Heartfelt
East Hampton
December 5, 2020
Dear David,
We want to send our heartfelt gratitude and appreciation to the East Hampton Fire Department and the East Hampton Village Police for all they did for our beloved Bo during his funeral on Dec. 4. It took a lot of coordination on their part to put together such a display of honor and respect for Robert Lawler.
During these difficult times, when the serious threat of Covid prevents us from being there in person to support one another when we lose a loved one, the incredible gesture given by our local first responders was a soothing balm on an open wound of loss. Seeing the firemen lined up in uniform outside Most Holy Trinity Church, knowing they stood outside the entire time in the cold so they could give Bo the same salute upon leaving the church, having the police escort the family to the cemetery on Cedar Street, stopping traffic at every intersection, it truly was a memory to hold dear and a reminder of just how special East Hampton is as a community, especially when it loses one of its own.
Bo took great pride in being a boy of Bonac and giving back to his community by being a member of the fire department for 40 years. So for that same community to honor him the way they did, from the bottom of our hearts, we thank you.
ROSE LAWLER KERIN
For the family of Robert “Bo” Perry Lawler
Recently Rediscovered
New York City
December 14, 2020
Dear Editor,
We were delighted with the article in The Star (Nov. 25) about an early film from 1915 picturing Fourth of July festivities in East Hampton. This gem was recently rediscovered in a collection of films at LTV by Robert Anen, postgraduate fellow with the Regional Media Legacies project.
We have been working with LTV and their extraordinary collection of film and video for many months. Regional Media Legacies is a project of New York University’s Moving Image Archiving and Preservation Program made possible with the support of the Robert David Lion Gardiner Foundation. It is worth noting that the Gardiner Foundation prioritizes Long Island history, and organizations with archives such as LTV are encouraged to take advantage of the foundation’s grant program.
Though their film collection is small, LTV’s video collection reflects 40 years of life on the East End and numbers over 25,000 shows yet to date, it is what we call a hidden archive. The aim of Regional Media Legacies is to help them to move forward in preserving this legacy for the future. Regional Media Legacies is providing them with a professional and detailed assessment of their collections so that, once stabilized, they can readily be accessed by the community and the world at large. It is a treasure of local history celebrating the life of a much-celebrated area.
We hope our fruitful partnership with LTV can serve as a foundational network to assist other local but smaller organizations to help move their own unique audiovisual histories into the light.
Sincerely,
JUANA SUAREZ PH.D.
Director,
New York University Moving Image Archiving and Preservation Program
MARIE LASCU
Project Manager
Regional Media Legacies Project
N.Y.U. Tisch
Pearl Harbor
Amagansett
December 8, 2020
Editor,
I looked at your online version and your feed on the cesspool that is Facebook, but couldn’t find it can you help me? Where was the story on the 79th anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor? Or did you forget it happened?
NICK PUPO
Being Widened
East Hampton
December 11, 2020
To the Editor,
I have just read among the current issue’s letters that Amazon has made a deal with Gabreski Airport in Westhampton. This illuminates something that was puzzling me deeply while I returned to East Hampton on Route 27 from Oakdale on in. The long four-lane section of Route 27 from the end of the area with the service roads on each side, all the way to the Shinnecock Canal, is clearly being widened, the roadbed for an additional lane eastbound being clearly almost complete, lacking only the final surfacing.
Exit 63, which serves Gabreski Airport, has particularly well-developed widened off-ramps. I was going to call a friend in Westhampton to ask if they were adding lanes to Route 27, but the answer came to me in your letters. It is being widened — for the additional truck traffic that will be going to and from the airport under the Amazon deal. While an additional westbound lane is only hinted at, the hints are fairly clear if you look at certain details of the work on the eastbound lane. One wonders how this will impact the rest of the East End with a six-lane highway at least as far as the Hampton Bays exit and perhaps all the way to the Canal, if I read the clues correctly.
The work that has been done has been accomplished with astonishing speed. One wonders about the approval processes, and, to repeat the concern, precisely how this will affect the rest of the East End.
FRED KOLO
On a Desert Island
Amagansett
December 12, 2020
To the Editor,
I often tell friends that I would be happy on a desert island as long as I had The New Yorker to read. After finishing this week’s issue, I’m adding The Star. Such great writing!
I got goose bumps reading Bess Rattray describing in her latest “Shipwreck Rose” piece how she would concentrate as hard as she could to “preserve forever in amber” certain moments in time. (I do that too; most recently “saving” a moment in the Catskills woods so I could conjure it up during a scary medical procedure.)
And yes, Baylis Greene, the point of a personal reminiscence goes well beyond navel gazing, at least for this reader. Thank you for encouraging some fond recollections of my own after reading Thursday’s “Gristmill” column.
And what can I say about Norbert Weissberg’s absolutely delightful “Guestwords” piece? I’ll never feel the same about a cup of coffee again.
Thank you all for livening up a rainy Saturday morning.
