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Letters to Artvoice

the news and the

NF airport

Artvoice,

I really enjoyed reading the article “How Stupid is Your Daily Paper?” [January 5, 2006]. I am a recent graduate of the University at Buffalo where I studied International Business and Geography. What saddens me when I read this article is how accurate you are in what you were stating versus how ridiculous the statements that were made in the Buffalo News about developing the Niagara Falls International Airport were. Western New York has the potential to be an emerging and prosperous economic center. The main things that has held this region back is lack of good leadership, sound decision making, willingness to take calculated risk, and properly investing and re-developing the resources here.

You said it best: Buffalo is not going to be an industrial town again. That time is over and done with. We have to move on and re-create Buffalo/WNY into a successful economic region. I think what holds us back the most is that the city’s “Big Dogs” fear change and competition. If you open up the doors to new businesses to relocate here you run the chance of shutting down or at least damaging the profits of some of our city’s long time major players.

The time for change is today...if the NFTA wants to invest in developing the Niagara Falls International Airport so be it. In fact, they should invest as much as possible into this project to get the highest return on it.

Your story really has filled me with the ability to dream of what a prosperous WNY could look like.

Edwin Kelly

Buffalo

Hi, Jamie,

I loved the list of projects that the Buffalo News has been on the wrong side of, and I was charmed by your vision of an air-freight-based renaissance for Buffalo/Niagara Falls. It sounds great, until you consider certain sobering geological limitations.

Your model is based on the assumption that jet fuel will always be cheap and plentiful. Now that the Chinese are buying and making cars, China can be expected to start vying with the West for the remaining oil in the gulf region. The more petroleum we and they burn in our vehicles, the less we’ll have for making cheap plastic crap and flying it to North America to stock our Wal-marts.

As James Howard Kunstler says, “Globalism is a set of temporary economic relations based on cheap petroleum.”

best,

Cynthia Van Ness

Buffalo

To the Artvoice staff,

I am writing in regards to Mr. Moses’s article “How Stupid is Your Daily Paper.” Great article. It taught me something I never knew or really thought about before. It makes perfect sense that strong air transportation capability would correlate to a strong local economy.

I subscribe to a similar, if not the same, philosophy. We should make decisions to strengthen the local economy, thereby improving the quality of life of our citizens. However, that’s not the way that the financial superpowers and our elected officials see things (time will tell with Byron Brown). In fact, their approach is exactly opposite. Warren Buffet and his Buffalo News crime lords could give a rat’s ass if the average Joe can fly to Paris on an Airbus for half the price of a regular plane ticket. In fact, that’s probably the last thing they want. Why should Western New York’s wealthy waste their time and energy making other people prosperous? They are big fish in the little pond that is Western New York, and they don’t plan on turning this place into an ocean of fair trade and competitive capitalism any time soon.

Sincerely,

Jonathan Quinn

Buffalo

Dear editor,

The recent article “How Stupid is Your Daily Paper?” is both on the money and mistaken.

I do not understand why I should NOT be irked at the profitability of the News. Increased cost for reduced service always irks me.

So far as their being on the wrong side of every recent decision, that is an exaggeration. Demolishing the Larkin office building may or may not have been a mistake; it isn’t obvious to me. Putting the UB campus in Amherst was a good idea, regardless of the pipe dreams of “revitalizing downtown” with 35,000 students and all the acreage necessary for a major university. The pedestrian mall on Main Street is an unmitigated disaster, but I thought it was a good thing when it was first built. The News can be forgiven for making that kind of mistake. There’s nothing wrong with the rapid transit system (the underground part). Joseph Ellicott’s radial street design is an idiocy that hamstrings Washington D.C. to this day. A healthy downtown traffic flow would be better served by getting rid of the above-mentioned pedestrian mall. Supporting Mark Hamister was stupid.

Supporting Kevin Helfer was the losing side but not “stupid.” Standing against funding to expand the Niagara Falls airport is also stupid and shortsighted.

But I don’t expect farsighted wisdom and judgement from a newspaper. I expect the news and that is why I stopped subscribing [to the Buffalo News] years ago. Artvoice does a better job at that and it is completely editorial and columnist opinion. The best part of Artvoice, apart from your (Jamie Moses’) occasional articles is the “News of the Weird.”

