Letters to the Editor

Dear Editor:

(An open letter to the New York Congressional Delegation:)

Sexual assaults in our military are running into the thousands and are way out of control! Victims usually are required to report all incidents to their military superiors. A very bad move ... very little justice will come out of this idea.

I urge you to introduce legislation requiring Congress to create a civilian review board with power to discipline any accused military sexual predator found guilty.

This matter should have prompt consideration on your part.

Dear Editor:

I was in the supermarket the other day and the young person in front of me was speaking to the cashier in Spanish, and I noticed that he was buying four one-quart ice cream boxes. The total price was about $15 and he gave the cashier a “blue” Benefits/Medicaid card — with a picture of a woman on it. The cashier didn’t say anything about the picture on the card being a woman; she just processed the purchase. I noticed that the total amount he had to pay was zero.

My questions are:

1. Why did the cashier accept a card from a young man (in his twenties) when there is a picture of a woman on it?

2. I thought the “blue” Benefits/Medicaid card was for impoverished people and could only be used for food. Is ice cream now considered food?

3. Why are my tax dollars being used to pay for people to buy ice cream?

4. Why are “illegal” aliens allowed to get a ‘blue’ Benefits/Medicaid card and get food, prescriptions, hospital/doctor visits, hearing aids, glasses, etc. for free? While I, a person who is 80 years old and has been paying taxes all my life, must pay for all these things? Wh

y are my taxes being used to pay for all these free benefits (including ice cream)?

Can anyone answer these questions? No wonder the United States is in such a financial mess!

Dear Editor:

Walking along the six blocks encompassing Windsor Park and Bell Boulevard with my aide, I meet and greet beautiful people who smile and offer their services well beyond the norm. This neighborhood offers everything for rich and poor alike. Windsor Park, you are the sunshine in my life — next to my family.

Dear Editor:

Queens Chronicle Asst. Managing/Online Editor Joseph Orovic's article — actually expose would be a more accurate description — about an Abu Dhabi oil multibillionaire prince who would appear to be Mayor Bloomberg’ s choice for a Major Soccer League stadium, where else but in Flushing Meadows Corona Park, represents excellent journalism (“UAE’s Sheikh Monsour to be FMCP’s MLS king,” May 2).

Equally worthy of applause is the Chronicle’s editorial condemnation of not just giving away parkland, but giving it to someone whose wealth is directly related to a repressive government whose policies “are not ones that most Americans would find tolerable” (“No park giveaway to an oil billionaire for soccer,” May 2).

With apologies to William Shakespeare, the fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but at the feet of the current occupant of the office of mayor of New York City, Michael Bloomberg. In the almost 12 years he has held the office, he not only never lifted a finger to reverse the neglect inflicted on

FMCP, the second-most used park in our municipal park system (primarily by the less privileged), but has actively participated in giving up FMCP land, a nonrenewable resource, to private interests.

The expansion of the United States Tennis Association complex in the park; on the horizon a 1.4 million-square-foot shopping mall on the Citi Field parking lots, which were built on FMCP land; and a Major League Soccer stadium capable of seating up to 35,000 people are all part of Bloomberg’s romance with the wealthy and indifference to the little people. He fails to understand parks are the lifeblood of an urban society, or if he does understand, he is contemptuous of the people who need and use the park.

I believe if Frederick Law Olmstead, the genius who created Central and Prospect parks in this city and important parks elsewhere, was still alive, he would not break bread with Bloomberg, and justifiably so.

Dear Editor:

To the owner of a black Honda who hit my car parked on 62nd Drive and 69th Place, on April 21-22, causing extensive damage: I wonder if your conscience lets you sleep since then while I’ve been without a car.

Dear Editor:

At a recent press conference, President Obama renewed his 2009 pledge to close the Gitmo military prison in Cuba. His executive order to do that was blocked by the GOP House.

I agree with all the reasons Obama explained to the reporters. These alleged terrorists, serving years in Gitmo, deserve to have a trial — not in a military court but in a federal court. We all agree justice should be served. If found guilty, they should serve their time, like many other guilty terrorists are doing, in a federal prison.

Dear Editor:

The Queens Chronicle has done a great job in covering the recent local news items related to tobacco control and smokefree issues. However, I have to disagree with the April 25 editorial stating that the City Council proposal to raise the minimum purchase age to buy cigarettes in New York City to 21 should be dropped (“At 18, smoking is your call”).

There are a number of tobacco-control proposals that have been introduced into the City Council, all of them worthy of passage and signed by Mayor Bloomberg, but the proposal in question could be the decisive turning point in finally reducing the number of our high school-age students from being the next replacement smoker generation.

