Letters may be edited for clarity and length. E-mail to le*****@oc******.com, or send to Letters to the Editor, c/oOC Weekly, 1666 N. Main St., Ste. 500, Santa Ana, CA 92701. Or fax to (714) 550-5908.
REAGAN REDUX
Rebecca Schoenkopf is absolutely right about Ronald Reagan [Commie Girl, June 11] but forgot to mention a few things about his dubious rsum: he was a political opportunist (from president of the Screen Actors Guild to air-traffic controllers union buster, from signer of “liberal” abortion legislation as California governor to pandering to racist Southern pro-life Dixicrats as president), to say nothing of his hiring such a-holes as George Schultz to encourage Alameda County sheriffs to crack me and other college students in the head in the spring of 1969. He didn't deserve to die as slowly as he did, but he just as surely doesn't deserve the respect and adulation he's getting either.
Jon Webb
via e-mail
Thank you for being one of the few to stand up and tell everyone who is so sad about Reagan dying to SHUT UP [Tom Carson's “Death of a Salesman,” June 11]. Right, I'm so upset the guy finally kicked the bucket 20 years after he cut funding for mental hospitals so the homeless mentally ill were spilled out onto the streets. Was everyone a moron before Reagan died? Or did his death make them forget how horrible he was?
Becca Cucu
via e-mail
For several years, I was a volunteer at the Orange County Memory Walk, sponsored by the county's Alzheimer's Association. One year, the organizers came up with the idea of a team for Reagan called “Dutch” or something. You would have thought Orange County Republicans would show their support for Reagan and would turn out for the event, but the response was so miserable that the idea was scrapped the following year. I suppose Republicans do not like to be bothered with sick and old people, even if their beloved president is one of them.
Hanna Hill
via e-mail
WEEKLY DIES, REAGAN LIVES
I don't know why I bother writing to people who probably can't read, but your article on Ronald Reagan was despicable. President Reagan served his country for decades, ended the Cold War and ended years of Democrat misrule. To piss on his grave as you did is worse than bad journalism—it's un-American. I will tell all of my friends to boycott your so-called newspaper. It has no place in Orange County—or in this woman's America!
Sylvia Nicholson
via e-mail
FIGHTIN' MAD
As a proud Navy veteran, Commie Girl's June 4 rant was to me and a few fellow vets (including some who are presently suffering sand flies) beautiful. We did not serve our country to see our freedoms eroded and our nation become the hated bully it is today. If Rebecca Schoenkopf ever wants to dump her young boys for an older, well-traveled sailor, give me call.
Steve Stanton
via e-mail
CAR RIDE
I feel obligated to send a note of “well-done” for Stacy Davies' article on Madonna [“Material Hurl,” May 28]. I would add to your list of Madonna's horrors the scene from Body of Evidence that she did with Willem Dafoe. They were in a parking garage at night. She climbs on the hood of a car, unscrews a light bulb and smashes it on the hood. Dafoe lies down on the glass in a white shirt and tie, and then Madonna screws him on top! I've never been able to look at Dafoe seriously after that.
Scott Hill
Huntington Beach
HAIDL
It seems to me that defense attorney Joe Cavallo and his conduct mentioned in your article are the clearest impending signs of the fall of western civilization [R. Scott Moxley's “Pool Cue vs. Penis,” May 23]. I have trouble wrapping my mind around the idea that videotaped gang rape of an unconscious victim is deserving of any defense whatsoever. But then the good Mr. Cavallo steps in and proves me wrong.
His behavior is reprehensible. I am beside myself thinking how he could arrive at the conclusion that it would be a good idea to bring a rape victim to tears, to try to convince a jury that she's really the criminal in all this. This is law and order?
Steve
via e-mail
I can tell you that even in Mississippi, people are shocked at the antics of defense attorney Cavallo.
K.F.
Biloxi, Mississippi
I notice the same feedback regarding the Haidl trial week after week. Readers can't seem to understand why these boys' parents would help them with their defense. Or why they deserve a spirited defense if it means embarrassing or offending Jane Doe. The fact is that these minors were sex buddies, and Jane Doe was often a willing participant in sexual activity within this group. She went to the house that day to participate in sex. Her own testimony (disputed by the defense) is that one of the boys offered her a drink. “What will this do?” she asked. “It will knock you out,” one of the boys answered. So what does she say she did? She says she drank it willingly.
All of this gives at least some measure of validity to the defense claims that she was a willing participant in the sexual activity that occurred. Do I think that the boys should be punished? Yes, without a doubt. Should they be required to forfeit their lives for these transgressions? In my opinion, that would be overkill.
If the DA's office had pursued a reasonable punishment for these acts, we would not be in the middle of this fiasco. By trying the boys as adults and going for the flat-out maximum penalties, the DA's office forced the boys' families to engage in an all-out defense to try and avoid decades in prison for their children. What would be a reasonable penalty for what these boys did? How about two to three years in jail, five years of formal probation and fines steep enough to offset some of the prosecution expense? The boys would be harshly punished, Jane Doe would not have to go through the ordeal of the trial, the county would be saved big bucks, and we could all be spared the constant media infatuation with this sordid trial.
Ted Griffel
Newport Beach
