News

'Parents on strike' story didn't deserve front-page coverage

Letters to the Editor
Published December 18, 2004

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I am very disappointed in your choice of front-page news for Dec. 11. Amid news of a fatal shooting, an advance in cancer treatment for women and new equipment for our troops in Iraq, you chose to fill the center of your paper with a set of pictures and an article about untidy bedrooms (Parents on Strike: Now, those dishes . . .). Setting aside the ridiculous nature of the news itself, it boggles the mind that you would pick this as the story most worthy of your readers' attention.

Besides the other, more worthy, stories already displayed in what space was left on the front page, a quick scan through the interior of the first section shows a multitude of other stories more deserving of front-page recognition: Soldier pleads guilty in death (Page 2A), should be of great interest to everyone concerned about the Iraq war. Bush picks energy chief, loses homeland choice (Page 3A) helps highlight the changing administration in Washington, and how it will govern for the next four years. U.S. aid helped Ukraine political groups (Page 4A) is another important story, about democracy around the world. Even buried as far back as Page 12A, Israel seeks coalition government, seems far more worthy of being front-page news, given how it may affect terrorism and global politics.

It's not that I feel you shouldn't have covered the story at all. It's simply that I feel it to be far less appropriate front-page news than many other stories being covered in your paper.

-- Ben Thomas-Moore, St. Petersburg

Who are the children here?

Re: Parents on strike: Now, those dishes . . . .

After reading the Dec. 11 front-page article about parents camping outside of their home, I found myself rather shocked, and for many reasons. First, that such an article was considered front-page material, and second, that these parents are being so freely allowed to treat their kids as if they were some kind of hired help.

It's sad to think that the largest crisis in these adults' lives is their son not tucking his socks all the way into his drawer. What are these parents really teaching their children - that if you throw a large enough fit you'll get your way eventually? I don't think those so-called adults should be able to raise children. They should have thought of hiring a maid before they had children - it's cheaper than having kids - because that's apparently all they wanted.

-- Evelyn Peters, St. Petersburg

It's not easy being a teenager

Re: Parents on strike: Now, those dishes . . ., Dec. 11.

Parents don't seem to realize just how busy teenagers are, especially this time of year, with exams. I put my part in at home whenever I can, but recently it hasn't been as much as I normally do. I still feed the dogs, clean my bathroom, set the dinner table and put away groceries. I can't help it if I can't dust the whole house or mop the floors every day. I just don't have time.

I understand that health is important, but so is school. We've been taught our whole lives that getting a good job will help us in life, which means that we need an education. But how is it possible to maintain good grades to get into college, keep up with things you have to do at home and at least getting an hour or two a week of relaxation time? It's nearly impossible with the courses that students are taking nowadays!

Our work at school is hard enough, but to be pressured at home too can make someone just want to crash and be stressed out.

-- Nava Cohen, Spring Hill

Orchestra deserves its donations

Re: Be diligent before donating, editorial, Dec. 11.

As a donor, I thought your end-of-year message was timely, accurate and helpful. As a volunteer for the Florida Orchestra, I'm perplexed with the rationale of the study that grouped our orchestra with the other Tampa Bay organizations that rated a "poor" one-star rating.

As you suggested, I did my homework and sifted through the recommended Web sites and rankings with interesting results.

Peer analysis: We were compared to orchestras in Buffalo, Colorado, San Diego and Kansas City, most if not all with permanent homes in cities with abundant corporate benefactors. Contrast that with our orchestra, lacking a permanent home with fewer corporate benefactors while bearing the extra burden of playing in three rented venues throughout Tampa Bay as well as concerts throughout the state.

Organizational efficiency: fundraising expenses of 9.1 percent, an acceptable percentage and hardly fitting of your description of "an organization that gives more to fundraisers than people in need."

Organizational capacity: We are well aware that our revenue growth must exceed growth of expenses. Strategies are being executed to improve working capitol ratios.

Overall rating: 39.36, or .64 of a single point away from a two star "needs improvement" rating, versus the stigma associated with one star and the rating of "poor."

Does the Florida Orchestra need to do a better job and improve its efficiency and in turn its charitable ratings? Absolutely, and our dedicated staff, advisory boards with 75-plus volunteers, as well as resourceful guilds throughout the bay area, are energized to make sure this happens.

Is the Florida Orchestra indeed a "poor" organization, failing to meet industry standards as compared to peer charities in its cause? Hardly. It is an amazing organization with a steely resolve, determined to prosper while preserving a 400-year-old art form, live orchestral music. It is our community gem.

-- Michael W. Doyle, volunteer, Board of Advisors, The Florida Orchestra, Tampa

Music is a worthy cause

Re: Be diligent before donating.

It upset me to read that the Florida Orchestra, one of the outstanding cultural organizations in our community, is not using my donations of the past 10 years wisely.

When symphony orchestras throughout America are struggling to pay their musicians and to educate citizens, young and old, of the value of music to our human experience, how can it be true that our monetary support does not "actually benefit someone besides a professional fundraiser?"

-- Naomi T. Stinger, Oldsmar

Another resource for donors

Re: Be diligent before donating, Dec. 11.

I'd like to commend you for telling consumers to check out charities before they donate. I have urged consumers for years to find out where their donations are going before turning over hard-earned dollars.

Your list of resources to contact was excellent; however, you left out one very important and efficient tool Florida consumers have at their fingertips. Most charities are required to register with the Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services and provide annual financial information. It is true that the department can inform consumers whether a charity is legally registered and how many complaints have been filed against it. But the department also can provide consumers with exactly how much of a charity's resources are being spent on program services.

The department is prohibited from regulating how a charity spends its money as long as no deceptive claims are made. But this financial information provides consumers with exactly what they need to know to determine whether they think a charity is spending its money wisely, and make informed choices.

