Michelle Obama’s ‘news-free zone’; pink-slipping librarians; remembering Fess Parker

Rules of the house

Re “TLI: Too Little Info,” Opinion, March 22

I don’t understand Gregory Rodriguez’s analogy comparing the head-in-the-sand attitude of so many in suburbia with Michelle Obama’s declaration that her domain in the White House was a “news-free zone.”

The first family is not your average suburban family. Michelle Obama is married to the most powerful man in the world. If she finds a way of making life more peaceful, then she is entitled to her news-free zone.

The column closes by saying that many people are hiding from “the harshness of reality” and calls this “escapism.” It is quite a stretch to say that Michelle Obama has chosen escapism, considering the issues her husband deals with on a daily basis.

L. Nichols
Sherman Oaks

State Fund’s pricey president

Re “Paying dearly for reform,” March 21

As an employee of State Fund in the 1960s and ‘70s, I still remember the great people and managers of that time. State Fund was the best of the workers’ compensation carriers, and helping injured workers was its No. 1 priority. We were not allowed to accept even a free lunch from anyone.

I can’t imagine why there was a need to go out of state to look for a president. To then cave in on a huge salary and perks is inexcusable.

Times have changed, and not always for the better.

Ray Block
Chino

Reading former State Fund President Janet Frank’s statement that The Times’ inquiry into the $1.6 million she earned at the private-public insurer over two years “has nothing to do with me; I’m a private citizen,” one comes to the realization that she has become the clone-like offspring of the private corporations she has been working for -- a private tyranny unto herself, whose primary function is to increase her profits, whether or not her actions cause significant harm to the public she ostensibly has been working for.

Indeed, Frank’s conduct allows a view into a brave new world where corporations have become so powerful that the humans within are inclined to emulate these institutions and then hold themselves as strictly “private citizens,” and thus wholly unaccountable to the public around them.

Tom Wilde
Santa Monica

Help is just a librarian away

Re “Saving the Google students,” Opinion, March 21

“Help me . . . my teacher and my mother are going to kill me! You got a really thin book? I gotta write a book report for tomorrow!”

Credentialed librarians connect with kids. We’re there to help them in their hour of need. Not all calls for help are humorous. There are the heartbreaking requests for a story or information on divorce, violence, bullying and the myriad problems our children face.

We connect with teachers. Collaborate on lessons. Help raise our students’ reading scores. And yes, as Sara Scribner stated, bridge that informational divide.

Pink-slipping school librarians today will sweep away that literacy and information link our children deserve. Tomorrow our community, our state and our nation will be the poorer for it.

Roza Besser
Calabasas
The writer is a librarian at Portola Middle School in Tarzana.

As a children’s librarian, I recognize the phenomenon Scribner describes -- students with the ability to find information but lacking the sophistication to evaluate or understand it.

A junior-high-age student recently asked me for help researching a certain scientist who had “invented colors. You know; red, green, blue.”

After I couldn’t find anything about this scientist in books or databases, I did a Google search to find out where the student’s information had come from. The only mention online was a post that was undoubtedly a prank -- and that the student had copied verbatim as the start of her research paper.

The problem with the Internet is that it allows anyone to be “published.” If we don’t give children the critical thinking skills and skepticism necessary to navigate this new world, we will have a generation that simultaneously knows more and understands less about the world they live in.

Jason Daly
Pasadena

Listen up, KPCC

Re “Pasadena radio station making waves,” March 20

I’m happy that KPCC has a new studio and is doing so well, and I guess it’s fine that Southern California Public Radio President Bill Davis’ next goal “is to improve the station’s signal on the Westside and in Santa Clarita, and expand it north toward Santa Barbara and down to south Orange County.”

But I live in Altadena, maybe six miles from the station, and we have to twist and turn our radio, move it and, depending on the weather, go through all kinds of gyrations to get a decent signal.

Despite years of swearing I would not become a member until KPCC fixed that -- and after being told by one KPCC engineer that the solution was for me to wire my house with antennas -- I joined last year.

Now, Bill, could you do something to get me the product I’ve paid for? I’m a neighbor!

Dave Datz
Altadena

I’m a sustaining member of KPCC now, but I “rebelled against the loss of favorite music shows” by dropping my membership for several years after the SCPR format change.

We listeners didn’t lose a “hodgepodge” of shows -- we lost irreplaceable music and cultural affairs programs that spoke to the diverse Southern California audience.

I still mourn the loss of “The Sancho Show,” which presented great music in a format designed to encourage teens to stay in school.

What did KPCC’s listeners get in exchange? “The Story,” Canadian news on “As It Happens” and endless hours of the BBC. At best informative, at times entertaining, almost never relevant.

As good as KPCC is, in the end I think we listeners lost more than we gained.

Kay M. Gilbert
Manhattan Beach

A true man of the frontier

Re “Fess Parker, 1924 - 2010,” Obituary, March 19

Years ago when Fess Parker was putting the finishing touches on his Santa Ynez winery, my wife, Karen, and I drove by. Karen noticed Parker and one of the construction workers lifting heavy stones to the top of a nearly finished rock wall.

I hate to inconvenience celebrities (or anybody else for that matter), so I tried to keep going. But before I knew it, we had stopped and Karen had hauled me over to Parker -- who quickly tossed both of us into his Jeep. Off we went, bouncing through the vineyards.

For two kids who wore coonskin hats back when Davy Crockett was king, it was an unforgettable moment. Parker never tried to sell us any wine. He wanted only for us to savor the moment.

We left knowing that this gentle “King of the Wild Frontier” was really King of the Mild Frontier.

Bill Smith
Malibu

Keeping up El Pueblo

Re “The heart of L.A. history,” Column, March 19

Hector Tobar is “right on” to emphasize that El Pueblo belongs to all of us in Los Angeles, not just to selected interest groups.

At this time of shrinking city resources, it is essential that we all work together to assure that El Pueblo’s irreplaceable historical assets, collections and cultural programs be maintained and perpetuated for future generations in Southern California.

Munson Kwok
Westchester
The writer is immediate past national president of the Chinese American Citizens Alliance.