Let’s not fool ourselves to think that teens wait until they have reached the magic age of 18 before they try their first smoke. It’s very clear that kids start to experiment with tobacco as early as age 14 and most start at age 16 or 17. This unfortunate dilemma was verified by the previously secret tobacco industry documents that uncovered their research and subsequent marketing strategy to target mid teens to become new tobacco users.

The key point that the Queens Chronicle is missing here is teens who are not legally able to buy their smokes rely on their friends aged 18-20 to buy cigarettes for them. A 2001 published report indicates that 90 percent of persons buying cigarettes for minors are in this age group. If the minimum age is raised to 21, then, there will be a paradigm shift of how teens, especially the 16-18 year olds, will be able to get their cigarettes. Their sources will no longer exist. Those who are 21 years old are in different social circles and are young adults who either are in their junior year of college or have been working for a living for three years and generally don’t hang with 16-18 year olds and are wise enough by then not to buy them cigarettes.

New York City would not be the first venue to raise the purchase age of cigarettes above 18. Two Massachusetts towns have raised the bar to 21 and New Jersey and neighboring Nassau and Suffolk counties have a minimum purchase age of 19. According to a New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene survey conducted last year, two-thirds of New Yorkers favor raising the minimum age for sale of cigarettes from 18 to 21, with 69 percent of nonsmokers and 60 percent of smokers supporting this policy.

Dear Editor:

Re “Searching for a new vision of FMCP,” April 25, multiple editions:

It does not take a rocket scientist to make a decision concerning a Major Soccer League stadium in Flushing Meadows Corona Park. All one needs to know is the site is parkland in FMCP, a park that for years has not only been neglected, but systematically alienated piece by piece for structures and for organizations that have no legitimate right to be in the park.

The culprits are too many myopic public officials who do not understand the importance of urban parks. That City Councilwoman Julissa Ferreras cannot flat-out reject a soccer stadium for the benefit of a private, for-profit business makes it clear she is a member in good standing with the mediocrity who should not be on the public payroll. While Ms. Ferreras could be applauded for suggesting a coalition of private groups and companies currently in the park as well as those outside, she is not worthy of such applause because she has failed to make clear contributions to a fund that will only be accepted on a philanthropic basis.

Furthermore, while we are stuck with what is currently in the park, Ms. Ferreras should have made it clear, enough is enough. Under no circumstances, economic or otherwise, are the gates to be closed permanently except for passive urban park users. Her failure to say so makes one look forward to term limits that will replace her with an official who understands it is the public that is his or her constituency, and not private interests.

Dear Editor:

Liberal thinking seems to be on the rise.

A short while ago the Vatican agreed with President Obama concerning the need for gun control. Recently, West Point did an in-depth study on right-wing conservatives and liberals. The Combating Terrorism Center at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point released the study, warning against American “far right” groups including the “anti-federalist” movement and strong limited-government activists. It was also concerned with the ease with which they so flagrantly can obtain weapons.

The analysis was conducted by West Point professor and CTC director of terrorism studies Arie Perliger and entitled “Challengers from the Sidelines: Understanding America’s Violent Far-Right.” It also draws correlation between past mainstream conservatism and what it says is today’s violent “far right.” The study then goes on to laud liberals as forward-thinking while maintaining that conservatives harbor a more archaic mindset.

“While liberal worldviews are future or progressive oriented, conservative perspectives are more past oriented, and in general, are interested in preserving the status quo,” Perliger says. He also characterizes the liberal-democratic system as inclusive and “designed to emphasize civil rights” while far-right ideology inherently “excludes” minorities.

Perliger also identified limited government activists as belonging to one of three categories: “a racist/white supremacy movement, an anti-federalist movement and a fundamentalist movement.”

First, the Vatican aligning with liberal gun control advocates, then, the military-breeding West Point applauding the liberal approach to government. What could be next? Watch out NRA, The good guys are coming for you.

Dear Editor:

On the northeast corner of Northern Boulevard and the Clearview Expressway in Bayside, is a green area where the Soldier’s Monument proudly stands. The monument commemorates the sacrifices that our brave men and women made serving in the Armed Forces during wartime. Unfortunately, this green area is frequently littered. Recently, I picked up a bag of cups, remains of lunches and other bits and pieces of debris that some people thoughtlessly left behind near this symbol of honor. And I thought how disgraceful that this special site should be befouled with garbage, this site where we should be remembering and respecting our fallen heroes.

This is not the first time I stopped to pick up litter there. There used to be a litter basket by the bus stop in front of the monument. But it is gone. Again. My understanding is that Sanitation keeps taking the baskets away because people keep putting household garbage in them. But is it better to take away the baskets and have litter left on the ground by the monument and other areas? It does not make sense to me.

Litter baskets along much of Northern Boulevard keep getting removed. So where does the debris go? It goes in the streets, or is left on the sidewalks, or it clogs the catch basins, or it lands in green areas. I walk a lot and I have been astonished at the amount of litter that I see on my travels of late. Garbage and litter are also problems by many businesses throughout the community. And let’s not forget the dog poop issue. Why do some owners allow their pets to poop on sidewalks and then just leave it behind for someone to step in?

