10.26.11 home | north bay bohemian index | news | north bay | letters to the editor ### Direct Contact Thanks for your article on Shirley MacLaine ("Totally Shirley," Sept. 21). I have read all her books and would love to have her email address if you happen to have it, or a way to directly contact her. Shirley got me going on my spiritual journey, which Shirley herself has been on since writing Out on a Limb. Going within one's self (like Mandela and Ghandi) is the only way to work out what is going on in our violent, unhappy world. Margot Hays Australia ### A Clean Break The United States has been pledging since Gerald Ford was president to become energy-independent. The best way to do that is to create jobs. Investment in solar energy creates seven times more jobs than in old dirty energy like coal and oil. Clean energy like solar and wind power employ more than a hundred thousand Americans throughout the country, and it is an area of business that is growing. Be forward thinking and go solar. Jody Weisenfeld Petaluma ### Simple Math It's based on percentage. A Jewish friend of mine told me a Bible story about a poor widow who gave more than all the fat cats to help a greater cause. She was one of the 99 percent. Gerry Benway Santa Rosa ### Walkable Locale It's ironic how history repeats itself. Oliver's Market has threatened to leave Cotati if it doesn't get its way. In 1997, many Cotati citizens, myself included, joined forces with Oliver's to successfully defeat the "evil" Lucky grocery store. It was seen as a threat to Cotati's small-town character and, more specifically, to Oliver's profitability. That was why, behind a facade of "Keep Cotati Small" and "Size Matters," Oliver's bankrolled the consultants, political ads, flyers and all other Measure F expenses. Fast-forward 14 years, and now Oliver's is the 800-pound gorilla. Using the profits from its continued monopoly in Cotati, it purchased the former Lucky property. The proposed modifications to Old Redwood Highway that it now labels a "deal breaker" have their origin in the Walkable Cotati meetings from 2000—meetings that I sat in with Tom Scott. These modifications were widely acclaimed but now pose a threat to Oliver's profits. Cotati had Oliver's back in 1997, and now it threatens to turn its back on Cotati. It may be sandals now instead of Gucci loafers, but the tactics are unchanged. Steve Maass and Tom Scott should be ashamed of their ploy. I am. John Eder Sebastopol ### Look in the Sky I appreciate your coverage of least-reported stories ("News to Me: Project Censored picks old media's most ignored news stories," Oct. 12). I understand your writer's aversion to the evidence pointing to the 9-11 attacks being an inside job, and the report on geo-engineering/cloud seeding. I felt the same way. But the evidence is there for both. The geo-engineering is going on regularly over Sonoma County. Look at www.californiaskywatch.com. I'd like to see some reporting on this. Thank you. Bridget Breese Sebastopol ### Can't Stop Much as the lamestream-media tripe-sheets of this country would so delight in just blowing off the occupation movement, blithely dismissing us on their fifth or sixth page as the "disgruntled few," they don't stand the chances of a gingerbread angel in a rat hole of getting by with such a willfully omissive stunt like that now. This phenomenon, like an incoming meteor, is just too immense to ignore: the ugly cat is out of the bag about the so-called Federal Reserve Bank, and all the attempts at suppression by the tethered media cannot stop what is coming. Robert Hauser Vineburg Send a letter to the editor about this story.