ALICE HENRY WHITMORE
Turned Out Great
Amagansett
December 7, 2020
Dear Mr. Rattray,
I hope you and your family had a lovely Thanksgiving celebration. For Mary and me it was turkey for 2 at our table for 12 — none of the kids felt comfortable with the travel restrictions and Covid protocols, especially the ones with babies. I put a 10-pound organic turkey on the charcoal Weber and left it there for almost two hours. A “wing and a prayer,” so to speak. Turned out great, actually, and I’ll share my turkey secrets with you in 11 months, so put the pen away. Mary set the table for a banquet with all the fixings. Perfect. Except for the 10 empty chairs, for which two Zoom calls were not a fully satisfying substitution. Still, we were thankful.
But that’s not why I’m writing, Mr. Rattray. I’m writing because I’m embarrassed, and maybe a little bit ashamed, of the amount of time I’ve spent thinking mostly of myself, my personal “needs” or aspirations, and not the genuine needs of others. As a result I’m often directing my worst language at myself. You know exactly the words I’m referring to, the kind of words even you might utter when you hit your forefinger with the hammer at full swing. Or cut your thumb while carving the turkey. Those words.
As you know, in my tireless (and tiresome) self-promotion, I’ve (self) published the story “What Vienna Saw,” which I’d previously (self) published just over a year ago in the anthology “The Soul Mate Expeditions.” I did this because I’d always felt that the story should be a film, a noir-ish, indie thriller set in Greenwich Village in the 1980s. I thought, “Okay, it’s a short book, quick read. It will be easier to share with contacts in the film world, whether producers or directors, than the entire collection of stories and letters.” But I don’t (insert one of those words) know people in that world! Still, undaunted and self-possessed, I sent copies of “Vienna” to several friends and colleagues who loved the story and promised to pass it along to their connections in the business.
For example, our friend Rusty sent it to his friend Billy Joel. Good. Then I thought, “Hey, I’ll leave a copy at Alec Baldwin’s house - he’s a neighbor!” (It’s not that I have his address in my phone, so don’t think I’m so [insert word] cool. However I did attend a Clinton fund-raiser at the Baldwin residence over 20 years ago, so that counts for, um, well, nothing. Never mind.) So I wrote a lovely note, placed it and the book in a one-gallon Ziploc bag and rubber-banded it to the split-rail fencepost at the end of Alec’s Yellow Brick Road. Even as I was doing this I was embarrassed as hell. Seventy-three years old. Fastening a book to a fencepost. Notice me! Jesus. Couldn’t wait to drive away and smack myself in the forehead with a rolled-up Star.
Doesn’t stop there, Mr. Rattray, so keep shaking your weary head. We have a neighbor in the Dunes who is an Academy Award-nominated film composer. You know that I know that he knows film directors! I will not disclose his name because this individual seems to be a far more private person than Bill Clinton or Alec Baldwin. Nonetheless, I did the same thing at the foot of his driveway: left the book in a baggie with a lovely note. This was even more embarrassing because I noticed some kind of camera mounted on top of the gatepost. What if he’s watching me jam a book into the fence, and it appears I’m trying to cut the fence or something? Shit! (Sorry.) I got outta there quick and went home to be ashamed. And that was it for the drop-offs. To my surprise, several days later I received a thoughtful email from a young associate in Alec’s New York office saying that Alec appreciated my thinking of him but that he’s not developing anything new at this time, thanking me for my understanding and wishing me the best. That was nice and I thanked him. It also made me realize I probably need to make another hundred “submissions” before someone actually reads the story and begins trembling with excitement. Will keep you posted.
But that’s not the end of the vanity expeditions, Mr. Rattray, so pour yourself another. As you probably do not know, I am the co-composer of a pop holiday song, one day to be a “classic,” right up there with Sir Paul’s “Wonderful Christmastime,” Mariah’s “All I Want for Christmas,” and George Michael’s “Last Christmas.” We recorded the song, “Dear Santa (Wrap My Heart)” in 2019 with the awesome singer Neysa. And of course at this point only friends and family have heard it. So I thought, “Maybe I could get our local radio station to play it.”
I spoke briefly with Bill Evans, esteemed on-air personality, meteorologist, and program director at WLNG, who said “Sure, send us an mp3 of the song, and we’ll try to play it!” Okay, it wasn’t quite so easy, given LNG’s history of playing the classics, from the 1950s to the 1980s. Still, I figured that by 2050, “Dear Santa” will be right there, so maybe they’ll give it a shot. But right now we could use an assist from our elves, Mr. Rattray. I’m referring, of course, to my 63 readers (there’s been a spike since the pandemic. I know, that’s messed up). So let’s all call WLNG radio and request “Dear Santa” 631-725-2300. But don’t use my name; it’ll seem like an obvious self-promotion move. Duh.
Wake up, Mr. Rattray. I feel better after that “cleansing.” I now realize it’s time to walk on the bright side of the road, and begin thinking of others in this season of good will. Also, the old Catholic guilt is definitely kicking in, having a positive impact on my charitable giving this year, so that’s a plus for sure.
And finally, I was able to convince our president that he was not, in fact, re-elected. That was a tough one, but apparently someone had passed along the previous letter describing in detail plans for the Donald J. Trump Presidential Library, Casino, and Tower. He loved it and is now focused almost exclusively on the build and securing funding before Jan. 20 for the 163-floor tower. You’re welcome, and happy holidays to all! (Oh, did I mention that “What Vienna Saw” is available at BookHampton? Hey, it’s not like I’m thinking of myself — just the people on your gift list. You’re welcome again.)
