Doesn’t The Monterey County Herald print your paper the Monterey County Coast [sic] Weekly? (“Squid Fry,” Nov. 10-16). Well, then why are you in bed with a company that is outsourcing?! - ginamonterey | via Web


Oh, let me correct myself, Squid, the Media News prints your paper, who is the owner of Monterey County Herald. You really shouldn’t throw mud at someone that you do business with and wouldn’t have a paper unless they printed one for you! - ginamonterey | via Web


Editor’s note: The Weekly is printed in San Jose (at the Media News-owned Mercury News, by people we know and like), not in India. 


Occupying Thoughts


Fairly well rounded article (“Occupy Monterey camp at Veterans Park struggles to integrate homeless,” Nov. 10-16), but I take issue with one stanza: “The homeless Occupiers present a nuanced challenge for encampments from Oakland to Toronto to Wall Street. Some are sane and healthy; others struggle with addiction and mental illness.”


The reason why this does not sit well with me is that it suggests that addiction and mental illness is a problem of the homeless. Actually the largest demographic of drug abusers comes from the privileged tiers of society: Those individuals who can afford such luxuries. The whole reason for the popular conception that drugs are low class is because the more impoverished members of society cannot afford another luxury: privacy. The wealthy can afford to use all of their very expensive intoxicants in their buffered domiciles while the poor are subjected to a vicious environment in which crime rates are measured by how often people get caught doing something. Not being able to afford privacy or legal defense results in high crime rates that are out of synch with reality, which in turn results in more police funding and more arrests, a vicious cycle for the poor.


For us Occupiers, drug use is far below what you will find in your typical cloistered suburbia. - simple1248 | via Web


Corporate Rhetoric


I make my living as a corporation (“Movement defends Americans’ identity as ‘We the People,’ not ‘We the Corporations,” Nov. 10-16). I am the president and many of the employees are my grown children. There are nine of us, and we have worked very hard for years to make our business a success. We are people, you idiot. And every corporation is a group of people joined together, operating under specific rules, regulated by law. If the Occupy people cannot even understand how it works it’s not surprising they all live in tents. And [to writer] Jim Hightower, it says you have battled the Powers that Be for 30 years. How has that worked out for ya? - Donald Boys | via Web


Mobile-Ization


Rent control is not good for anyone (“Seaside trailer park residents allege unfair property management,” Nov. 10-16). If you want lower rent then you need to stop asking your government to give you a hand out. Every hand out you get, it raises the taxes and you have to pay it… the landlord can’t afford the increase. Go talk to your landlord and see what needs done to help him lower his costs. It’s so depressing to hear people beg to be socialist… next you’ll want to be communist, and have your landlord put in jail. You do have an option, you know. You can move to a socialist country. You’d be happier… so would I. - Cclame | via Web


Huddled Masses


My first experience with immigration was trying to bring my Mexican spouse into the U.S. (“Growers say E-Verify will destroy the modern ag industry, but Congress has yet to offer a fix,” Nov. 3-9). We did everything the legal way and faced long waits, endless paperwork and incredibly expensive fees (which had to be paid in dollars although my husband’s salary was in pesos). After finally securing his resident visa I turned my attention to the issues facing individuals who merely want to get work visas. You articulated these issues in a story that clearly shows why is it in everyone’s interest to work toward improving the immigration process. - Kelly M. Phillips | via Web


Conservation Party


Yikes. Sam Farr reports to Mary Duan in your Oct. 20-26 issue that the GOP House has gone to the extreme in their war against conservation. To actively get rid of anything green such as removal of recycling bins in the Capitol Hill cafeteria and an attempt to pass an amendment that would prohibit anyone under the age of 17 from learning about conservation, is the pinnacle of idiocy and irresponsibility. The GOP has gone far off course and they are so pathetic. I can only hope that there will be enough Americans in 2012 who will remember these types of deeds and vote for the alternative parties that are willing to lead this country in a reasonable way. - Matthew Sundt | Monterey


Farr Out


Sam Farr will do anything to cut the DOD budget to nothing but bare bones, but of course he wants to leech off the federal dollars that DOD would bring (“A major military branch checks out the Peninsula as a potential new home,” Nov. 3-9). 


The time to get rid of that hypocrite Sam Farr is now. I love the military and our economy would benefit much from having them in the area, but the Fort Leonard Wood area would be a more supportive community for the CA. It would also be economically cheaper for the federal government. NPS and DLI are already bursting at the seams. - lacarids | via Web


zippity d0-dah


Two questions: One, isn’t it a change in the way our nation functions to have public officials give away land in public parks to businesses? (“County Parks Department is quietly considering a zipline at Jacks Peak,” Sept. 15-21.)


Two, David Lutes of the Parks Dept. is quoted as saying he hasn’t received much negative comment on the zip line in Jack’s Peak. Is there any way to check on this? I sent him this:


The first urban American park was Central Park in New York City. The city acquired 840 acres (approximately the same as Jacks Peak’s 764 acres). Europeans thought at that time that Americans lacked a sense of civic duty, that we had an unhealthy materialism that took first place before the common good. In the willingness to give away the public land of Jacks Peak park to the zip line business, it looks like they were right.


Helene Constant | via Web


CLARIFICATION: Last week’s Table of Contents implied residents of the Seaside Mobile Estates are taking issue with their mayor over rent reform, when they are trying to work cooperatively with Mayor Felix Bachofner.