters have the opportunity in the upcoming elections to remove from office those rubber-stamp legislators that have failed in their responsibility to maintain checks and balances.

Now is the time to end this reign of corrupting absolute power.

JIM DOOLEY

North County Times

Letter to the editor - Pub. May 24, 2006

Vote the Republicans out

Republicans, Democrats and Independents alike should be outraged at the latest report that NSA has been monitoring millions of phone calls within the U.S. without a warrant. We were told many times by our president that this was not being done. He lied to us again, and now that it is uncovered, he is defending it.

This administration is trampling on the Constitution of the United States right in front of our eyes. People escape communist and fascist countries to come to the U.S. for freedom and liberties, and now our president and his lock-step administration are slowly becoming more tyrannical than the worst of them.

Where is the outrage? We cannot let one-party rule eat away our freedoms, regardless of whether we are conservatives or liberals, or anything in between.

If the government wants to monitor my phone calls, if they think I am a subversive, let them get a warrant. If not, I demand my privacy. I now read that even the Justice Department cannot investigate the NSA.

It is time to oust the majority party, and time for some investigations. Vote the Republicans out just to get oversight. We are heading for an armed revolution in this country if King George continues down this dangerous path.

GERARD SARNATARO

Fallbrook

Goldberg’s letter far from the real truth

By Bonnie Wright
Printed in The Village News April 6, 2006

I can’t do much about the current Administration taking me for a fool but I can respond to Robert Goldberg when he does the same thing. Mr. Goldberg, your lengthy letter (3/16/06) regarding the merits of the Medicare Prescription Plan D Program read like a George W. Bush press release. That’s probably the reason it was so far from the real truth of the matter. The only item I could ascertain as being correct was the number of people who have signed up for the program.

Unfortunately, you neglected to mention that the probable reason they signed up is that they were given very little choice but to do so. If they don’t sign up for some plan by May 15 they will be hit with lifetime cost penalties if and when they do decide on a plan. Or, if their HMO is Secure Horizons, as mine is, or something similar, they had no choice when it came to signing up; in fact, signing up wasn’t even necessary. Secure Horizons did it for me. I either accepted their plan or, bottom line, I would lose my current healthcare coverage. The exact same health coverage, including prescription benefits, that was available to me before Plan D was forced on us.

Now let’s talk about what I get with Plan D. First, I get an increased cost to me of $23 per month. That amount is added to my health insurance each month whether I need a prescription or not just for the privilege of being able to purchase a prescription if and when I do need one. Then, I get a list of drugs available to me that are price-based according to several Tier levels. If a drug is on the first Tier, it is fifty cents less than it used to be. If it is on the second Tier it is triple the amount it was before Plan D. Costs continue to rise according to Tier level.

In my case, it just so happens that the one prescription that I do rely on, and have relied on for many years, is not on the list at all nor is there anything on the list to replace it. So I am now paying an additional $23 a month and can’t get the one prescription that I need at any price.

Yes, Plan D does have a discount program for low-income seniors. I believe the maximum qualifying amount for the discount is about $1,140 per month income. All seniors who go over that maximum, even if only by a few dollars a month, end up paying more than they used to. Yes, people who are using large amounts of drugs will get discounts after their deductible amount. That still leaves most seniors paying more than they used to. You compare Plan D to prescription availability in Canada or the VA. What you need to compare is pre- and post-Plan D. Post-Plan D is definitely the loser in that comparison.

Mr. Goldberg, the Village News indicated that your title is Vice President for the Center for Medicine in the Public Interest. I’m so glad they cleared that up for me, because the one thing I was fairly sure of is that you were not writing as a retired senior, with a limited and fixed income, dependent on Medicare and Plan D.

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