Letters to the Editor
Cut to the core
Mr. Lunch:
I recently read the small article concerning the Chalfant Mercantile, and its former owners, Tom and Jan Johnson. First and foremost, I am appalled that Mr. Core would take it upon himself to “air” dirty laundry of two people who have, time and time again, gone out of their way to help and serve the residents of Chalfant and Hammil. Mr. Core is obviously ignorant to the fact of what a small community needs when it comes to goods and service. The Johnsons kept the staples available, helping keep travel to Vons in Bishop at a minimum.
I, for one, never expected to walk into the “merc” and find full shelves of every item available to man. What I came to expect, and receive, on a daily basis, was friendship, courtesy, and the willingness to go the extra mile in times of need. For the “merc” to stay open through the recession is a testament to the hard work and business sense of its former owners, Tom and Jan. I truly hope the new owners distance themselves from hate mongers such as Mr. Core, because they will learn in quick fashion what Tom and Jan meant to everyone in the community, and that their store was a place where residents came together over the years for both happy and sad events. On a final note, as Fire Chief for the Chalfant Fire Dept, the support we received from the Johnsons would be hard to duplicate for anyone, something else that I’m sure Mr. Core would have a hard time understanding.
I do wish the new owners well, and hope they understand that they have purchased something more than a “store,” they have purchased the “Merc,” and the “c” in Merc stands for community.
Rob DeForrest
Chalfant
Core shot
Dear Editor:
This is in regards to the letter that Jerry Core wrote in your paper. Why did he have to bring up someone’s laundry when it wasn’t necessary? Everyone has something that didn’t work out in life, but it isn’t put out there for everyone to trash talk. I’m sure Mr. Core has dirty laundry himself, and we don’t need people like him talking trash about our community here in Chalfant. Karma will come and bite you in the ass. Tom and Jan are good people; they did what they could under the circumstances.
TJ’s had the best burgers, the coldest beer and good company. What is wrong with a bar and good food? I hope that someday Mr. Core will realize he was wrong for his comments and apologize to Tom and Jan. And just to make it clear, the new owners live in Chalfant not Bishop. Get your story right.
Danise Grindle
Chalfant
Bluesapalooza cures MUSD blues
Dear Editor:
The Mammoth Unified School District would like to give a warm thank you to the community for their support of the temporary closing of Minaret Street for the Bluzapalooza Event the first weekend in August.
We thank the Town Council for their continued foresight to support community safety with their action with the temporary closure of the road.
We thank Sean and Joyce Turner who allowed our high school students the opportunity to solicit voluntary donations for folks that wanted to park their cars on Minaret for the event.
We thank Dennis Hartman that made a $1,000 donation to the high school marching band.
We thank student leader Olivia Wardlaw for recruiting the student volunteers and to Music Director Cameron Yassaman for coordinating the music volunteers and their parents.
Our students raised $3,500 in cash for parking cars, which will support our MHS Interact Club and their local community service projects and the MHS Marching Band.
Rich Boccia
MUSD Superintendent
Your worst nightmare
Ladies, Paul Ryan is your worst nightmare. Want a smaller government? Well this guy will put the government right inside your hoo-ha.
Todd Akin, a Missouri congressman running for U.S. Senate who, by the way is on the House Science Committee, let it slip that many in the Republican Party believe that if a woman is ‘legitimately raped’ her own bodily trauma will prevent conception from occurring. The conclusion which must be drawn from this statement is that raped women who did become pregnant (about 32,000 a year) must, somewhere deep down in their glands, have wanted to be raped.
Historically this loophole for the right to use federal funds for an abortion which results from rape or incest has been a longtime burr under Republican saddles. Sarah Palin in 2008, and the following 2010 Senate candidates, Sharron Angle, Joe Miller, Rand Paul, Christine O’Donnell, and Ken Buck, all stated that they believed no exceptions should be made for rape or incest.
Todd Akin has teamed up twice with Paul Ryan to sponsor HR 3 and HR 212. House Resolution 3 tried to narrow the rape loophole by limiting federal funds only to ‘forcible rape’ survivors. Exactly what that meant, no one knows.
Akin-Ryan also sponsored HR 212, a personhood bill, which said the “life of each human being begins with fertilization … at which time every human being shall have all the legal and constitution attributes and privileges of personhood.” Such an interpretation could outlaw some contraceptives which inhibit a fertilized egg from implanting in a woman’s uterus. Ryan and Akin’s personhood bill could turn some contraceptives into murder weapons.
Paul Ryan also sponsored a federal version of Virginia’s transvaginal ultrasound bill which forces women to undergo a medical procedure against their will even if their doctor doesn’t recommend it. Rep. Ryan has voted repeatedly to de-fund family-planning programs and he even supported the ‘Let Women Die Bill,’ which would allow hospitals to refuse emergency lifesaving abortion care, even if the woman could die without it.
As a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, Ryan has cast 59 votes on abortion and other reproductive-rights issues. “I’m as pro-life as a person gets. You’re not going to have a truce. Judges are going to come up. Issues come up, they’re unavoidable, and I’m never going to not vote pro-life.”