It is time for all of us to be more cognizant about these problems. If you have litter, please dispose of it properly. Please pick up after your pet like most owners do. Sanitation also has to improve its efforts in confronting this issue. All members of the community, including businesses, should do their part in keeping their neighborhood litter free and beautiful.

Dear Editor:

Every newspaper in the country should print the names of the 41 Republican senators (along with the 5 Democrats) who voted down the gun control bill. It will make it easier for the NRA when they mail out the checks.

Anyone who believes the NRA executives (the majority of whom have financial interests in gun manufacturing companies) give a damn about the Second Amendment is truly an idiot! It's all about profits! Profits over the lives of children! A perfect depiction of this whole debate would be the NRA executives (and the politicians in their pockets) dancing on a pile of money, strewn across the graves of the children killed in the Newtown, Conn. massacre.

Dear Editor:

The U.S. Senate’s rejection of expanded background checks for gun buyers was an act of cowardice and a catalyst for carnage. Those 46 senators who voted against it gave a green light to the next Adam Lanza, James Holmes and Jared Loughner. They’re NRA lapdogs. The gun lobby won a battle, but not the war. More can be done by political leaders and journalists to defeat mass murder enablers. Here are 2 approaches that should be followed ASAP.

1. Gun control advocates in Congress, starting with Sen. Chuck Schumer, must pressure the Treasury and Justice departments to challenge the NRA’s tax-exempt status. How can an outfit that spends $100 million on lobbying and pays its CEO — the gun lobby’s Lindsay Lohan — nearly $1 million a year, qualify as a nonprofit social welfare organization? The NRA is a pimp for the firearms industry, thriving on tax-free donations from gun makers who sell their perilous products to anyone. We pay for that. Taxpayers should not foot the bill for 32,000 gun deaths a year.

2. Journalists should follow the money, just like Woodward and Bernstein did in the Watergate scandal 40 years ago. They can track every blood money bribe the NRA paid individual legislators, and how these representatives voted on gun control measures. Focus must be placed on the five rogue Senate democrats who abandoned their party and defied the will of 90 percent of U.S. voters. How much did each traitor get to buy their vote? Reporters can obtain this data under the Freedom of Information Act. We’re entitled to know the current price for selling your soul to the gun lobby and acting as a cheerleader for child killers.

NRA RIP ASAP

Dear Editor:

You can judge a person’s character by the company they keep “Defending the chairman”(Serphin R. Maltese, Frank Padavan and Michael J. Abel, Letters, April 18) concerning current Queens County Republican Chairman Phil Ragusa.

The indictments of both GOP Councilmember Dan Halloran and Queens County Republican Party Vice Chairperson Vincent Tabone are just the latest chapter in the spiraling decline over the past three decades of the once-relevant Queens County GOP.

One way of judging the health of any political party is looking at the number of candidates who qualify for ballot status on their line.

Up until the 1980s, the GOP routinely qualified candidates for all Congressional, state Senate, Assembly and City Council seats.

After the 1982 reapportionment, Democrats eliminated the districts of Queens GOP Assembly members Rosemary Gunning, John LoPresto, John Flack, Al DelliBovi and John Esposito. Sen.Padavan voted for this plan as it protected both his and the late Sen. Martin Knorr’sown gerrymandered districts.

In 2012, there wereno GOP candidates on the ballot for one of six Congressional, three of seven state Senate and 13 out of 18 state Assembly races in the general election. Watch how many Democratic City Council members will geta free pass with no GOP opponent this year.

After being elected in 1972, Padavan listed Republican-Conservative affiliations on his headquarters’ storefront. In the 1990s the Padavan and Assemblyman Doug Prescott team proudly campaigned as your local Republican/Conservative team. But Republican and Tea Party activists in 2010 were disappointed by Padavan’s campaign headquarters. There was no literature, bumper stickers, posters or lawn signs for his fellow GOP running mates.

A party’s ticket is only strong when all the candidates, from top to bottom, work as a team. Republicans are in trouble when they are afraid to identify party affiliations and campaign on their own. Other Republicans were confused with Padavan’s standard campaign theme, “Nobody Cares Like Frank,” when he obviously didn’t care about them. Both Padavan andMaltese failed for decades to build a Republican brand name when they ran from it. No wonder Maltese lost in 2008 and Padavan lost in 2010.

Queens Republicans are on the way to political extinction like the dinosaurs of old! How disappointing that voters will have to look elsewhere for any alternatives to the Queens County Democratic Party machine monopoly.

The failure to build a viable Queens GOP is the inheritance the lastunderdog Republican City Council member,Eric Ulrich,has to live with.