Good Medicine


Concerning the piece “Patient Patients” (“As SVMH mulls the future of healthcare, business leaders ponder how to stay afloat,” Dec. 27, 2012-Jan. 2, 2013), the most commentary I have heard about this important story is the captioned toenail clippings quote.


The real point of the story is pointed out by SVMH’s own consultant. The financial means of the patient base is changing. That privately insured 25 percent propping up 61 percent of the revenue is not a good business model, especially as the Affordable Care Act will likely lead to less reimbursement, even by the private insurers. The article also reminds us that SVMH is still more cost inefficient than Natividad Medical Center. Those two things being considered, does it matter that SVMH is doing “more sophisticated stuff,” as Mr. Pillari states?


By the way, Natividad Medical Center operates the only Level 3 Neonatal Intensive Care Unit in the county. Considering the county’s needs, that’s not only cost efficient, but patient satisfying. Ag leader Bruce Taylor is partly right – rather than acquire Natividad, with level heads and less rhetoric, complementary coexistence (aka, a merger) will be the solution. Let’s get back on track. - Roycamp39 | via Web


Grapes of Wrath


Is Monterey County so backward that a professional woman – who has clearly accomplished what she was hired to do – is being criticized for having four children? (“Disagreement on how to rep county wines leads a founding member of the growers association to quit,” Dec. 27, 2012-Jan. 2, 2013). I question the legality of any negative actions that have been taken against her based on her choice to be a mother. - Scardigli | via Web


Photo Finish


Nic Coury’s year-end photo collection (“Monterey County offered up a wide range of emotions in 2012,” Jan. 3-9) begins with a sad and poignant photo of grieving mother Gregoria Galarza weeping over the casket of her son, who was killed in Afghanistan. The insensitive headline that was placed underneath this heart-wrenching image is a cavalier “Make It Snappy.”


Wouldn’t one of the other five photos included in this article be more appropriate to be placed next to the headline? Do you honestly think the family of Vilmar Galarza Hernandez would appreciate his memorial being placed next to “Make It Snappy”?


Having worked in a television newsroom, I know that folks in the media industry deal with horrific stories on a daily basis, which often leads to one getting a tough skin. However, your editors need to tread carefully; a community newspaper has to be sensitive to people in the area that it covers. - Sean Kahuila | via Web


Tweetcha


I was almost through the “831 – Tales From The Area Code” article on Vexing Texting (“Many of Monterey’s naughtiest and implausible activities are captured on smartphones,” Jan. 3-9) – yes, very entertaining – when I realized the true meaning of this article: Your texts and mine are all public. - Bruce Merchant | Big Sur


(Editor’s note: Texts on the featured website are submitted by the people who were sent those messages.)


Jumping the Broom


Dan Hudak’s review of Django Unchained is well written, but I have to laugh at the reference to “Broomhilda,” when it should be Brunhilde (“Quentin Tarantino’s slavery revenge flick Django Unchained marks his best work since Pulp Fiction,” Dec. 27, 2012-Jan. 2, 2013). In case you haven’t seen the movie, slave Django, with encouragement from his new owner-then-partner, German dentist-turned-bounty-hunter Dr. Schultz, seeks to free his slave wife – named Brunhilde (pronounced Broon-hil-da). Brunhilde, a strange name for a Negro slave in 1858, got that German name from a German-speaking governess. Django imagines himself as like the hero in the German myth about Brunhilde being rescued by her lover.


Hudak misspells the name as “Broomhilda,” which is the name of a modern day comic strip about the misadventures of a witch flying around on her broom, hence Broomhilda. - David Brown | via Web


(Editor’s note: That crackpot Quentin Tarantino apparently went with Broomhilda. Yell at him.)


Frackin’ Right


I know as I write this letter that the editorial staff of the Weekly is biased against fracking as you are biased in favor of the anthropogenic global warming (AGW) myth, but I speak on behalf of true non-politicized science, and it’s time for the lemming masses to be enlightened to the irrefutable real science to the issue of fracking.


Both the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the National Research Council have consistently debunked the alleged risks to the health of humans and animals from fracking. In spite of the constant pressure being imposed on these scientific agencies to distort the truth to fit into the Left’s contempt for fossil fuels, these agencies remain hard-fast to the science.


What very few Americans know because very few Americans bother to seek out the real facts is that all the money being poured into defeating fracking in America is coming from the Middle East countries, all of which are controlled by Middle East oil. Even that joke of a movie starring Matt Damon – The Promised Land – was funded with Middle East oil money. Why? It should be obvious to anyone with an IQ higher than a banana slug’s: The Middle East does not want America to become energy independent.


Good grief, my fellow Americans, are you all that blind? Energy independence is within our grasp, and those in the know about AGW know it’s a sham. Fossil fuels are not our enemy, and it’s tragic that the majority of people have been duped into believing they are. - Jeffrey Van Middlebrook | Pacific Grove


Speaking of Fossil Fuel


(“Man with flamethrower robs bank,” posted Dec. 28)


Ban all flamethrowers! - Alessandro Guzman | via Facebook


You say “interesting” like it isn’t terrifying. - Creighton “Tony” Peet | via Facebook


Jesus. Aren’t flamethrowers already banned? - Carmela Moreno | via Facebook


CORRECTION An article (“Even after citywide ban, plastic bags are trashed at the Monterey mall,” Jan. 3-9) incorrectly stated that the Monterey Regional Waste Management District does not service the city of Monterey. Monterey City Disposal Service is the city’s hauler, but Monterey is a MRWMD member and receives its range of services.