Cheers,
LYLE GREENFIELD
Finer Points
Wainscott
December 13, 2020
Dear David,
It never ends well when arrogant men draw lines on a map deciding “who belongs where” — the Levant in 1916, India’s partition creating Pakistan in 1947, Wainscott in 2021. The map proposed by Citizens for the Preservation (Privatization) of Wainscott of a “new” Wainscott Incorporated appears to remove those north of the highway on the east side of Hedges Lane, north side of Merchants Path, Georgica Woods, and various other easterly regions, disenfranchising roughly 80 homes. The right to Wainscott beach access that these homeowners currently have increases their property values. So arrogant men with a Sharpie decided they must now pay a fee to go to the beach they most likely have used in the past or venture all the way to Amagansett. And they will not even be allowed to vote on incorporation!
The C.P.W. seems hell-bent on rushing through incorporating Wainscott when very few people who it will actually affect know much about any of these finer points. Why the rush? We have been a hamlet for the last 350 years I think we should wait until the Covid crisis is over to better inform those most impacted and least likely to attend Zoom “meetings.”
Oh, but it is not really about what is best for all Wainscott residents, just the chosen few who formed a political action committee of private/secret donors who can afford to hire lawyers, expensive consultants, engineers, advertising agencies to run slick P.R. campaigns and PowerPoint presentations at Zoom meetings.
The C.P.W. performance at the December citizens advisory committee was a sham. Their proposed budget was a skeleton of what a proper budget would cover. Not to mention one of their slick tag lines is “Independence from East Hampton Town,” when what they proposed was just renting back at a higher cost to taxpayers the exact same boards: planning, zoning, and architectural review. Perhaps their real ad should read: “We really just plan to use the same government but rent it back at a higher rate to the taxpayers. Why pay less!”
Seems to me the working folks who live here have been overlooked and not even consulted about their higher taxes coming. The arrogance is appalling and shameful. This issue needs more time and a lot more consideration before it gets rushed ahead and put to a vote by the chosen few with more money than. . . .
Best,
DOREEN A. NIGGLES
Save the Whales?
Springs
December 13, 2020
David,
Thank you for your sharp editorial pointing out that the organizers of a protest in Wainscott against the wind-farm cable route had used an image of the wrong whale, a humpback, on their posters. The mistake exposes the glib opportunism of the leadership of the Wainscott wind farm opponents who were behind the event.
“Who’s not all in to ‘Save the Whales!’ Eureka!” Si Kinsella, the wind farm Don Quixote, must have thought when the idea crossed his radar to link the issue of offshore wind to the plight of right whales. (Although babies might have been even more effective; who doesn’t love babies?)
Whales, and especially right whales, do need saving. The protesters are entirely correct to call for studies into whether wind farms and the cables that bring their power ashore are hurting the vanishing whale populations. So far, there’s no evidence that is the case.
The known cause of the decline of the right whale, which is on the verge of disappearing from the face of the Earth, is human activity. We can do something about that right now. Right whales are a dangerously threatened species due to strikes by ships, getting tangled in fishing nets, and choking on floating plastics.
You want to save the whales? Live small, use no plastics (or at least as little of that Earth-killing product as possible), reduce your footprint on the planet to reduce the need for ever more shipping, and push for laws to move shipping lanes. And, if we’re concerned about the ill effects of windmills and huge underwater electric cables — which we should be — look around in this community, home to the most voracious consumers on the planet, and think hard on why we need all that extra power.
The ironies here are so rich that it’s hard to know where to begin. Our infinite appetite for, well, everything is killing the planet, which drives the need for more sustainable power, which leads to windmills off our shores, which leads to a huge cable running through one of the most expensive ZIP codes in America, whose residents, outraged by having to host the cable, decide to use the plight of the world’s last right whales — a plight brought about entirely by human activity including the activity of those very residents — to put the brakes on the cable plan.
That cable, should it come ashore somewhere along the South Fork, might well be another human-driven nail in the coffin of a beautiful, almost mythic creature. But let’s not fool ourselves into believing that preventing it will save the whales.
There’s powerful, mobilizing anguish in the grim truth of a species’ extinction. But as an emotional tool in this self-serving political fight it confuses and distracts from what is really killing the whales — us.
BIDDLE DUKE
Not Good
Wainscott
December 13, 2020
Dear David,
Thankfully, The Star pointed out that incorporation is not good for the residents of Wainscott.
From last year’s dubious petitions never produced when asked for so the signatures could have been validated, cost factors produced by their consultants who apparently had faulty calculators, and now their estimate has ballooned by double and will add another layer of taxes that are unwarranted. Who anointed Alex Edlich as Lewis and Clarke to redraw the boundaries that have been here for centuries?
“Well, we have to draw the line somewhere.” Who the hell are you and your wife as the talking heads? Stand up and identify those whose checkbooks are behind the decision to disenfranchise residents, who may be the proletarian masses, who they decide aren’t worthy to belong. Barriers erected in the middle of roads that allow them to at least peek at the chosen. Please eliminate my street as well and stay away from us.