This information is available in our annual "Gift Givers' Guide," which is free to the public and obtained by calling our consumer hotline at 1-800-435-7352. It is also available on our Division of Consumer Services' Web site at http://www.800helpfla.com/ I encourage all citizens to take advantage of this free information when making decisions about charitable donations.

-- Charles H. Bronson, commissioner of agriculture, Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, Tallahassee

News thieves can use

Re: Young bandits behind increase in auto thievery.

What is possibly gained by informing the public of how to break into a car? The article describes the technique used by young people, and even says the technique may not set off the car's antitheft device. Wonderful! I'm sure every potential thief in this area will be glad to know that.

-- James Bardsley, Madeira Beach

Truman made the right decision

In the Dec. 12 Travel section, Ginger Warder wrote a description of her visit to Hiroshima, Japan and the feelings that visit evoked (Horror and hope in Hiroshima).

As someone who was not born at that time, I too can absolve myself from any direct responsibility for the action taken against Japan. However, as an avid student of history, I am well able to understand and even agree with the use of this weapon by President Truman and those in charge of the U.S. military.

The war government of Japan avowed that it would defend the home islands to the last person, man, woman and child. From our soldier's experience in the Pacific, most notably on Iwo Jima and Okinawa, the United States expected horrible losses to our invasion forces. Further, by August of 1945, Japan still had a substantial military capability to resist any invasion and take a heavy toll on American lives before surrendering. The decision to use the atomic bomb on Japan seemed the correct one at that time. After 60 years, Warder should not be setting herself up to judge the correctness of that action.

Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor without warning in a time of peace was an atrocity. The unthinkable pain and suffering inflicted on those in Nanking and throughout China during Japan's occupation of that country was an atrocity. The horrific abuse and murder of prisoners of war in direct violation of the rules of war was an atrocity. Warner obviously needs to read up on the history of World War II before making such absurd statements.

As for her feeling ashamed to be an American, it is obvious that Warner apparently has little or no regard for the individual freedoms our citizens died protecting in that struggle. To make such a statement without a full understanding of that conflict and the reasons the United States did what it did only aid to tarnish the image of America.

-- Brian Pumphrey, St. Petersburg

U.S. losses were prevented

After reading Ginger Warder's Dec. 12 article Horror and hope in Hiroshima, all I can say is, if she's ashamed of being an American because of the atomic bomb, then shame on her. It's a good bet that on Aug. 6, 1945, she had no relatives fighting in the Pacific and awaiting the invasion of Japan.

I had a brother there (one in Italy, too), and I'm glad that at 86 he's still alive and kicking. There's a good chance he wouldn't have made it if the invasion occurred.

Japan got what it asked for and what it deserved. I'd rather have thousands of enemy civilians die than one American GI. God bless Col. Paul Tibbets, God bless our fighting men and women, and God bless the U.S.A.

-- Murray Harris, St. Petersburg

A beautiful bridge - within budget

Re: France opens a sky-high highway, Dec. 15.

In your front-page blurb on the new Millau bridge in France, you might have added some interesting facts about its construction. The bridge was built entirely with private funding (hence the higher toll), and it was completed on schedule and within budget. How many local projects could boast this kind of success, let alone rising to aesthetic masterpieces?

-- Ashley Soleil Haselwood, Lutz

Bring French engineers to Florida

Re: France opens a sky-high highway.

Now we know the reason the French did not want to go to war. They were building something both beautiful and useful, instead of spending money in search of Bush's Holy Grail, aka WMD. Not only does it eliminate four hours from the drive from Paris to the Mediterranean, but it will pay for itself in tolls and not be a national burden that will require its residents to forgo their medical coverage. Now that it has been completed, their civil engineers will not have a project. Maybe Florida could cut its losses by firing PCL, and have them complete the Crosstown Expressway and Clearwater Memorial Causeway bridges.

-- M. E. Fitzpatrick, Palm Harbor

Gourmet cruelty

Re: Foie gras ban is the wrong food fight, by Gui Alinat, Dec. 15.

www.gourmetcruelty.com says: "Foie gras - French for fatty liver - is the grossly enlarged liver of a duck or goose. Medically known as hepatic lipidosis, foie gras is a disease marketed as a delicacy. Birds raised for this gourmet cruelty are force-fed enormous quantities of food through a long metal pipe three times a day. This process of deliberate and painful overfeeding continues for up to a month, by which time the birds' livers have swelled up to 12 times their healthy size.

"The process of force-feeding is so traumatic, and the confinement and conditions on foie gras farms (New York State's Hudson Valley Foie Gras and California's Sonoma Foie Gras produce all the domestically raised foie gras in the United States) so debilitating that the preslaughter mortality rate for foie gras production is up to 20 times the average rate on other duck factory farms."

During the course of GourmetCruelty's investigation, corpses of ducks that had literally burst open through overfeeding were discovered. Birds had choked to death on their own vomit. Necropsies determined that some of the birds had died of aspiration pneumonia - a painful condition caused when, during the process of force-feeding, food is pushed into the lungs of the birds.

Please help put an end to this cruelty.

-- Lucy Scheuringer, Seminole

We are not alone in grief

Janet Burroway's article Life after Tim (Dec. 12) is eloquent testimony to the fact that when we grieve we are neither crazy nor alone in the maze of feelings we struggle through. It is a lonely journey. Her talent for making concrete what for many is inexpressible is a gift she gives her readers. Grief can be a powerful tool for growth. I feel it is appropriate to thank her for writing it and the St. Petersburg Times for printing it.

-- Judy Kramer, Sun City Center

[Last modified December 18, 2004, 00:08:20]

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