This year Republican Presidential candidates, Ron Paul, Rick Perry, Newt Gingrich, Rick Santorum all signed on to “Personhood” as their policy position. Idaho, Iowa, Indiana, New Hampshire, Virginia, South Carolina and Georgia are removing protections for rape and incest victims and forcing women to give birth against their will.
Under a Romney-Ryan administration anti-choice zealots could wipe out decades’ worth of your reproductive rights. I’m old enough to remember the days of back-alley abortion deaths. My fellow American women, vote Republican at your own peril.
Carolyn Crawford
Lee Vining
Police for profit?
Dear Editor:
In the recent article, “Rider on the Storm” (The Sheet, Aug. 11), your reporter recounts a ride-a-long experience on the Saturday evening of Bluesapalooza, where they were hoping to, “catch the most action.”
Well, I was the individual involved in the action missed at Lakanuki after 12:30 a.m., and I wish your reporter could have been there to witness the non-event of my arrest for intoxication and battery. Now that the author is acquainted with how the [Mammoth] Police operate, I would like to familiarize them with the other side of the equation: that of a vacationer who was served to the point of drunkenness and then served to the police by power-tripping Lakanuki employees.
After the Bluesapalooza was cut short by cloudburst I, along with many others, took shelter at the village where I spent the next few hours. After midnight at Lakanuki, where I had a spent some time drinking and watching the Olympics, I exited the establishment and was refused reentry. Okay, fair enough … I had spent the day drinking some of the most exquisite beer and listening to some fantastic music, and it is perfectly within a vendor’s prerogative to refuse service, but it was what happened next that was most surprising.
While outside the premises away from the restaurant, I was harassed by the aggressive door person and ordered to leave or he would call the cops. Since I was outside, away from the establishment, sitting down, carrying on a conversation with someone in the plaza, it didn’t make any sense. Was I supposed to leave the entire Village? I was subsequently arrested at the direction of the door person and charged with a litany of criminal activity, including public intoxication and battery, and spent the night in a cell in Bridgeport.
Now, I’m not an attorney, but when a customer and patron is served to drunkenness, surely the vendor profiting from the sale of alcohol has a responsibility to his customers besides serving them up to handcuffs, holding tank and hard luck! Just because I don’t generally respond to direct orders from overly aggressive restaurant employees doesn’t mean that I’m prone to violence.
Apparently by exiting the restaurant and refusing to leave the Village, I crossed some invisible, arbitrary threshold determined by the doorman of Lakanuki, beyond which I was treated with the utmost disrespect. One minute a busy contented restaurant with a paying customer and then going postal on the paying customer the next. Not a very good business model.
When I was released from Bridgeport Jail the following morning I had to hitchhike back to Mammoth. The Good Samaritan who gave me a ride said that I was the second person in as many weeks that he picked up that while vacationing in Mammoth, was picked up for public intoxication, jailed in Bridgeport, and forced to hitchhike back. Coincidence? Maybe. Evidence of a pattern? Probably.
I don’t make it to the Eastern Sierra very often, but there is pretty convincing evidence from recent fiscal difficulties in California that when municipalities are starved for revenue or facing bankruptcy, the fees, penalties and taxes are hiked to pay creditors, and public employee paychecks and pensions.
Is it just coincidental that police activity seems to uptick in these locales to reflect the new fiscal paradigm? Is this Mammoth’s new public paradigm? Policing for profit? Forcing the non-resident vacationers to yet again subsidize Town’s debts to the creditors and public employees? If my experience is any indication, I would answer in the affirmative.
One thing is for sure. After I settle the bogus charges against me, I will go out of my way to avoid spending any time and money in Mammoth in the future.
Gregg Wright
Sacramento
A tough go out here
Dear Editor:
In response to an article that appeared in The Sheet on Aug. 18 in regard to the Chalfant store, in my opinion, the article was both inaccurate and incomplete, particularly the comments by Jerry Core of Inyo-Mono Title Company.
Tom and Jan Johnson worked incredibly hard at the Chalfant Merc. Seven days a week, 12 hours a day. They obtained a license to sell beer in an attempt to increase revenue and improve store traffic. They did not simply turn it into a bar.
In recent months, Tom was diagnosed with life-threatening cancer. Obviously, from that time on, Tom and Jan’s primary focus was proper procedures and treatment to save his life. With personal experience, I know the amount of energy and effort required to fight cancer. For Mr. Core to say that Tom and Jan operated the store poorly is insensitive and pitiful. He should be ashamed.
I have been a resident of Chalfant for 25 years and have witnessed 3 or 4 changes of ownership at the store. It is a tough go out here.
My wife and I wish the best of luck to the new owners and I am sure Tom and Jan do also. More than likely, we will continue to patronize the Chalfant Merc and I encourage all area residents to do so as well. If we pull together, we might be able to maintain the store in a long-term, viable position.
Don Franklin
Chalfant
