Put a McCorkle in It

I would like to comment on a part of Chris Limberis' TUSD article "Fantasy Ireland" (July 5): "Mary Belle McCorkle ... cast the necessary vote to install her daughter as principal at Dietz Elementary School."

I do not know what Chris is implying here or what he would have the readers believe. Installing Lisa McCorkle as principal of Dietz was a gift to students, staff and TUSD. I work with her. She is a wonderful principal. I just wanted to tell the whole story.

--Susan Syracuse

Revenge of the Farts

I was offended by Dave Devine's commentary "Pompous Old Farts" (July 5).

Devine confuses style with substance. The hyperbolic marketing style of Tom Brokaw's The Greatest Generation tells us more about the marketers at Brokaw's publishing house than it does about how World War II vets regard themselves. The incredibly ugly placement of the World War II monument on the Mall tells us more about the "brown-nosing" of politicians than it does about how the vets want to be remembered.

Devine's most outlandish assertion comes in the last paragraph. He tells us that the "Greatest Generation" was "just a group of people who did their jobs." Well, last time I checked, my job does not mean that I have to storm a Normandy beach over the dead bodies of my friends, freeze in the Hurtgen forest while being shelled unrelentingly by the Germans, or have my arm blown off by a panzerfaust and scream for a medic who is too busy with someone else. My job does not entail the assumption that I am willing to be killed in the name of pushing back the fascist war machine of Germany, Japan and Italy.

It seems like boomers and Xers just assume that World War II was gonna be won by the Allies no matter what, so what's the big deal? Do some reading about it; talk to some vets. It was not a done deal; it was a terrible struggle to win. What if the other side had prevailed? They believed in master races; they bowed to dictatorship. Was your average GI thinking about the Bill of Rights in his foxhole? No. Were some vets racist and sexist? Yes. But thank God they won the war.

Build them a huge monument. They deserve it. They fought and died representing our country and our country, thank God, has founding documents that we can appeal to that hold certain truths to be "self-evident"--like equality.

--Regina Kelly
Executive Director
Voices: Community Stories Past and Present, Inc.

To the Editor,

Let me commend the Tucson Weekly and Dave Devine for his incredibly insightful and poignant essay. I admire your journalistic integrity and courage. It took a lot of balls to publish that.

My brother committed suicide last August, but he really died 30 years ago in Vietnam. One of his duties was to dispose of corpses, stacked like firewood, in the back of his five-ton truck. The living really do envy the dead.

Although I served in Germany, I could never share his pain or personal demons. My Mexican-immigrant parents remained in denial, assuming that contributing cannon fodder would prevent them from being deported--what a lucky man my brother was!

--Jose Vasquez

To the Editor,

China, Chairman Mao and the Chinese people were most assuredly not "pivotal in defeating the Japanese" during World War II. To claim that they were shows an egregious misunderstanding of that theater's role in the war. China was most certainly a sideshow, and there is no non-Chinese scholarship that claims otherwise.

As for Joseph Stalin and the defunct Soviet Union: He and the USSR, by means of the Ribbentrop-Molotov pact, were allied during the run-up to Hitler's invasion of the USSR, and for this reason deserve blame for the outbreak of the war, not kudos for its end.

--Steven W. Wood

Star Gazing

NEWSFLASH! The Arizona Daily Star is trivial and insipid! Great article voicing what many of us already believe. It was fun to read, but broke no new ground. How about offering some constructive and workable suggestions for the Star?

The problem is that the banks, car dealerships and developers all own each other, and they're the ones who advertise in the Star. Naturally the Star won't offend them. The Weekly, on the other hand, has it relatively easy. You guys get your ad revenue from porno shops, restaurants, nightclubs and record stores. It's therefore easier to take on meatier local issues.

How very funny: By courting the big advertisers, the Star has neutered itself. The meek shall inherit the publishing industry.

--Howard Salmon