That’s really pathetic.

Jim Scandale

Buffalo

your take on tookie

I am writing in response to Michael I. Niman’s article titled “Why Tookie Had to Die” [January 5, 2006]

I can’t believe how warped people’s sense of reality is. Tookie Williams had to die because he was convicted of killing five people—period. Regardless of what governor Arnold Schwartzenegger wrote in his “Statement of Decision,” Tookie got exactly what he deserved for killing those people.

Why is it that everyone is willing to speak on behalf of this murderer, yet no one is speaking on behalf of the victims? What if one of the victims was your father, brother or any other relative, would you want Tookie spared because he was “reformed” and wrote some children’s books? Of course not, you would want to see him punished to the fullest extent of the law.

Turning this into an assault on the First Amendment is a sham. A laundry list of names that “cost Williams his life” is presented, as if these people had anything to do with the actions by Williams or Schwartzenegger. The real list of people that cost Tookie his life are the five victims. Where are the victims’ names? Now maybe the five victims were lawless criminals, but the fact remains that killing is punishable by death in California. Arnold did the right thing by upholding the execution. Any attempt to divert this execution into some wrong doing by the governor is simply unconscionable.

Daniel O. Hoffner

Williamsville

Dear Artvoice,

I have read the latest column by Mr. Niman and it has brought the usual smile to my lips.

As always I have to ask why, in a nation as repressive as ours has it been possible for Mr. Niman to keep presenting his point of view to the public? If Mr. Williams and the national known others listed in the column could be silenced, why is this relatively obscure writer for Artvoice still permitted to be published? Why is Artvoice still permitted to present him to the public? Is there some vast plot to make U.S. citizens think that constitutional liberties still exist? Would such a plot be covertly enlisting Mr. Niman an unwitting player? The more he protests the lack of freedom the more he plays into the hands of the plotters.

Arnold Markowitz

Williamsville

Mr. Niman,

I am against the death penalty. This man deserved to rot in prison. I don’t care how many kiddie books he wrote or what a model prisoner you seem to think he was behind bars-Fact is, he started and participated in one of the most murderous organizations this country has ever know.Oh yeah and they are still in existence. As far as proof of a crime there was enough to convict and one can only guess how many other murders he committed. Behind bars he was written up many times by his warden for a wide range of infractions. Go to the Wardens website for details. This man was by no means Nobel Peace material. I find that insulting to the justly awarded. Should the state kill-no that puts them up for a Nobel Peace candidacy too. So I feel we should really consider who our heros are. For me it’s not some murderer of the innocent.-

Sincerely,

Jim Parry

Mo’ Money

Dear editor,

When Willie Sutton, a 1960’s-era criminal with an unusually high I.Q., was finally caught, he was asked, “As smart as you are, why do you keep trying to rob banks?” His famous reply was, “That’s where the money is!”

If Willie were alive today with his criminal bent and nose for cash, he most likely would be an active participant of the Bush Administration’s crime spree. Quite the operation, really... war profiteering, election fraud, lobbying firms with their congressional partners in crime, great job opportunities at pivotal national agencies (no experience necessary), gobs and gobs of cash for the taking, no strings, no accountability, no money down! The W Treasury is the Bush Republicans’ private piggy bank, and Willie Sutton would be like a kid in the proverbial candy store.

Thanks to the Abramoff indictments, however, a lot of the cash might be going to criminal defense attorneys. The word inside the Beltway is that 20 congressmen or more are involved, and with a little prodding, a plea deal here and there, who knows how far this could go?

All in all, W and the boys should have a very interesting second term. Make some popcorn, all you Democrats... we may have had five years of hell, but these hearings to come should be payback, as good or better than Watergate (for those of us who were around).

Speaking of Watergate, when Woodward and Bernstein had reached a dead end in the story, Deep Throat told them, “Just follow the money.” Considering Cheney and Rumsfeld were Nixon administration alums, these criminal allegations should surprise no one.

Happy New Year, and enjoy the show!

Cy Alessi

Kenmore