No mention of the seniors on fixed incomes and Social Security. Fears that they will be forced to relocate and leave their support systems here. The hard-working families that strive to provide the basics, whose costs are rising steadily. The mere selfishness and disregard for others that live here, too, is appalling to most — but not them.
Stand up and state the truth: Everyone knows their sole agenda is the coming electric cable. They have branded the town board as the evil empire because they don’t run and hold their hands fast enough?
The town taxes already supply us with services and these taxes will remain in place. Yet they propose bringing in an outside village police department, where it requires five officers to staff one car 24-7. Top-tier officers’ compensation will cost over a million dollars per year, yet we already have a well-trained department. Then their wizards just want to utilize the departments we already pay for. The incorporated village will become the complainant, and we the taxpayers are on the hook for the gaggle of lawyers, instead of C.P.W.’s secret backers.
They are hiding behind the Zoom scam and using the virus as a smokescreen. Their teeth are on fire to ram this through, keeping the entire hamlet from voting — why?
I supported them until their real agenda became clear. That cable is coming. Get used to it. When the first shovel hits the dirt, I hope they have a bugler to sound the cavalry charge as they pile the dirt in front of their hedges.
ARTHUR J. FRENCH
Exclusive Village
Wainscott
December 14, 2020
Dear David:
I write this in my private capacity and not as a representative of the town or the town planning board, which I chair.
After weeks or months of quietly gathering signatures on a second petition to incorporate the hamlet of Wainscott into a village, the Citizens for the Preservation of Wainscott announced its new village boundary at a Zoom meeting of the Wainscott Citizens Advisory Committee two Saturdays ago. Since this was the first time that the new boundary had been publicly announced, its full impact did not become clear until it was examined more closely. My quick analysis that approximately 30 houses on the south side of South Breeze Drive and on Cobber Lane would be cut out of the village was an underestimate.
In fact, C.P.W.’s new boundary would also deprive the 20 or so homeowners on Georgica Woods Lane and the east side of Hedges Lane, as well as about 30 homeowners north of Merchants Path, free access to the Wainscott Beach. Thanks to C.P.W.’s new boundary, a total of approximately 80 homeowners in Wainscott, not to mention hundreds of families in Northwest Woods, would have to pay for the privilege of attempting to park at the beach nearest to their homes.
C.P.W.’s paid consultants claim that the proposed village will earn $66,000 annually from parking fees. Presently, the Village of East Hampton charges $400 to park at its beaches (where there are large parking lots). Assuming a similar fee is charged by a village of Wainscott, that would amount to 165 parking passes. That’s a lot of Oldsmobiles crammed into the already-limited parking on poor little Beach Lane.
But the aspect of the new boundary which would make Sykes and Picot most proud is how nimbly and conveniently it slices out of Wainscott the modest amount of affordable housing that the town has slated to be built on Route 114, on the site once owned by Triune Church. While your editorial (Wainscott Village: A Terrible Idea, Dec. 10) is quite correct that the motivation for incorporation by a small group of south-of-the-highway Wainscott property owners is their dismay at the plan for an underground electric cable at Beach Lane, surely their dreams of incorporation are enhanced if their exclusive village does not include affordable housing.
The time has come to say that incorporation is a ruse. In February, when C.P.W. first presented the idea of incorporation, its representatives claimed that a village could operate on a budget of $250,000 to $300,000. Then, earlier this month, C.P.W. estimated this cost to be closer to $900,000. In my view, this new figure continues to be based on, among other things, absurdly low calculations of the expense of subcontracting the hard work of planning and zoning, and assumptions about the litigiousness of property owners on the East End, which have no relationship to reality.
Having lured Wainscott into a yearlong conversation with their now admittedly incorrect predictions of the real costs of operating a village, C.P.W. is now striving wildly to find some valid, legitimate reason for incorporation. There is none. The plain fact is that incorporation serves only the purposes of those south of the highway, who oppose the electrical cable, and wish to impose on their neighbors the enormous legal costs of that fight, whether their neighbors support the cable or not or have no opinion one way or another.
Very truly yours,
SAMUEL KRAMER
Default Setting
Montauk
December 12, 2020
Dear David,
Thanks for the article reporting on Gordian Raacke’s plea to the East Hampton Town Board for rapid action on reducing energy use in the housing sector here in East Hampton. Hear him, hear him!
Action to rewrite code so retrofits and new construction over a certain dollar amount have to follow rational guidelines to restrain energy-wasting heating, cooling, and other systems is long overdue, and can’t fail to win support from townsfolk.
Add egregious water use to that list of necessary code revisions, please.
Gordian’s remarks on transportation also incline me to beg for an answer to the question as to why parking lots all over town are not covered in solar panels. Newly installed electric charging stations are a step in the right direction, but the benefits will be much greater when the energy they use is generated by panels on nearby rooftops and canopies over the lots. Excess can be distributed to the grid. Please don’t use the excuse of aesthetics. A quick glance at the power lines that now disfigure the charm of the East End is proof that our residents turn a blind eye to aesthetics when it comes to electricity to power our way of life.
