Letters to the Editor

Can we expense that?

Would someone please give Dan DeMaggio $20 for a blow job? But who would want to waste their money when he obviously can’t get it up or keep it up (“Rockette in my pocket,” Metro Times, Dec. 17-23).

Blaming his erectile dysfunction on almonds, perfume and the bald guy in front of him? How sad to see just how limp his fantasy life and his anatomy are when there are 20 beautiful women dancing their legs off and the poor “14-year-old” doesn’t even get to see some “snatch” — or was it “bush?” Is he mad because they have husbands and boyfriends and girlfriends and friends? Or is it because he knows if they had a choice between celibacy, masturbation and him, he would come in fourth?

Don’t tell me that he’s a pseudo-intellectual, I’m-oh-so-bored, fin de siècle, cooler-than-thou hipster. It has so been done. —Paula Jellis, Pontiac

Don’t tread on me

I would like to tell Jack Lessenberry not to cry about allegedly losing the term “liberal” to Hillary’s vast right-wing conspiracy (“Counting our blessings,” Metro Times, Dec. 24-30). After all, it was his Marxist crowd who stole it from its original owners: our Founding Fathers.

Long before John Stuart Mill perverted the concept, liberalism stood for freedom — absolute freedom. Freedom from all government intrusion into our private affairs, not just morally, but economically as well. These were new ideas back in 1776 (thus the term “liberal”), but they have been lost to the modern concept of Big Government and entitlement.

Rather than bemoan his group’s press clippings, Lessenberry should celebrate the fact that his movement’s core concept — unconstitutional expropriation and redistribution of personal wealth — has long been cemented into our social mindset and will remain virtually unchallenged until the day that the United States collapses under the burden. —Gregory J. Winters, Warren, gregory.winters@pc-bs.com

Definition of terms

You are right on target with your observation that the right has somehow managed to make “liberal” a dirty word.

I have wondered for years how come nobody confronts their redefinition head-on, but I think that’s the wisest course.

So we need to exhume a more sympathetic definition. I would suggest one from the ’50s: A liberal is one who places human values above property values. —Fred White, Bandon, Ore., whit1307@isp101.com

Time to shove off?

Good piece on reporter Steve Wilson. (“Role reversal,” Metro Times, Nov. 26-Dec. 2). I too was appalled at his unprofessional interview techniques and I e-mailed him my thoughts immediately afterward.

His response was that I did not watch the same video as he had and that it was he who was shoved.

I hope Channel 7 wakes up soon and dismisses him. —Sarah B. Mason, Bloomfield Hills

Re: Gina Pasfield’s article on wages for waitstaff (“Tips, screws & the minimum wage,” Metro Times, Dec. 3-9):

I have been in the food service industry for 35 years and have done it all. There are owners out there that will have you believe that it will destroy the bottom line. No way. As an owner of a 100-seat restaurant from 1982 through 1994 (when I sold) I started my servers at the minimum. After one year they got a raise to $3 an hour. If they stayed for four years it went to $3.50. My bottom line did not suffer, it got better! My help stayed longer, felt appreciated and worked harder than what I see today.

There are many issues to consider from both sides, but raising the minimum would benefit all involved. Owners would have a few less servers on the floor, thus the servers would have the opportunity to make more tips through higher guest counts. Service would not suffer if owners and management actually pitched in to help out on the floor instead of hiding in offices.

At $2.62 per hour, management can overstaff the floor “in case we get hit” which is terrible for the servers who stand around with little to do until management decides to “cut the floor.” —Paul Grattarola, Royal Oak