Public Comment

FRESH AIR? 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Sen. Dianne Feinstein stated that the new Attorney General Mukasey is an “independent breath of fresh air.”  

I wonder how the victims of the Bush administration’s waterboarding would describe him. 

Dave Heller 

• 

TRUTH 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I applaud Gray Brechin for his smart and powerful commentary piece, “Taking the Chronicle to Task.” I’m appalled that Dianne Feinstein voted to approve Michael Mukasey for attorney general, and that the San Francisco Chronicle supported her actions. To Brechin’s point, “controlled drowning” (which sounds more ominous than “waterboarding") is reprehensible under any conditions. Mukasey may be administratively more adept than his predecessor but, sadly, he’s as unspeakably supportive of the Bush-Cheney machine. Thank you, Brechin and the Berkeley Daily Planet for helping us readers remember what, uh, journalism is really about (the truth?). 

Elizabeth Bertani 

Alameda 

• 

COPENHAGEN 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Michael Katz, in his Nov. 6 First Person article, opposes greater density and taller building for downtown Berkeley, comparing the city to the low rise capitals of Scandinavian countries. He says Berkeley should be more like them. Copenhagen has a population density of more than 15,000 people per square mile—50 percent denser than Berkeley. I guess he is suggesting that instead of having towers downtown, we should cover the town in five- to eight-story buildings as they do in Scandinavia. I agree—but I bet he doesn’t. 

Victor Silverman 

• 

CELL PHONE ANTENNAS 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

It seems that the idea of anything rising into the air (towers, antennae) stirs the ire of Berkeley’s build-nothing, do-nothing troglodytes. I imagine that if the campanile were being built today, UC-haters would complain that it was being done without community input, feminists would rail against having a phallic structure imposed on them, and community activists would warn of impending noise pollution from the carillon. 

I’ve avoided commenting on the antenna hysteria, but because superstition just annoys me, I’ll break my silence. Anyone who has attended high school, including presumably the Justices of the Supreme Court, should understand the square law that defines the attenuation of radiated energy as the distance from its source increases. Here are a few things more threatening to your health than living within a block of a rooftop telephone antenna: 

• Putting a cell phone to your ear. 

• Breathing near Center and Shattuck. 

• Eating a burger and fries. 

• Standing near your micro-wave when it’s on. 

• Drinking a Coke. 

• Voting Republican. 

My thanks to the City Council for not wasting my tax dollars on a pointless legal battle. 

Jerry Landis 

• 

COUNCIL’S 

CAPITULATION 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I was brokenhearted to see the capitulation of the City Council to the corporate fascists who insist on putting more cell phone towers in our neighborhoods. Watch closely, for this is how fascism comes to America: through the complete misuse and abuse of our constitutional system of law. One look at Kirk Trost told me in no uncertain terms that the man is a corporate stooge. The other attorneys relied on for their pessimistic advice were all hand-picked by our departing city attorney, whose lies I have documented in the LRDP case. How naive can the well-intentioned members of our City Council be? Perhaps the public should stop giving you the benefit of the doubt and assume that if you go on walking like a fascist, quacking like a fascist, and harming the people like a fascist, you probably are a fascist. 

Max Anderson is the only mensch amongst you, and even he is giving too much to the lies of the fascists. While it is true that there are many bad judges, there are also good ones who might have ruled properly in this matter to deny the fascists the anti-social object of their greed. It’s not that you fight even though you can’t win, it’s that you never know if you can win until you fight. If you are in the right, you may find hidden resources, but it is so long since any of you have been in the right that you probably forget what that feels like. 

Dona Spring complained that there were no lawyers even willing to take the case. How hard did you really try in looking for one? If all you did was rely on the city attorney to look for one for you, then how can you call that a sincere effort?  

Peter J. Mutnick 

• 

TALE OF NEW ANTENNAS 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

After the cowardly votes by five City Councilmembers, now Verizon is pushing for 12 antennas on French Hotel at 1504 Shattuck. Hey, with such good friends in the city offices, Verizon is sure a permit will be issued. Based on my experience since 2002, I describe how the tale of this new set of antennas will unravel. 

This Thursday, Nov. 15, 2007, there will be a Design Review Committee meeting to discuss the superficial aesthetic issues of the proposed antennas. This committee is like a Stalinist court. It shuts people up if they cannot compare the beauty of the antennas to Sistine Chapel. The committee will quickly rubber stamp the approval. 

