Hot dogs, apple pie and Japan
The handling of the Japanese bia for the Seattle Mariners has been very poorly handled.
Baseball Commissioner Fay Vincent's statement about the "unwritten rule" precluding foreign ownerhsip (i.e. not American or Canadian) smacks of blatant racism.
The owners feel that local ownership is so important, but where does the current Seattle Mariner's owner live? In Seattle? No, he lives in Indianapolis. Meanwhile, prospective owner Minoru Arakawa has been a Seattle resident for 15 years. The other members of his group are all long-time Seattle businessmen as well. Nintendo has been rewsponsible for bringing in thousands of jobs for the people of Seattle. Are baseball's owners afraid that Arakawa is goingto move the team to Japan? Well, if he doesn't become the owner, the team might just be moving to St. Petersburg. Heaven forbid that Seattle might adopt the Japanese training methods -- four hours of practice on fundamentals before every game. Japanese ownership can't be much worse than American (a la Steinbrenner).
American owners are afraid that in addition to building betters cars and better stereos, the Japanese will also build a better baseball team. What's more American than Nintendo, anyway?
Daniel E. Alexander
Gambrills
Stadium smoke
The Orioles have decided to allow smoking throughout the new stadium. This disgraceful policy allows a minority to indulge in an activity which will harm the health of the non-smoking majority. Secondhand smoke is the third leading cause of preventable death in this country. Maryland has the country's highest cancer death rate. Yet an opportunity to do something about this serious problem and send a message that needs to be heard has been squandered.
The Orioles have no right to dictate smoking policy anyway. The team doesn't own the stadium; the citizens of Maryland do. The state legislature should revive efforts to ban smoking in the stadium.
There is no constitutional right to smoke in public. Smoking is not protected under the First Amendment guarantees of freedom of speech and expression. Non-smokers, however, have a right to
life, which is taken away by secondhand smoke.
Shawn Blair
Lutherville
Insurance flap
Your myopic editorial "Liberating the insurance division" (Feb. 18) offered an unwarranted attack on Secretary Fogle and unfortunate support for a costly bill. The efficiency problems in the Insurance Division are the responsibility of Insurance Commissioner John A. Donoho alone and will not be solved merely by throwing more money at the problem.
Strangely enough, the editorial failed to mention the latest Legislative Audit of the insurance division, which found blatant mismanagement despite two reorganizations and the hiring of three new assistant insurance commissioners at $75,000 each. The auditors found that it was duplicated work and poor staff communication that severely impaired national accreditation, not a lack of funding. A quick fix spin-off with more money is neither the panacea imagined nor a realistic solution.
Likewise, creating a new department will only waste tax dollars since additional personnel, computer, fiscal and legal services must be provided. These higher costs, masked as a "surcharge," will be passed on to taxpayers in the form of higher insurance premiums - essentially a new tax.
The bill to separate the Issurance Division from the Department of Licensing and Regulation does not guarantee national accreditation and does not further the best interests of the citizens of Maryland. Instead, the bill will only create a more costly bureaucracy and reward Mr. Donoho for agency mismanagement.
Gary P. Henson
Baltimore
The Tyson verdict
I'm inclined to believe if an opinion poll was taken by both sexes, Mike Tyson's conviction would have been unjustifiable. Tyson's reputation and notoriety and obsession for women were no secrets.
His actions, mentioned by many beauty contestants, had not gone unnoticed. They did not escape the decent and intelligent contestants who avoided further contact with Tyson, realizing his motive was for sex. This supposed lady who had Tyson prosecuted surely must have known this. This woman realized she could make money and jumped at the opportunity to cash in.
Why would one of bare acquaintance with another person rendezvous with him at 2 a.m? She obliged him with her telephone number and accepted this date. I'm of the belief any decent woman would have rejected the offer at that time of the morning.
Milton Parran
Aberdeen
'92, not '69
Gov. Bill Clinton is an honest and decent man who deserves a break. He did, after all, put himself into the draft for the Vietnam War. He did it to maintain his political viability. What's wrong with that? From what I've read only two members of Congress had sons on the battlefields of Operation Desert Storm.
Mr. Clinton has stated that as he has matured he has changed his 23-year-old views on the military draft. He supports the draft when the national interest is at stake, when there is a clear and present danger and when Congress has constitutionally declared war. He supported Operation Desert Storm. But just as Desert Storm was not Vietnam, Vietnam was not World War II.
Bill Clinton is not a draft resister. It's time to give this man a break and listen to what he has to say in 1992, not 1969.
Grason Eckel
Baltimore
Saving landmarks for the city's sake
About 20 years ago, when a group of community leaders brought Robert Embry, then Baltimore City commissioner of Housing and Community Development, to Fells Point to see a house they were excited about saving and restoring, he exclaimed, "But that's as ugly and dilapidated as any house in the city!" That was the Robert Long House, which with the help of Mr. Embry and many others is now a jewel of the neighborhood and a major tourist attraction.
Two important buildings standing derelict today at the northwest corner of Thames and Bond streets might evoke the same reaction from most observers. One of these buildings was built in 1771, and was operated as the London Coffeehouse until 1805. The other is referred to in city records of 1787 as "George Wells' new brick house."
In 1771, that intersection was the heart of the town of Fells Point. Bond Street was the major north-south thoroughfare and led to Baltimore Town; Thames Street was the major east-west street of the town. In that time, too, coffee houses were the centers of events and the gathering places of town leaders. The London Coffeehouse was undoubtedly the scene of many business sessions of merchants, sea captains, landowners, entrepreneurs and others who shaped the development and history of the port of Baltimore. Under the incremental debris of the years, enough of the original fabric of this building remains to warrant a full restoration.
Just to the south of the coffeehouse, fronting on Thames Street, stands the shell of the 3 1/2 -story mansion of George Wells, ship builder. Across Thames Street, on the waterfront, was his shipyard where in 1776 his men built the Continental Navy frigate "Virginia." The mansion has lost its roof and much of the interior, but again enough of the exterior fabric is intact to warrant a full exterior restoration. The interior space would be large enough to permit a variety of adaptive reuses.
Both of these buildings and the waterfront shipyard site belong to Constellation Properties, a subsidiary of Baltimore Gas and Electric Co. The redevelopment of this entire parcel must respect its importance in the history and the visual architectural integrity of the area. And surely, in keeping with present developments in Fells Point, the London Coffeehouse could be restored and profitably operated in its original use.
We all know that if these relics were in Annapolis or Alexandria they would be regarded as integral to the history of the city; they would be saved and restored and their history would be exploited for the benefit of the community.
Surely if the owner of these buildings were to allow the Society for the Preservation of Federal Hill and Fells Point (with their 25 years of service in the area, as well as the successful Robert Long House landmark) and the newly formed arm of the Fells Point Business Association, Historic Fells Point Inc., to plan and execute the restoration of the London Coffee House and George Wells house and Shipyard sites, Baltimore would eventually recover some important and long forgotten landmarks.
Robert L. Eney
John C. Gleason
Baltimore