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Sound Off for June 8, 2008
| Saturday, Jun 7 2008 6:57 PM
Last Updated: Saturday, Jun 7 2008 7:00 PM
Reader: I always enjoy reading up on various and unique food joints Bakersfield has to offer, but restaurant reviewer Pete Tittl's description and review regarding the "deep-fried burger" and Green Frog Deli was petty.
It's bad enough when The Californian reviews and rates Kern County Fair foods: fried Twinkie, fried snickers, etc. Now, I know I don't speak for all, but I for one would sure like to see some of Tittl's reviews and articles that don't contain the word fried or grease.
In a city that battles the bulge, I sure would like to read all the healthful hotspots Bakersfield has to offer. Thanks and bon appetit.
-- Jolie Brouttier
Jenner: I'd point out that Pete does indeed write about healthy food. But I shared your comments with him and asked for his response. Here it is:
"I can certainly back any efforts to promote public health, but this is America, and although it's not part of the Bill of Rights, we still have the freedom to consume any item, fried or not, that satisfies our palate.
"And while I certainly think that we provide plenty of coverage of healthful spots, there is significant news value in any restaurant that concocts something as unusual as a deep-fried hamburger. But to ignore any restaurants that fry foods would be a grievous disservice to the Bakersfield public."
Reader: Did you see all those great write-ups about Memorial Day celebrations in our local newspaper on Tuesday, May 27? I didn't.
Were you off work, were schools out, were some businesses closed? What for?
It would be good to read about good things sometimes and more about what goes on in our hometown.
-- Fern Alfred
Jenner: Are you kidding?
The top half of the front page was devoted to local observations of Memorial Day. Above the newspaper's nameplate was a photo of a woman surrounded by flags and headstones at Union Cemetery as she obtained a flag for the grave of her father, a World War II vet. The picture was the width of the page.
Below that was a story about local services, headlined: "Veterans remembered for valor, honor."
Reader: Monday's AP news story about the May 12 immigration raid in Postville, Iowa was puzzling. The story said immigration enforcement is imbalanced, easy on owners, hard on illegal immigrants. The only evidence presented was the sentencing of 297 illegal immigrants while no company official has faced charges.
The story omitted significant facts, so I located it on the Internet. The start of AP's article matched The Californian word for word, but where The Californian stopped, AP began the other side of the story.
I learned that ICE search warrants targeted the company and management for violating several federal laws, including harboring illegal immigrants.
Last year more than 90 of 863 company personnel ICE charged with crimes held supervisory positions and there were 4,000 administrative arrests. A week after the raid, Congress grilled James Spero of ICE, who said they routinely target and develop cases against management and owners. Kelly Nantel points out that developing evidence against employers can require complex white-collar crime investigations.
The immigrants who were sentenced pled guilty to using false IDs to get the job, false Social Security cards or numbers, and unlawful re-entry into the U.S. Five rejected the plea and await federal trial, as do 20 facing deportation for illegal immigration. This simple but compelling evidence explains the pleas.
In my view, wondering why no company official has been charged after three weeks of investigation is laughable. Because of evidentiary differences, to compare company officials to those 25 awaiting trial is a stretch, to compare them to the sentencing of those who pled guilty is to mislead.
One-sided stories are something other than news. Your readers deserve better.
-- Ray Stamper
Jenner: We weren't able to run a full version of that story because of space restrictions. I agree it would have been better if we could have published the complete story.
But I disagree with your conclusions about the story. The portion we ran focused on the one raid in Postville, not every immigration raid. Asking why no company officials were charged when more than a third of the work force was arrested is not laughable.
These days, human resources managers have a duty to ensure their workers are legally allowed to work in the U.S. One phone call to a Social Security office can reveal if someone is using a false Social Security number.
I do wish we'd been able to give our readers every word of that story. But it was not irresponsible of us to run the portion we did.
We'll watch for updates on that story, and if members of management face charges, we'll report it.
Reader: There's stupid and then ...there's STUPID!
I always look at The Day in Pictures and enjoy the photos. Tuesday there was one that to me is a very STUPID photo and perhaps should not even have been printed.
It showed a man using an electric leaf blower to clear his driveway after a flood. If he were to drop that, he, that lady and the dog could be killed. I never cease to be amazed by how stupid some people can be! I hope printing it does not give anyone ideas.
-- Phil Anderson
Jenner: Editors who selected the picture found the juxtaposition of a man appearing to confront the massive body of water in front of him with a leaf blower both futile and humorous.
Yes, if he had entered the water with his leaf blower, he no doubt would have put himself at risk.
But I can't imagine that a reader who looked at that photo would be inspired to wade into a lake lugging an electric appliance.
Occasionally we'll hear from readers objecting to photographs of activities that they consider hazardous. We get calls when we run a photo of a boy riding on the handlebars of another's bike. Back in the day when there was water in the Kern River in town, we'd hear complaints when we ran photos of people playing in it.
We do take care when selecting photos. We don't want anyone to do themselves harm because they tried to copy some risky behavior we depicted.
But just as we need to use good judgment, so do our readers. If we never ran any picture showing behavior others shouldn't try at home, we'd deny our readers a lot of great photos.