A few weeks later, the Zoning Adjustments Board (ZAB) will listen to false claims of the applicant and will ignore what people have to say. They will rubber stamp a permit to Verizon. (The story may unravel differently here in that ZAB may deny permit; either way, it does not matter.) 

In two weeks, people (or Verizon) will appeal the ZAB’s decision to the City Council. 

The appeal may get ping-ponged a few times between the City Council and the ZAB. 

To give a new kink to the story, the City of Berkeley hires a so called “third party independent” engineer to evaluate Verizon’s application. Interestingly, the “independent” engineer is paid by Verizon. Not surprisingly, the “independent” engineer approves Verizon’s application. 

There could be more dramatic moments in the story. For instance, Verizon will threaten the city by a lawsuit or even file one. 

Final showdown. The city opens a public hearing. But, it will rest it for two three weeks to sap people’s momentum. 

Finally, after 18-20 months, the city tells people: “Sorry, according to Telecommunications Act of 1996, nothing can be done.” Thus, the city will rubber stamp a permit to Verizon. I can hear what council members will have to say: Capitelli: “We will lose in court. We will lose quickly and cleanly.” Maio: “I like to vote no, but will vote yes.” Wozniak: “Go catch Clinton; he passed the TCA 1996.” 

In the last scene, people tired after 18-20 months while have spent hundreds of dollars are yelling “shame, shame,” as the City Council disappears in the back chambers for a break. 

Yes, truly, shame on this sham democracy. This is rubber-stamp democracy. 

Shahram Shahruz 

• 

NEXT CITY ATTORNEY 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

While nondiscriminatory “affirmative action” has been assigned numerous wordings by way of definition, the basic focus has been on policies intended to redress discriminatory practices in employment. These policies commonly redress discrimination and victimization based on age, disability, gender, marital status, sexual preference, and racial or ethnic origin, and they provide for equal opportunity in employment. 

Following introduction and implementation of employment affirmative action, it became apparent that an affirmatively managed search process can produce a pool of the best and most qualified-for-the-job candidates. 

It has been urged that the next city attorney’s appointment be the result of a search outside the city’s ranks, i.e. outside the city and state. Would the City Council—in the words of the legislation—“throw the net wide and inclusively”? 

An aspect of such a search process is creation of a “search and screen” committee consisting of representative persons especially qualified for such an endeavor. 

Helen Rippier Wheeler 

• 

PROTESTING TREES? COME ON! 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Do the second-generation spoiled idiots riding their parents’ bank accounts through school realize there is a war going on? One that our administration lied to back us into? A war that is so wrong on so many levels it makes a person dizzy? A war that has destroyed our standing on an international basis? Get some respect—get out of the damn trees and deal with real issues already. How embarrassing. 

Michael LeBrun 

U.S. Navy veteran 

• 

TORTURE INTO FOCUS 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Our senators need to see the movie Rendition. It brings current U.S. practices of kidnapping and torture clearly into focus. The film shows the injustice, the pain, and the counterproductive pointlessness of these policies. Torture doesn’t provide useful information, but it does generate more terrorists. We don’t need another attorney general who can’t distinguish justice from torture.  

Bruce Joffe 

Piedmont 

• 

CROSSROADS EVICTION 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

1990 was a rough year. I spent most of it fighting eviction and other actions taken by C.E.I. Corporation, my landlord. I organized a tenant’s association on the property and we took the slumlord to the Berkeley Rent Board. When I went to the city about the condition of the property at 1970 San Pablo Ave., they could not find any record of an apartment house there, and so started the law suits and rent strikes. In the beginning we had 14 units out of 26, that belonged to the association.  

I was under so much stress that I collapsed in the ER at Highland Hospital and spent seven days in Intensive Care, from a stomach ulcer. My only visitors while in the hospital were my friends Hali Hammer and Carol Denney. Carol actually drove me home from the hospital. 

About a month after I was released from the hospital the tenants in apartment number four decided they had had enough and they were going to move. I got the old tenant to agree to a sublease and since all prior agreements were oral my sublease was completely legal. This is when I contacted Carol Denney and she agreed to sign the agreement.  

Carol was the 14th member of the association that gave us the majority of the tenants in the building, which was a crucial factor in getting the loans on the building. It was also a factor in getting R.C.D., a management company, to come on board. Without Carol Denney I doubt the co-op would have gotten off the ground. 

