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Cops naysay downtown opening of Phantom Lounge
Why is this even an article? Any time anyone tries to open anything downtown the police and a bunch of dipshit residents complain. If you don't like noise then move out of downtown, especially if you live on the corner of 5th and Broadway. Why isn't there an article about Broadway Lofts complaining about the hundreds of people per night that park in the parking garage where Phantom Lounge is and walk across the street to HOUSE OF BLUES which has concerts every night? How about the fact that the property sits between the trolley line and the bus line which causes problems? I don't see them complaining about the fact that the main route for the fire station down the street is down Broadway, directly past the On Broadway Lofts. Talk about loud! It's a restaurant and bar just like everything else in the Gaslamp. You cant even get a nightclub license anymore downtown, ever. There are 5 licenses in the whole downtown area that don't require food and they cant be moved from their existing locations. SDPD is also not telling you that the crime statistics track every type of crime, not just crimes that are a cause for concern. Homeless people pee on the sidewalks down there and when police get called guess what gets reported as a crime? Is the new restaurant going to cause this crime or is it going to help police it by chasing away the bums that hand outside of the vacant space?— October 11, 2013 2:27 p.m.
I was a safety ambassador in downtown San Diego
People like you infuriate me. I grew up in the ghetto where there were gangs, crime, people getting killed and all kinds of other bad things going on. Guess what? I didn’t ditch school and smoke two blunts a day. Who are you, Sublime? Snoop Dogg himself? I went to most of my classes and got an education. So you graduated. Big deal. Any retard with a pencil and paper can graduate. Maybe you should have learned something in class and went to college and then attained a better job. But then again you are just a lazy complainer who thinks he and his friends may be “victims”. You should get out a dictionary before you use that word again. I have been laid off and you know what? I worked harder to find a BETTER job. I was going to join a gang but they were out of applications and I was going to “hit someone over the head for some cash” but I got screwed and had to find another job. Oh, the humanity! Personally I wouldn’t have any remorse if whoever killed you boy Meredith gets his eyes stabbed out and stomped to death in prison but that’s just me. However, in reading the story about it I just come back to one thing- What the hell is the point in your article? So we have crime and about a billion other problems as other readers have pointed out. So what? Should we call the tourism board and ask them to stop advertising. You may want to think this through since tourism dollars help our city and out economy. I would explain but you probably never took Economics. The money may even help your loser friends live off the system, join gangs, and smoke blunts all day while they complain about The Man keeping them down. I have had friends die too Vic but life sucks sometimes. By the way, you never said what the motive was behind the shooting? Was it random violence? Usually if someone has a “hit’ on them it isn’t just for grins and giggles. Here is some free advice- go back to the ghetto. Go to that place called the Library. It’s the big building with books. Get your free education and go to college which may, in turn, lead to a better job and a way out of your pathetic situation. I did it, you can too. Then I won’t have to worry about you writing stupid articles for the Reader that have no point whatsoever. I guess your point was conveyed with the statement, “It’s the fact that I saw this totally incorrect commercial that the bureau of tourism ran about San Diego.” Wow Vic, way to make a difference in the world. The only real surprising things about your article is that you talk like a character in Huckleberry Finn but somehow managed to put together a well articulated, although pointless, article; and, that you thought it was somehow newsworthy to hide the real identity of your badass friend who “hit two clean-ass doughnuts in the middle of the street, leaving the whole block smoked out.”— August 4, 2009 10:12 p.m.
I was a safety ambassador in downtown San Diego
Thank you for the great article Victor. I am now officially dumber for having read it. Thank you Reader staff for choosing Victor’s article for this week’s COVER STORY. Once again you have proven that your magazine is nothing more than something I can use to find an apartment, a pot dispensary, or use as a concert guide. Gone are the days when I used to look forward to picking up the Reader so that I could read something edgy that no one else would publish. This week’s cover story shows how far you have really fallen. Does your Editor owe someone a favor? Is Mr. Rice related to someone on staff? Please, please give me a reason to understand why such stupidity was published. Thank you Mr. Rice for letting me know that one of America’s cities has a ghetto, gangs, and (gasp!) crime! You see for me, I was just sitting at home in Arizona one day when I saw this add about visiting San Diego on TV. It looked so nice that I quit my job and moved out here the first chance I could get. Imagine how shocking it is for me to learn all these years later that my city is no different than any other city in the world. I guess I will never go anywhere again because if what you say is true then all the tourism adds about other cities and countries must be blatant lies and those places probably are not the Utopias I dream of. What exactly is the point of your article Mr. Rice? So you grew up in a rough neighborhood. So you encountered gangs, crime, and poverty growing up. Boo hoo. So you get asked stupid questions about Snoop Dogg and dolphins by ignorant people. Boo hoo. You didn’t grow up hard because you lived in a bad part of town. You grew up hard because you are too unmotivated to make a difference in your own life. Maybe instead of using stupid questions as a motivating factor to write articles that make me dumber you should educate yourself. Tell your sister in Indianapolis that yes, relative to where she is you do live close to Snoop Dogg since San Diego is not far from Long Beach (get a map). Maybe take some time and hang out at the ocean instead of rap concerts and you can tell people that yes, there are dolphins at the beach. “What’s hatnin’ wit you, boy? You got something on ya mind, blood.” You drink Hennessey and pineapple? Wow Vic. Way to break down stereotypes. Let me guess, you are black? Oh wait, you are a Safety Ambassador downtown but you took the trolley to court when you had to testify because parking downtown is so expensive? Wow Vic. Why not park where you work and then walk to the court house? I know it’s not around the corner but it certainly is walkable if you are trying to save a buck. Lazy. Again, way to break down stereotypes.— August 4, 2009 10:10 p.m.