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To
Know Suffering
To
the Editor:
She
haunts me still, that fragile, tiny infant girl featured in
the photo essay on Iraq [“See No Evil,” June 20]. Praise to
the Metroland editorial staff for the courage to select
this piece to appear alongside summer frippery.
As we head to the beach and the baseball park, gather in red,
white and blue celebration of the revolutionary, radical humanistic
ideals this country does, can, should represent to our planetary
brothers, we need to be made to pause and ponder how to work
together to make impossible national policy which purposely,
callously, systematically perpetrates such human suffering
in our name.
Thank you, Metroland, for doing what responsible media
should do: disturbing us. Perhaps the next step might be to
call a local symposium to generate a ground swell, true patriots’
“NO!”
Maureen
Baillargeon Aumand
Schenectady
With
Obedience and Conformity From All
To
the Editor:
As
a liberal, the Rev. Jo Page is concerned that reciting the
Pledge of Allegiance doesn’t “enhance citizenship” or prove
“real national loyalty” [Reckonings, July 11]—she accepts
these statist goals. She’s wrong, though. The loyal citizen,
such as Ms. Page, obeys the state without question. In a very
real sense, then, the more meaningless or moronic the message,
the more its regular recitation teaches the lesson that unthinking
obedience and conformity are good, or at least prudent. So
it doesn’t really matter that many schoolchildren not only
don’t understand the words, they don’t quite know what they
are.
That may be the only lesson the schools are fully competent
to teach.
Bob
Black
Albany
I
Remember 1981
To
the Editor:
Thoroughly
enjoyed Stephen Leon’s article about the Montreal Expos and
the year that never was [Sports, July 25], but it seems that
your “Je me souviens” headline might have to be amended to
read “J’ai oublie.” When I read it, I thought for sure you
were talking about 1981, not 1994. I am a diehard Expos fan,
and that was the year that truly and forever broke the faithful’s
hearts. I remember as if it were yesterday driving from Albany
up to Castleston, Vt., on a cloudy and cool late October day,
my radio tuned to the playoff game between the Dodgers and
the Expos that would decide the National League pennant.
That year was also a strike season, and because the Expos
(overall record of 60-48) won the second half of the abbreviated
season, they qualified for the playoffs. In the first round
they knocked off the Phillies, which set up the National League
Championship series with L.A. The first game, in L.A., was
won by the Dodgers, 5-1. The second game in L.A. was taken
by the Expos, Ray Burris hurling a masterpiece to defeat one
of the game’s best, Fernando Valenzuela. The third game, at
Stade Olympique, drew over 54,000 and saw another Expo victory,
4-1.
Now “les ’spos” were a game away from the World Series, with
the home edge. The fourth game, however, saw a Dodger blowout,
7-1. Which set up that game I was listening to in my new Chevy
Cavalier, driving up the Northway from Albany back to my teaching
job at Castleston State. It was 1-1 in the ninth when Rick
Monday clocked one that dashed our hopes, probably forever.
The Expos went down like gentlemen in the bottom of the inning,
and that was that. “C’est la vie,” say the old folks, but
for a day or two in October 1981, we did believe that “it
just goes to show, you never can tell.”
Steve
Swartz
Schenectady
The
Art of Best Of
To
the Editor:
Your
Best Of issue [July 18] had just one category for fine arts
(Best Museum). Yikes!
It’s bad enough that the public, our friends and our families
take us entirely for granted. But now you? To help alleviate
the shame, please allow me to make a few modest suggestions:
Best Artist—fill in the blank with your personal favorite
(mine is Willie Marlowe).
Best Gallery (Old)—Canajoharie Library.
Best Gallery (New)—Mandeville Gallery (Union College).
Best Gallery (Revived)—Albany Center Galleries.
Best Critic—Timothy Cahill.
Best Group Show—Artists of the Mohawk-Hudson Region (at AIHA).
Best Retrospective—Bob Blood at Schenectady Museum.
There—I feel much better now. Thanks!
David
Brickman
Albany
Metroland
welcomes typed, double-spaced letters (computer printouts
OK), addressed to the editor. Or you may e-mail them to: metroland@metroland.net.
Metroland reserves the right to edit letters for length; 300
words is the preferred maximum. You must include your name,
address and day and evening telephone numbers. We will not
publish letters that cannot be verified, nor those that are
illegible, irresponsible or factually inaccurate.
Send
to:
Letters, Metroland, 4 Central Ave.,
4th Floor, Albany, NY 12210
or e-mail us at metroland@metroland.net.
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