Carol was also promised when she joined the association that she could never be evicted from her unit as long as she paid her rent and went generally along with the rest of us. Which is what makes her eviction extremely unfair since at the time I was the vice president of the board of the Village Co-Op and all of us were given the same assurances. We were all told that any eviction would have to include dispute resolution and mediation. In all fairness the eviction of Carol Denney should be stopped at once by the Crossroads Village Co-op. 

Gary Isom Spencer  

• 

CITY COUNCIL MISTREATMENT 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Every person in Berkeley should be outraged by the mean-spirited treatment imposed on the disabled members of the One Warm Pool Advocacy Group at the City Council meeting on Nov. 6. I also hope that moral and caring people will voice their outrage to the City Council and more specifically to the two members of that body who blatantly carried out that travesty. Their behavior was despicable and beneath contempt and was not worthy of a city which prides itself on its humane treatment of the disabled. 

Juanita Kirby 

• 

THANK YOU, CODE PINK! 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I was deeply impressed by the open letter exchange between Captain Richard Lund, the Marine Corps officer in charge of the Berkeley Recruitment Center, and Anne Joi of Code Pink regarding their continuous demonstration in front of his office requesting its moving out of Berkeley. 

I’d like first to thank Capt. Lund for opening the door to this conversation by his letter describing clearly what it takes to have a job in the military commanded by the president. That is once you are employed, you are not allowed to change your position no matter how and where the military power is deployed. 

I know Lt. Watada, who lost his faith in the war, has now to endure a long struggle against the military’s criminalization of him. 

And I am very grateful that Anne Joi has responded to Capt. Lund in a polite conversational letter. 

To me her letter is a comprehensive reminder of the illegality and unpopularity of this war both home and abroad, the unjust treatment of both veterans and prisoners alike, the sexual abuse of female soldiers wearing the uniform of the U.S. military, and the insidious health and environmental hazards posed by the continued criminal use of depleted uranium by the U.S. military. 

It also reminded me of the Berkeley City Council’s resolution against the Iraq war, which I had almost forgotten. 

I sympathize with the position of Capt. Lund, but I think we should not have the Center in Berkeley. Living through this quagmire of war, we must not forget all the people who suffer. Everyday we must try to remember the whole picture of the world. What is more important than conversations between people with different occupations and viewpoints? 

I thank the Berkeley Daily Planet for offering a space to make this dialog possible. 

Fusako de Angelis 

• 

KPFA ELECTION 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I want to thank the Daily Planet for its coverage of the KPFA election. I disagree with John Katz’s criticism for running my commentary and not Brian’s. The issue before you ran commentaries from two Concerned Listener (CL) candidates and none from www.peoplesradio.net.  

John Katz takes three shots at peoplesradio’s 10-point program. With regard to corporate underwriting, last year the GM from Houston publicly suggested that Pacifica consider “underwriting.” The fact that we don’t do it now is no guarantee for the future.  

On the Democracy Now! issue, John’s comment that it already plays twice a day is true but intentionally misleading. As our strongest news/public affairs program it should be played in prime time 7-8 a.m. Playing it at 6-7 and 9-10 a.m. begs the question. There are more people listening to their radios between 7-8 a.m. than at 6-7 and 9-10 a.m. combined. The second playing should be at night for people that can’t hear it during the day. The Morning Show folks that support CL refuse to move up one hour for a more dynamic and informative program to be in prime time. Turf before Mission? 

Transparency and accountability is far from what it should be and it has been Peoplesradio and others on the LSB and PNB that have been pushing it. CL folks have generally fought against transparency. Peoplesradio’s La Varn Williams, current PNB Treasurer, has done more than anyone to promote financial transparency at Pacifica and at WBAI, where a sectarian group has almost destroyed the listener base. CL members and allies on the PNB have refused to vote to hold WBAI accountable. Due to this I made a motion to require KPFA’s PNB members to report on their votes. CL found every bureaucratic reason to oppose this motion for transparency and accountability. 

The question that needs to be answered by John Katz for all the voters, is why has the CL slate never taken a public position on three very contested issues at KPFA? 1. The role of the Program Council; 2. The Unpaid Staff’s right to organize; 3. The Democracy Now! prime time move. 

I think the reason is that to continue to support the current KPFA staff/management group that asked CL to form their slate, CL would have to take positions that are anti-democratic and would expose CL’s power before principles politics. CL’s silence on these issues is deafening. 

Richard Phelps 

Oakland