So let’s make renewable, locally generated, and directly distributed energy our default setting, and bring our codes into alignment with our stated goal of energy self-sufficiency. And let’s also make it impossible for those water hogs to empty our aquifer.
Regards,
JANET VAN SICKLE
Need to Know
Springs
December 12, 2020
Dear David,
I’m a little behind in reading newspapers, but when I looked at your editorial, I find the need to know why you thought it necessary to belittle Congressman Lee Zeldin? Is it the liberal attitude you have: Agree with me or else?
Does it bother you that much that he won his election? He has served our country, both in the armed services and as our congressman. Will you write an editorial on Congressman Swalwell and research news on Hunter Biden? Double standard lives in The East Hampton star.
In God and country,
BEA DERRICO
Null and Void
Montauk
December 13, 2020
To the Editor,
Sign on a truck outside the auto repair shop on Industrial Road in Montauk: “Biden is not my President.” (During the weeks before the election the same truck sported Trump flags and pro-Trump message boards.)
Should we not have a sign proclaiming, “Zeldin is not my Congressman?”
Although I did not vote for Zeldin, I had accepted the legitimacy of his victory. But now, by insisting (without evidence) that the election in which he was returned to office was effectively rendered null and void by fraudulent voting procedures (a blatant lie), Zeldin implies that his own win be canceled. Is it not an outcome devoutly to be wished, that a deluded disseminator of untruths regarding America’s democratic election process be hoist with his own petard?
HELEN SEARING
Serious Question
Amagansett
December 12, 2020
To the Editor:
This letter is directed to the readers who voted for Congressman Lee Zeldin.
Mr. Zeldin signed the amicus brief filed by Republican House members in the Supreme Court case of Texas v. Pennsylvania et al., asking the Supreme Court to throw out the votes of the swing states which certified their electoral votes for Joe Biden, and allow those states’ Republican legislatures to “appoint” Donald Trump instead.
Friday night, the Supreme Court immediately and predictably dismissed the filing the same day it was completed (as all law professors and attorneys familiar with the court and constitutional law had foreseen) on the grounds that Texas had no legal right (standing) to complain of the way other states ran their elections. All three of President Trump’s appointees, by the way, voted against Mr. Trump on this issue. They did that because they refused to be mere tools of the president’s frustrated wishes, and took their role, of protectors of the U.S. Constitution and of democracy, quite seriously.
Lee Zeldin doesn’t. Please think for a moment about the initiative Mr. Zeldin wholeheartedly supported. It flew in the face of federalism and of states’ rights, which have always been vaunted as significant Republican values. It would have created a precedent that would have allowed, for example, New York to sue Texas, on the theory that Texas’s gerrymandering of congressional districts, or photo ID requirements for voter registration, diluted the impact of Democratic votes — in New York. It also would have permitted New York to disregard the victory of a Republican candidate — like Mr. Zeldin — and substitute the “appointment” of a Democratic replacement by the legislature.
This last point is extremely important. The Texas case’s “ask,” despite the dishonest rhetoric about “legal” votes which Zeldin has also echoed (he tweeted about protecting the “legal voters”) was not to recount all the votes and make some differentiation between supposedly legal and illegal ones. The Texas case’s sole requested relief was that the court “vacate the Defendant States’ elector certifications from the unconstitutional 2020 election results, and remand to the Defendant States’ legislatures.” Don’t believe me? Find the document on the Texas attorney general’s or the Supreme Court’s web sites and read it yourself. I am quoting the conclusion, page 35 of the Texas Bill of Complaint.
The Texas lawsuit thus sought to disenfranchise every voter in Pennsylvania, Georgia, and the other swing states. A huge fact getting lost in the general partisan chatter is that, if successful, this would have deprived every citizen who voted for President Trump of their voice as well. The assumption was, since this is a coup in favor of the candidate you favored, you will not oppose his coronation by the Supreme Court. If you value your vote, and would not want to see the same card trick performed for a Democrat one day, you shouldn’t be all right with that.
This was really an anti-democracy, and therefore an extremist, measure. Lee Zeldin is an extremist. I can’t read his mind, so can’t say for sure which of three mental states Mr. Zeldin was in when he joined the brief: 1. Gross lack of judgment, a possibly ideological inability to see facts on the ground (he tweeted it made “a very strong, compelling argument”, which it did not); 2. Cynicism, opportunism, and gross dishonesty, in support of a power grab even Justices Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and Barrett could not support, or 3. Abject fear of the consequences of Donald Trump’s anger if he did not go along. There does not seem to be a fourth possibility, and any of these choices calls into serious question Lee Zeldin’s ability to provide leadership as a congressman for our district. Though I personally feel certain that numbers 2 or 3, or a combination, are his likely mind-set, even if number 1 were true, I still think we deserve leadership, conservative or liberal, with clear eyes and an ability to perceive facts, and not a false worldview.
Whether Mr. Zeldin is too naive to serve, grossly amoral, or just a coward, he supported an initiative to cancel the votes of millions of Americans and substitute the judgment of people in power, breaking the most fundamental link between the American people and their government.
Ask yourselves this: If Lee Zeldin saw an opportunity to dispense with your votes entirely, while continuing to serve in Congress, what would he do? And how would you feel about that?
