The mail
BUSH APPROACH FAILED MISERABLY
As a conservative Republican who has been involved
politically, both as a candidate for public office and in party leadership, I
am appalled and frustrated by the recent election. The electorate overwhelmingly
repudiated the policies of the Bush administration, especially so in regard to
the Iraq war,
where billions of dollars continue to be squandered, along with the tragic loss
of lives, in a conflict that offers little if any semblance of being resolved.
As a conservative, I bemoan this ill-advised waste of
finances and heartily endorse the “cut and run” approach to Iraq
rather than the Bush “stay the course” policy that can, if continued,
ultimately bankrupt our nation.
It is indeed clear that the current Republican brain trust
has failed miserably, as evidenced by the loss of both the House and the
Senate. The need for restructuring is clearly evident if the GOP is to maintain
its role as a viable force in national politics and avoid a future debacle like
that which characterized the 2006 election results.
Raymond Lee Snider, Garson Avenue, Rochester (Snider is a former Monroe
County Conservative Party chair.)
THE THEATER WE SHOULD HAVE
I can’t stand it anymore. Moshe Safdie
comes to town, serves up half-baked ideas —a cylindrical shape for a new
theater (has he never been to Toronto’s nuclear silo, Roy Thomson Hall, just
renovated for over $6 million to replace atrocious acoustics?), reducing a
400-seat hall to 200 for flippant reasons — and local “leaders” go “Ooo” and “Ahh.”
What gets me most is the acquiescence of the area’s arts
establishment. They’re the same cowards who were on a planning committee for
new theaters. The head of the committee, Thomas Mooney, swore them to secrecy
and threatened to throw them out if they divulged anything to the media. And they agreed.
The committee ignorantly dictated that Rochester
should build a 2800-seat theatre for the Rochester Broadway Theater League,
something that will not benefit a single local artist but only RBLT, which
brings five or six road shows to town a year. So now the arts establishment
accepts this as gospel and moans about needing to raise money for what it
desperately needs: a 1500-1800-seat theater to accommodate the Rochester
Philharmonic, Garth Fagan Dance, Rochester City Ballet, and possibly Mercury
Opera. The money is already there, if they’ve got the testosterone to go for it
by submarining plans for an unneeded road house.
The Eastman Theatre is gorgeous and comfortable but an
acoustical disaster for the RPO, with inadequate stage space for large shows.
My recent visits to six new halls, including two openings, have
been highly instructive. The Nashville Symphony’s new home is not what Rochester
needs, because it’s a single-purpose orchestra hall in which dance and opera
wouldn’t work. But how the people in Nashville
got it built is most instructive.
1) They knew what they wanted.
2) They got out of town. The powers-that-be took a private
jet, visited seven halls in six days hearing five concerts, and returned
knowing that Vienna’s Muskverein and Amsterdam’s
Concertegouw halls were their models.
3) Their architect and acoustician worked together from the
start. To do otherwise is to plan for failure (as in Philadelphia).
Results: They built their hall on time and on budget ($123
million). As the architect and acoustician said at the opening, “The best halls
result from clients who know what they want.”
The Ferguson Center for the Arts, opened just a year ago on
the campus of Christopher Newport University in Newport News, Virginia, is what Rochester wants: a 1700-seat,
visually sumptuous theater for orchestra and ballet whose acoustics have a
visceral impact, an equally sumptuous 400-seat theater for drama, and a
black-box theater whose 170 seats can be arranged in any manner. And from the
outside it’s stunning, too.
Cost: $56 million, thanks to an architect and acoustician
who knew how to skimp without compromising acoustics, visual esthetics, or
comfort for the audience or performers.
Not until the leaders of the RPO, Garth Fagan (why they even
bother staying in town is a mystery), and Rochester City Ballet band together
and go for the money that is already there, then “get out of town” and come
home with firm ideas, and finally hire an architect and acoustician who work together — not until then will they get the theater that Rochester truly needs to be built. They’d better
hurry.
Gil French, Wisconsin Street, Rochester(French is Music in Concert editor of American Record Guide, which
reviews classical music CDs and performances.)
UN-HARRIS
Atheist Sam Harris appears stuck in anti-religious mode (“One
Nation Without God,” October 18). The rigidity he decries goes far beyond
religions, and further, religions may offer some insight into life.
“There’s no question that religion emerges from deeply
ingrained cognitive traits….” No, in a recent speech Steven Pinker
acknowledged, “The universal propensity toward religious belief is a
genuine scientific puzzle.” He also points out that the simple (adaptationist) explanations for religion don’t make sense. That
we are born with a divided sense of body and soul (Paul Bloom, “Decartes Baby”), coupled with our ability to re-experience
this profoundly in near-death experiences, is
noteworthy.
“[Religion is] one of the principal impediments to
developing a genuinely sustainable global civilization.” Please! The main
challenge to sustainability is that we humans innately could care less about
it. Hopefully, governments will pressure us toward sustainable behavior, if
only for the sake of future humans.
Is there a better model for sustainable living then that of
the (religious) Jains? Furthermore, perhaps the most
striking national move was directed by Iran’s
religious leaders in reducing fertility from 7 to 2 kids per couple. I don’t
buy the underlying argument that non-religious people are more moral.
To blame religion for violence, you would have to separate
it out from our underlying violent tendencies. Look at religion-free nature.
The long terrorizing, suicide-bomb-using, Tamil Tigers are not religious. A
better approach to the war on terror would be to stop using Middle
East oil (a good way to jump-start climate responsibility), exit
the region, and find better things to do. Without the support of oil money,
what would happen to the jihad scene?
Finally, consider the support for a common religious belief,
the continuity from life to life (“metempsychosis” in my
encyclopedia). Some children are born with remarkable knowledge of a previous
person’s life and correlated behavior (Jim Tucker, “Life Before Life”). Over
half the variation in personality is not explained by genes or environment (Judith
Rich Harris, “No Two Alike”). This is most visible with conjoined (always
monozygotic) twins: they’re remarkably different. Finally, there appears to be
almost no connection between genes and longevity
(www.nytimes.com/2006/08/31/health/31age.html). This also appears to be true
for other animals.
These are huge, mostly off-limits mysteries for science, but
not for many religions. A Hindu, for example, could see the health-gene
disconnect as a footprint of karma. Evidence for “metempsychosis”
could certainly boost interest in sustainability.
Ted Christopher, Lilac Drive, Rochester
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This article appears in Nov 15-21, 2006.
