Curt Pringle

California gets CPR (Curt Pringle to the Rescue): After reading your Jan. 6 interview with the new Assembly speaker, I have hope for our future. Anyone who puts jobs as his first priority has my vote.

MALCOLM SACKS

Redondo Beach

* I remember when Republicans, wanting desperately for Pringle (R-Garden Grove) to win his Assembly seat, had “security guards” and signs posted at polling places in Orange County threatening that only citizens (maybe, only white) could vote. I remember the anger and shame I felt that someone could intimidate and scare people out of voting in this day and age. I don’t really care that Pringle denies having any role in this incident. The pictures of men in uniforms and signs made me think of other men in uniforms with signs-- in Germany during World War II and the South in the 1950s and ‘60s.

JOHANNA FREDRICS

Riverside

* Now that the Republicans in the Assembly have the speaker they’ve always wanted, it’s good to see that we’ll be able to get down to some serious business and forget about “politics as usual.” Isn’t the righteous, feverish, conservative revolution all about fixing what’s wrong with government? So what’s the GOP’s first order of business?

First they rearrange the seating chart on the Assembly floor to stick it to the Democrats (Jan. 5). Then they award $100,000 (of our money) to finance the Reform Party Caucus-- a former Democrat is the party’s only member-- in what smacks of a political payoff. The GOP unashamedly admits to making these moves to “tweak” the other side. Is it any wonder the electorate is so fed up with you knuckleheads? Cut the petty nonsense and do some damn legislating, would ya?

JIM MALLON

Morro Bay