JONATHAN WALLACE
The Way it Goes
North Haven
December 12, 2020
Dear David:
We had an election Nov. 3, and Lee Zeldin won, having gotten tons of campaign money from his cunning leader, Trump, to guarantee him getting a fourth term. Remember, Lee’s office supposedly represents all of the citizens of Suffolk County.
Well okay, folks, Zeldin won, and we are still stuck with him for another two years. That’s the way it goes in a true democracy. Elections matter, despite his embarrassing total commitment to Trump, rather than to the folks here in Suffolk County.
How is it that the federal election system that gave Zeldin his fourth term can be totally corrupt, according to Lee, but only where Biden won? This pattern of phony fantasy accusations was seen in the states where Republicans lost, but ironically everything was perfect in the states where they got elected.
This logical absurdity is pathetic and so beneath credibility, I had hoped Zeldin would have finally distanced himself from his loser, lame duck president, to start doing his job representing us in Suffolk. Actually Zeldin chose to continue pandering, as an indentured water boy, to comply with the insane demands of the deposed candidate. In his own Twitter words, Lee said: quote, The lawsuit filed by TX to the Supreme Court and supported by many others throughout the U.S. is a very strong, compelling argument in favor of & defending the constitution, law, and legal voters of Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin, etc. It’s a must read detailing eye-popping, confirmed wrongdoing, end quote.
Lee then proudly joined the Texas lawsuit before the U.S. Supreme Court, attempting to nullify the election results of four states. Clearly, our Suffolk “representative” has virtually no interest in actually representing any meaningful interests of Suffolk County’s. This man prefers to crash with a falling star.
Even Trump’s handpicked Supreme Court justices couldn’t buy this argument. Late Friday came this announcement from the Dallas Morning News: Quote, WASHINGTON – The U.S. Supreme Court finalized the ouster of President Donald Trump late Friday, soundly rejecting a demand from Texas to nullify 10.4 million votes in four states that put President-elect Joe Biden over the top. Seventeen states that Trump carried had backed Texas’ request, while 25 others, including two where Biden was victorious, had filed motions opposing the idea that one state can meddle in another’s elections, end quote.
ANTHONY CORON
Mixed Salad
East Hampton
December 14, 2020
To the Editor:
Democracy has taken a beating during the past four years. From the day Trump was sworn in, the moral yardstick we used to measure presidents by morphed into a moral slide rule, constantly adjusted by obsequious Republicans anxious to cover for the lies Trump spewed nearly every time he opened his mouth. We’ve been inching our way toward this crisis ever since.
And now, when Americans handed Donald Trump a resounding seven-million-vote defeat, Trump is doing what he has done his entire life — threatening friends and enemies alike to do his bidding and flooding the courts with frivolous cases. The lawsuit filed by Texas, a mixed salad of lies, debunked claims, and crackpot conspiracy theories that had already been rejected by state and local courts, was a frightening attempt to have the Supreme Court throw out the legal votes of 20 million people in four states.
Lee Zeldin joined in on the assault on America, signing a brief backing the lawsuit, along with 125 of his fellow House Republicans. That so many in the Republican Party have revealed themselves to be willing to steal a presidential election is a warning to us all: American democracy may still be standing, but it is on very shaky ground.
Sincerely,
CAROL DEISTLER
I Should Embrace?
East Hampton
December 14, 2020
Dear David,
Here we are, all this talk about coming together. Fortunately or unfortunately this will never happen. What all your left-wing writers forget about is how this country was founded and why.
Basic history tells us of British rule and why we wanted to break away. You know, the Boston Tea Party and the many skirmishes with the British. Right from day one, we had the loyalists to the crown and the colonists who wanted freedom. If you do a little research this was a big spilt. Right or wrong, left or right, split!
So after all the negative press, senseless investigations, and bashing of our president, I should embrace the other side and work together like we’re all warm and fuzzy? That’s bullshit. Even in your Letters to the Editor pages, which are my favorite section, you can see the opposite sides. You have the sane and civil writings of Bea Derrico and then we have the weekly rantings of Neil Hausig. His festering mind comes up with the liberal thoughts of a madman about to become unhinged. And of course, it’s all anti-Trump. He should spend some worthwhile time and investigate the testimony of the gal caught pulling the suitcases out from under the table during the election. You know, when the counting room was vacated due to a broken water main!
And by the way Bea, Biden-Harris won’t speak up about the violence from Antifa and B.L.M. Those folks are on the payroll somehow! Anyway, here is one fact that can’t be spun: Donald J. Trump, as president of the United States, did in fact spearhead the development of the vaccine for the China virus. Biden-Harris gets zero credit.
Yours to command,
JEFFREY PLITT
Bigger Picture
East Hampton
December 13, 2020
Dear David,
I want to thank the author of the letter from last week titled “Speaking Up.” Ms. Moore spoke the truth. Unfortunately there is this one particular person who continues to speak lies almost every week when submitting her letters to the paper. Her accusations are all falsehoods.
