Letters

--Susan Chacin

Berkeley

DEAR EDITOR:

Thanks to Spiro Agnew, for coining the phrase "nattering nabobs of negativity," and to "Anonymous" for "A firing squad of the left is a circle." How else describe the participants in the latest -- and most boring -- imbroglio at Pacifica, on which Marc Cooper tries to shed light.

Through the years, I have seen various radical/progressive groups self-destruct while conservative organizations flourished. Although it's fun and often accurate to blame the CIA, black helicopters and dirty tricksters, I am beginning to feel that for a large percentage of the ills we lay at the doorstep of the "other," we have only ourselves to blame.

At Pacifica, small groups of "activists" -- frozen in adolescence, with too much time on their hands -- are grinding axes unconsciously honed for parental necks. They feel threatened by any attempt at ideological flexibility, outreach or modernization. Under the guise of saving this, or freeing that, they summon enormous energy to subvert the organizers and poison the minds of the elder statespeople, the larger membership and the press.

The leadership, under attack, reacts, often heavy-handedly, ineptly or arbitrarily, and the fur begins to fly. Name-calling, power struggles and vindictiveness ensue. The doors close. On to the next debacle.

Meanwhile, the world in its handbasket hurtles toward its destination unimpeded by a strong, intelligent, cohesive movement to thwart the true enemy and its all too real "censorship, top-down conservatism and fascist corporatizing."

--Elizabeth Macready

Santa Monica

AND LEST WE FORGET . . .

DEAR EDITOR:

Thanks to David Bacon for his excellent coverage of the KPFA Berkeley Pacifica Radio story. As one of the first people arrested at the behest of the station manager at the radio station June 21, while expressing her constitutional rights of free speech and free assembly, I am dismayed by the costly and perhaps illegal use of my hard-earned dollars as a subscriber for 40-plus years. Listener-sponsored and community-based radio are in jeopardy. Stay tuned, folks. It's happening in your neighborhood -- at KPFK.

--Sylvia P. Scherzer

Emeryville