Best Brewery Contender

Regarding Brandon Hernández’s comment on Saint Archer Brewery I agree that Saint Archer has come in with more of a whimper than a bang. But...they currently have Yiga Miyashiro as head brewer. Yiga won reams of medals (well, that’s an exaggeration) in top U.S. beer competitions as brewer for Ocean Beach Pizza Port.

Because of this, I’m expecting Saint Archer to be a contender for best San Diego brewery in short order. In fact, I’m telling beer joints I frequent to try to secure an account with Saint Archer as soon as possible, for their own good. Enough said.

Chris Bowd
via email

The Logic of Some

Regarding SD on the QT: “Yoga = Satanism,” wherein yoga is proved to be evil because there exists a picture of Satan sitting in a posture similar to a standard yoga posture.

By that logic, Christians are proved to be Nazis because in worship they so often extend their right arms and palms up at a 45-degree angle — just like Hitler’s followers saluted him.

But then, by the logic of some, the id is the intellect!

Myke Smitley
via email

No Dumping or Unloading

Re Diary of a Diva, “Calm the F Down,” May 23.

Carelessly unloading on others just passes along your stress.

If you’re so busy and important, why don’t you have powdered protein in your cabinet? (Your husband would have been smarter to pick up Greek yogurt.)

In our culture, dumping is a cause of road rage and domestic violence. So, see a therapist, swallow a pill, or take up something athletic. Or, better yet, learn how to meditate!

Alexis Page Montgomery
via email

Callous Citizens

It’s absolutely disgusting that breathing the air is a problem for people in Barrio Logan. (June 27 cover story: “Hard to Breathe in Barrio Logan”).

This is America’s finest city? How can we, as citizens of San Diego, be so callous as to even allow a whole neighborhood to become poisoned by the very air they breathe? Having smog-producing industries next to families who then experience all manner of respiratory disorders is shameful. It shouldn’t take several years for the San Diego City Council to respond to this kind of inhumanity.

Where are the churches? Does not anyone really care about the environmental conditions within our own city?

Thanks to the Reader for alerting us to this tragedy. Let us hope it leads to some kind of positive action.

M. Laurel Gray
El Cajon

Ghost Medic

Re: Under the Radar: “Ambulances Chase Politicos,” April 18.

I always pride myself on knowing the goings-on within the EMS world. It honestly is, at times, a very dark and sinister place.

From the outside, the public believes it to be a place where heroes walk, and everyone involved in the program is tantamount to Superman or a Star Wars Jedi knight. However, it is more like the scene in Julius Caesar, where everyone stabs him with their dagger, including his closest friend, Brutus.

Just to make it all nice and clear, these Goliaths, AMR and Rural/Metro, have manipulated the system of EMS delivery in this region to the point of no return. It would literally take an act of God to correct the monumental issues that plague the entire EMS system, and there’s not a single politician with the stones to stand up to their financial might and overwhelming power.

I have been in San Diego since the beginning. I have been successful because I bite my tongue and play the role of the bobble-head doll. I never rock the boat at work. I do as I’m told and move forward. I’ve done what I believe to be an excellent job at laying low and keeping off of the radar. This affords me the opportunity to write letters such as this, with no fear of being penalized by the powers that are.

The companies that pick your tax-paying pockets are going to get away with all of it, and continue to take our money and send it to Arizona (who still is taking our water) and Colorado, while we have to put up with an EMS system that is clearly in the pocket of these two companies and the fire unions.

Rural/Metro will win the contract for the City of San Diego one more time. They have managed to get Mayor “pay-for-play” Filner to grant a two-year extension of the existing contract so that he may “study” the matter.

Translation: I owe Rural/Metro and the good ol’ boyz from AZ who filled my pockets when running for election. So, my pay off to them is to give them two years, so that they can financially back those candidates that are running against those who were against their company during the audit (bye-bye Marti Emerald...and others).

AMR is no better. Before they were AMR, they were MedTrans, a San Diego-based company that was operated by Phil Ayers and Tom Morgan (go ahead and look up these two guys and their past.) Every time one wins and the other loses, there is protest after protest, each telling the public that the other cheated!

And now, here comes Falck. Rural/Metro will fight hard and long over the next two years to keep San Diego, and to grease the right wheels to maintain their strangle hold on San Diego. Why? Because it would irk ’em in Phoenix to have to watch a guy they fired take over the City of San Diego and thumb his nose back at them.

Now, I work for one of them, and I’m not so dumb as to think that I can say all of this and walk away unscathed by it all if I didn’t have my anonymity. But I ask you this: When was the last time that you saw a legitimate company win one of these RFPs and be given a real chance to provide services to their hometown? Not since Bob and Juanita Hartson owned their company has it been that way.

FYI, the San Dieguito Ambulance District bid is going on right now. All the bids will be submitted on August 6, I believe. This will be a snapshot of things to come in San Diego.

The only department in the county of San Diego that doesn’t file an annual report is the county division of EMS. And that’s because Rural/Metro didn’t want anyone knowing who was calling them for transports or who they were contracted with, and threatened to sue them if they continued to make it public, stating that the county was revealing trade secrets.

Who will win San Dieguito? Watch and see. Heh, heh, heh....

Ghost Medic
via email

Low-End Reviews

I have read your weekly publication almost from the time of inception. I especially enjoy the restaurant and movie reviews.

However, recently the restaurant reviews have primarily focused on low-end establishments. I also miss the in-depth reviews that were written by Ms. Wise and her predecessor. I also miss David Elliott and his excellent reviews, as I don’t find the current reviews very helpful.

Name Withheld
via email