Is it possible to start putting disclaimers on letters from Trump supporters who spew hurtful and ridiculously false information? Just like Facebook and Twitter are doing now? Okay, maybe not. However, the bigger picture for me is how can there be so many people in our country who continue to repeat the outlandish, hateful, racist, and completely false information that our current president puts out every day. He talks about fake media? How dare he. He is the fake media. Everything that comes out of his mouth is lies. He is a very sick man.
Instead of addressing the pandemic — and spreading the virus among his staff, friends and family — he is obsessing and filing lawsuits to try and save face from his loss of the election.
I’m so disgusted by the politicians who are still stuck to the president’s backside, supporting his lies. He lost, and thank God he did. I am looking forward to seeing him and the rest of the swamp being escorted from the White House on Jan. 20, 2021.
Next stop for him and anyone else in his administration who committed a crime: a small cell in one of the many penitentiaries available to house criminals like him.
Thanks for the outlet to express my opinion.
DEBORAH GOODMAN
Personality Disorder
East Hampton
December 8, 2020
Dear David,
As two wise friends pointed out recently, “There’s so much false nonsense out there, it’s disturbing that people actually believe it.” I couldn’t agree more. Some ardently follow a particular “news” station and think it’s actually the truth. It’s rather like throwing junk into a machine that spins it up and serves it up to their loyal followers as if it were magical cotton candy.
But the dominoes are falling, not in one fell swoop, alas, but one by one they’ve admitted the current presidency is finished. Very soon he’ll be going to his mansion in the warm climes. I hear Melancholia is already packing her bags. Good, she’s got a young boy to finish raising and that’s more important than catering to a man-child lunatic husband. I almost feel sorry for her. She got caught in his web. Narcissists are charming. You often don’t know the trap until you’re well enmeshed in it. But she knows, as we all do, that her husband lost the election fair and square. He tried his cheating ways as usual, but this time it backfired, and he was bested by sensible citizens, voting in droves.
We’re on the road to recovery, refurbishing our country so we can recognize her and be proud of her. Like when there was actual leadership, once upon a time. It was never perfect, nothing is, but there was an order to things, possibility for improvement, and a willingness to do such. I think it’s called democracy.
Narcissistic behavior may at first glance seem amusing if you don’t actually live with or love someone with it. But it’s very harmful emotionally to others. It’s not conceit, as some wrongly think, it’s much darker and damaging and can be downright sociopathic at times, psychopathic, in the extreme. You’re lucky if you can escape it. But when one man holds all the power in the country and has this personality disorder, it’s dangerous when not kept in check. One believes they are God. Think of any dictator. You don’t feed the monster; you defeat him before he destroys the country. Narcissists lack a conscience, so there’s no concern for collateral damage, ever. It’s a game to them and one they must win at any cost.
The harm that has been done by the antics and incompetence of the Narcissist in Chief during this terrible pandemic is unforgivable. If only he had listened to reason. A narcissist doesn’t. He rails against whomever to cast blame. The next guy, gal, another country, science, God, anyone, bar himself. His need to be liked and adored is the goal, while he plots to win, caring only for one person — himself.
As a result of having such a type in the White House, the lives of hundred of thousands of Americans were lost. Did he invent the virus? No, of course not, but he denied it and then made fun of it. Over and over. He pooh-pooped mask wearing and made believe it wasn’t a deadly pandemic. He didn’t want his reign marred by such a thing. It was, anyway. He is an abomination, and the addiction of his “ism” during his time in office, and still, must be squashed immediately, cut at the root, become a distant bad memory for the greater good of all Americans. Like all diseases of the mind, there’s treatment: detox, de-Fox; a regimen can be applied. I hear there’s much success in these new treatments.
The mad king was never for the regular people, the paycheck-to-paycheck people, the family people, the all the colors and genders God made us people, the innocent children, the fragile elderly. He related to none of us.
Remember, he was abandoned emotionally by his own parents. He’s very damaged. He needs help. He will have time to get it. Of course he won’t: Narcissists don’t take to therapy even when they go. But I don’t care too much if he cures his narcissism, though I feel for his youngest son, he didn’t have a chance. Maybe he will now. Run, Melancholia, run silent and deep. Save yourself and your boy. The other grown ones are too damaged and were never for you, they’re forever loyal to the king, Daddy Dearest.
It baffles and disgusts me that anyone could have supported him. A woman relative who voted for him, as she thought, “the Social Security could be in danger,” tells me she’s now so angry at him. “He’s finished. He lost. Shut the hell up, already. Why doesn’t he stop talking?” Better late than never.
She and I have known narcissists personally, so we realize he won’t ever shut up or admit he lost. He can’t. It’s the narcissism. He’d need severe long-term therapy — and so do many of his supporters, it seems, who are holding on to an apparition. Like a form of Stockholm syndrome, they follow him thinking he’s their savior, rather than a dark villain. I remain curious why his base is afflicted with the “ism,” are so afraid of peaceful protests by Black people, but not rowdy, armed white militia groups? Or fanatic fundamental domestic terrorists? Is it perhaps because they look like your white country cousin instead of the dark mysterious stranger abroad? Are people that naive? It’s worrisome.
