Mailbag
Mining Coming to Rosemont Ranch?
Last spring, you printed a Guest Commentary by Randy Serraglio on the potential purchase of the Rosemont Ranch properties by Pima County (March 17). Mr. Serraglio opposed the county's purchase, and he didn't take seriously the threat of a mining company purchasing those lands. As it turned out, Augusta Resource Corporation did purchase an option to buy Rosemont, and they are currently conducting exploration operations. As I write this, they have at least five drill rigs there, are bulldozing more roads and making quite a mess of what used to be gorgeous, rolling, oak-dotted grasslands.Yes, this is private land, and they have the right to do whatever they want. But if they find an investor to develop this open-pit copper/molybdenum mine, they will need adjacent Forest Service lands. Augusta's option includes 13,000 acres of mining claims, and those 21 square miles would be used for the waste dumps and tailings. Although past attempts to mine there have failed, with the price of copper doubling in the past few years, and the price of molybdenum up 10-fold, what might have been economically unfeasible in the past might be viable today.
While these activities are on private land, there is little we can do. But if the mine does move forward onto the surrounding Forest Service lands, that's when we, as owners of these public lands, will have our say. There will be air, water, light and noise pollution. So, what do you say: Do we want this mine in the Santa Rita Mountains?
Lainie Levick
Welcome to Geology 101 With Donna Moulton
I was amazed to read in your Nov. 3 issue ("Recharging the Public," Currents) that Bob Beaudry says Tucson Water is filtering CAP water through the Earth's mantle!I doubt that Tucson Water could afford a well 19 miles deep. Did Mr. Beaudry pay for this?
I would love to learn more about how this works. What's left of the water after it is heated to 1,000 degrees Celsius? How do they remove the iron, magnesium, aluminum, etc., that the water encounters in the mantle?
Donna Moulton
Snyder Bridge a Waste of Money for Such Little Mileage
Jim Nintzel was right when he said in "Full Speed Ahead" (The Range, Nov. 3) that people demanding a bridge over Sabino Creek on Snyder Road "evidently never noticed the lack of a bridge when they bought their homes." This small group, who would spend tens of millions of taxpayer money to create a crossing over Sabino Creek, impacting wildlife and disrupting the quiet lifestyle of neighbors on both sides of the creek, is doing this to save about three miles of travel to the northwest side.Yes, a trip from Houghton Road and Catalina Highway to Swan and Sunrise roads is about three miles longer using the existing thoroughfares than the two-lane roads that a Snyder Road bridge would utilize. To save three miles, they would spend tens of millions.
Maybe they can get the feds to pay for this, along with the Alaskan $250 million bridge serving 50 people. Otherwise, this represents yet another waste of limited resources.
Patrick Murphy
Your Congratulations Have Been Passed On
Thanks for running Dan Freeman's "It's Time to Give Vietnam War Veterans the Respect They Deserve" in your Guest Commentary column (Nov. 10). It seems to me that the piece, elegantly presented, made a statement long overdue in your good publication.Please pass on my congratulations to Mr. Freeman.
Peter Wild
A Really Cranky Letter With Lots of Big Words
Jeneiene Schaffer's disgusting embrace of decorous, nonthreatening demonstrations merits the contempt of all those determined to undermine a palpably deranged social order only benefiting the propertied and educated classes (Guest Commentary, Nov. 3).Schaffer perfectly exemplifies the nullity of progressive politics. Politeness is wasted, to say the least, on the soulless bastards who run this wretched racket by which 5 percent of the world's population forcefully (through bases infesting the world) extracts 50 percent of the world's resources so the corporate cream of the crap may enjoy a grotesque Babylonian lifestyle of ceaseless self-indulgence.
To get anything from these really realistic replicants, they must be threatened with the loss of everything. The high incidence of fragging during the Vietnam War helped convince America's "leadershit" that they faced losing a war or losing their armed forces. They chose the former, and that particular crime ended. Unfortunately, our rulers are serial killers, obviously immune to any appeal to conscience.
Far from having seen it all, Joe Bernick sees precious little. Otherwise, he'd know anarchists are hardly a new movement, but agitated for the eight-hour day, women's liberation and sexual freedom well more than 100 years ago, winning significant victories precisely through autonomous and spontaneous tactics docile, compliant organizers always find offensive.
Those tactics--not the stale, ritual impotence of nonviolent demonstrations--point the way forward.
Dan Todd
So, Wait ... Are You Saying Materialism Is Good, or Bad?
C.L. Alexander ("Businesses Have Just as Many Rights as Residents," Mailbag, Oct. 27) sounds like one of those caught up in the myth that materialism will solve all our problems. To put business ahead of people is ludicrous ("Hijacking the 'Hood," Currents, Oct. 13).To the writer of that letter, and to any Weekly reader who might agree with him, I hate to break the news to you, but businesses are started and operated by ... people.
Some of those people may be indulging in such behavior right in your own neighborhood. And some of them may even be card-carrying ... materialists.
But their materialistic pursuits do lead to some good things. I'm talking about things like jobs being created, goods and services being purchased and sold, and taxes being paid.
Martha Retallick
Remembering Limbo: He Had Fans Across the Country
I look forward every Wednesday night to calling up the Weekly online. Living in the Washington, D.C., area as I do, I can't just run down to the local Circle K and pick up a hard copy. No Circle Ks here, and no Weeklys, either.What a sad jolt to open up the Nov. 10 edition to find that Chris Limberis had died. I worked with him at the Star, although not closely. He was in news; I was in sports. But I was well aware of his work and the quality of it.
One day, he complimented me on a story I'd done about a Tucson teenager who had developed considerable skill with cutting horses. Chris' praise meant a lot to me, and I never forgot that he took the time to offer a word of encouragement.
Tucson is a lesser place without him, and journalism has lost a fine practitioner of a difficult craft.
Ron Somers
Correction
Due to a pre-press error with our printer, the theater information for Where the Truth Lies was incorrect in "Threesome Gone Bad" (Cinema, Nov. 17). The film opened Friday, Nov. 18 at the Century El Con 20, not the Loft. We apologize for the error.
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