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Opera members advise: fire the Campbells
Having no wish to watch an opera performance is different from saying proudly as the sun of San Diego Opera sinks in the west, "I've never watched an opera performance and never will." That sounds like a philistine to me. But profuse apologies if I have hurt your feelings.— April 30, 2014 8:56 p.m.
Will money defeat Barrio Logan residents?
San Diego hits a new low when only one stay-at-home dad, his toddler and mother-in-law protest a gathering of corporate eagles who are destroying democratic process with their money and influence. Visduh makes an outrageous suggestion here -- a measure of how powerless average citizens have become since populist Mayor Bob Filner resigned in disgrace and was replaced by blond and bland Kevin Faulconer who falsely pledged to serve "all of San Diego." What will the ballot language say on our June referendum? Will it even resemble what's really happening? Will regular people understand? Will they even bother to vote? Barrio Logan's dirty industrial enterprises along the harbor have received judicial permission -- no thanks to enabling Judge Randa Trapp who once headed the NAACP here -- to lie and buy their way onto a public ballot and to claim they are "saving jobs," when in truth they are preventing a small and poor neighborhood from updating its own community plan to protect its residents' health and well-being.— April 30, 2014 12:50 p.m.
Opera members advise: fire the Campbells
I am amazed that you continue to flog this dead horse of Ian Campbell's being "overpaid." It seems an ungrateful easy out and just generates more opinion from philistines like dwbat or well-intentioned boosters like eastlaker. Ian Campbell indisputably made the San Diego Opera a standout. The Opera Board was probably delighted/grateful to be connected with Campbell's cultural miracle and happy to be associated with the remarkable institution's cachet. From what you have said, the former Opera Board was also generous in its financial support. The Opera Board was/is in charge of Campbell's compensation and everything else. If his salary was hindering the organization's future, the Board should have reduced his fee. If that meant losing Campbell but "saving" the Opera in some way -- well, that's what Boards are meant to do: make difficult decisions and plan for change, even if change involves popularizing or dilution of classic expression. Apparently the Opera Board was unwilling/unable to make those tough calls -- or to do much of anything else to improve the Opera's financial outlook. So there was stasis and implosion. None of this is/was Ian Campbell's responsibility. Continuing to blame his high take-home pay seems off-point, churlish and maybe just a bid to keep a sensational thread going in the absence of new information about this watershed cultural loss. These days business moguls and basketball players pull down enormous salaries: why would you contend the Opera's artistic director should make less?— April 30, 2014 12:04 p.m.
Opera members advise: fire the Campbells
This is not about the Civic Theater's difficult layout or its parking garage corkscrew ramps or its weird plaza with a ship's prow fountain. It might be partly about the high rent charged the Opera by the skin-flint City. (Thanks for nada, Mayor Faulconer.) And it most certainly is not about having the Opera Chorus sing the national anthem at ballgames. My nine-year-old grandkid does that with a kid's choir -- and he has to pay for his ticket for the "privilege." Let's end the blame refrain that Artistic Director Ian Campbell was wrong for collecting an impresario-sized salary. Campbell was an impresario: he made a San Diego Opera ticket worth its high price. He created a great and unusual experience, remarkable for this oh-so-limited municipality, and we should thank him for making the magic possible for as long as he did. The new Board probably will not be able to raise what's needed to sustain grand opera and if Campbell is fired or retired, there will be no one else to replicate what he managed to create. Wine and coffee and craft beer evenings are NOT what we've had and enjoyed. Maybe somebody can launch a Gilbert & Sullivan company -- that would be fun -- but it will not be new operatic amazements like "Moby Dick" or old ones like "The Masked Ball." Without recriminations against the maestro, let's just say hail and farewell.— April 29, 2014 6:10 p.m.
Opera members advise: fire the Campbells
Excuuuse me, Nathan Fletcher on the new Board? Has he ever been to an opera? Does this mean Irwin Jacobs is going to bail out the organization?— April 29, 2014 3:43 p.m.
This time you may really be fired, Sloat
Sloat & Bloat, Slanders & Libel, Oldmanchester & Faulconer, Gloria & Goldsmith. But never mind, Bob Filner was REALLY the evil-doer here. We know why he was dead meat before he ever got started, when we look at this array of self-aggrandizing, preening opportunists. Why do we tolerate it? So now I turn to the messenger: I am waiting for Matt Potter to write one story that doesn't evoke feelings of disgust and alienation from our body politick. It will be a challenge.— April 29, 2014 3:36 p.m.
Pala Indians battle against Bill Horn
Visduh, you are correct to say that political party identification in San Diego City or County stands for nothing. Along with notions of personal integrity or small-d democratic vision among most elected officials. Lamentable truths.— April 29, 2014 10:50 a.m.
Pala Indians battle against Bill Horn
Very hard for Reader readers to follow the convoluted path outlined here. But it is a good description of the kind of inbred mostly-but-not-only GOP wheeling and dealing that makes San Diego such a special place. Basically, it seems the Pala Band of Indians are covertly spending to support the opponent of way-too-long-a-Supervisor Bill Horn who is nearing what seems to be the century mark as a County officeholder. Additionally, Pala Band has opposed for years the development of a landfill that is still being pushed by an aging widowed lobbyist who, with her late husband, has been tied to countless Republican politicians for more than a generation.— April 26, 2014 12:37 p.m.
Questionable political fundraising? Roger on that
Yo, Dennis. Be afraid. The Koch Brothers are among us by proxy. Manchester's UT hires several right-wing Koch enterprises' former reporters. UT editorials support right-wing Koch-affiliated congressional candidate Carl DeMaio. KFMB Channel 8 TV and its AM-FM radio stations are owned by a DeMaio supporter. Right-wing Roger Hedgecock solicits campaign funds for DeMaio on the air at KFMB. What to do? Answer: Complain. Send a letter complaining about misuse of the public airways to the Federal Communications Commission and then send a copy to "the public file" at KFMB Channel 8. That file is supposed to be open to reportorial scrutiny and will be reviewed someday when the station is up for re-licensing. When will that be? Don't know, but at least you can read about your complaint in the Reader.— April 24, 2014 6:16 p.m.
Immigrants bad for environment, TV ads say
There was a time when the Sierra Club had an upstart group pushing for a platform of zero population growth (ZPG) and explicit limitations on immigration, but it was subdued by more moderate voices from headquarters. Maybe this is a resurgence of those same Anglo nativists -- certainly Kim Fletcher fits the stereotype. And KFMB -- that would be Channel 8, right? I guess any money is green and they will take it.— April 17, 2014 5:41 p.m.