Listen, change is going to come, because change is needed and has been long overdue. We are going forward in wide-awake mode getting our pandemic-stricken country on track. We need to get everyday people’s jobs and small businesses up and functioning post-pandemic, whenever that happens. Vaccine aside, though it’s happening, choose it or don’t it’ll help us all no matter if you’re on board or not. And wear your masks and stop your socializing like selfish idiots, and we will all recover successfully. Stop the hate. We won’t tolerate it. You’re outnumbered. You go live somewhere else if you don’t like it here. We’re rebuilding with or without you. Whatever God you believe in, we all have free will, as He and She intended, and we alone are responsible for our actions. Stop using religion as your scapegoat. God is busy.
We are proud citizens of the everyman and everywoman and will continue to fight for freedom earned and justice deserved for all until we finally get it right. We’ve work to do, so get with us or stay quiet. Maybe take a trip on a spaceship to meet your alien friends. Heard they left a new flag for you to fly.
“Much to learn, you still have.”
Merry Christmas and joy to the world,
NANCI LAGARENNE
Keep Pushing
Montauk
December 14, 2020
To the Editor,
It will not be over until all the legal votes are counted and all the fraudulent votes are discarded.
President Trump, keep pushing your way through the courts. You will eventually find a judge who has the courage to give you the opportunity to prove your case.
May God bless America,
VINCENT BIONDO
Ingrate
New York City
December 12, 2020
To the Editor:
Personification of ingrate and chutzpah: Ukraine, early 1900, when conditions became inhospitable, to say the least, his forebears emigrated to America and settled in the City of New York. They thrived, prospered, married happily, raised families, freely pursued their aspirations, launched businesses, eagerly integrated. One niece hit the big time in entertainment.
He and the offsprings benefited from the finest education. He entered politics in 1981, 18 years as congressman, elected senator in 1999, up to now attained the highest political ranking abutting the presidency. However, celebrating the Nov. 3 election, he verbally ejaculated a momentous, epoch-making standpoint scheme in a most-emphasized, vengeful, vindictive tonality: “Now we take Georgia, then we change America!” Change America! Why! Why a change?
Sadly bordering on diabolical, there is more to this appalling episode. His “declare” is not an original, hardly. In 1938 Germany Adolf Hitler exclaimed in one of his notorious rallies, “Heute gehort uns Deutschland, morgen die ganze welt” Translated: “ Today we own Germany, tomorrow the whole world,” Sound familiar?
EDWARD ELIMELECH WAGSCHAL
Owe Their Butts
East Hampton
December 13, 2020
David,
Watching Kelley Loeffler debate the other night was an incredible eye opener for me. Senators are rarely stupid, unconscious, incapable of articulating the simplest response to a question. Yet Loeffler answered every question with the exact same response as if only one question had been repeatedly asked. “Radical liberal socialist-communist Democrats are trying to destroy our country, and I won’t allow it to happen.”
Who are they, Kelley? Can you name anyone besides Bernie and A.O.C.? Can you tell us what they stand for? How about what you stand for?
Loeffler was a village idiot only to be outdone by the 126 Republican, white bread congressmen who signed on to the Texas lawsuit to over turn the election. A lawsuit that had no chance of winning because it was baseless bullshit. But 126 of them rushed to join the suit, crawling on their bellies, tongues wagging, searching for the generous nipple of the big loser. Because he told them to.
Real socialism-communism is about who controls the means of production. In the U.S. the people, not the government that represents the people, will never control the means of production. The problem we have is that democracy and capitalism relentlessly butt heads almost always to the detriment of democracy. This primary conflict is about the manipulation of the democratic system and the undercurrent of fascism that fosters the manipulation.
The connection of socialism-communism to the Democrats goes back to F.D.R. and the Depression, when the well being of the general population was considered more important than corporate bottom lines. But recent history (such an ugly word) clearly demonstrates that the connection has been completely severed.
For those of us who still remember the financial crisis of 2009, the all-Democrat government bailed out corporations and banks instead of homeowners and working- class people. Instead of solving the problem from the bottom up and saving the homes and livelihoods of millions of people, it went fat cats first. Not very socialist-communist. Furthermore, during eight years of Obama the minimum wage socialist-communist driving principle went nowhere. Bailing out the auto industry was the only token to the working class, barely 2 percent of the total bailout deal. So enough of this mindless bullshit about Democrats and socialism-communism.
History also tells us that the socialism-communism connection began in the 1880s and was officially dead by 1990. In 1968 the head of the U.S. Communist Party didn’t have a telephone. Yet, for every person who works for someone else they owe their butts to the Socialist Workers Party, the party that organized U.S. workers and gave them a say in every aspect of their working conditions — wages, overtime, vacations, benefits, workplace conditions, hours of work, retirement, Social Security, absolutely everything. What every cop, electrician, government worker, construction worker, et al., needs to know is that the only thing that kept them from $7.50 an hour was the Socialist Workers Party.
This isn’t something we debate or argue about. History can’t be rewritten because there’s too much to rewrite and it doesn’t fit into a sound bite. At the same time it is a warning that is clear and impossible not to recognize. Whenever someone, like Loeffler or the 126 cretins, mentions socialism-communism it means that they have their hands in your pockets and they aren’t trying to make you feel good.
NEIL HAUSIG