Good Samaritans
On the evening of Feb. 22, my wife and I were driving down Greenspring Avenue in Baltimore County returning home after having dinner with friends.
Our eight-year-old car lost power as we approached the intersection with Smith Avenue. My attempts to restart were futile.
I put on the hazard flashers and grabbed a flashlight to wave oncoming traffic around me as my wife set off to phone the auto club from one of the nearby residences.
Almost immediately a young woman stopped, offered to call on her car phone and drove my wife about two miles to our home, where she picked up her car.
This wonderful person, recently married and relocated from Cleveland, unfortunately remains nameless, and we hope she reads this.
During the ensuing two hours, long-time friends saw us and stayed with us until the tow truck arrived. However, while I was waving traffic around the stalled vehicle, many people paused to offer help, make calls and do everything except buy my car on the spot, an offer that I made several times as it got colder and later.
To all of these Good Samaritans, our most heartfelt thanks, especially to several gentlemen who parked their cars, offered hot shots and pushes.
In one case, a man diagnosed the problem on the spot (he was absolutely correct). We wish to mention the young man in a sports car who offered to park behind my increasingly dimming automobile to add his flashers, and the family who allowed my wife to check on the whereabouts of the tow truck from their home.
The experience was aggravating and frustrating, but very heartening, as many people took the trouble on a cold night to offer help.
They were young and old, in luxury cars and aging subcompacts, alone and in couples, a variety of ethnic groups. Many, many thanks, and I hope to do the same one late, dark Baltimore night.
Mike Roseman
Baltimore
Ashamed
What right do the mayor and City Council members have handing out more than $300,000 of taxpayer money to individuals for scholarships when the mayor says he cannot lower the property taxes (Evening Sun, Feb. 20)?
What right for the city to give someone not living in the city scholarship money because it was requested by the Maryland Institute, College of Arts?
I am surviving on Social Security, and the mayor should have transferred some of that money to cut my property tax. I am thoroughly ashamed of the mayor and City Council members.
Lula M. Clark
Baltimore
Mfume showed courage on Farrakhan
We, the friends, constituents and supporters of Congressional Black Caucus Chairman Kweisi Mfume applaud his courageous demonstration of leadership by reaching out to various members of the black community in an effort to develop a united approach to the extreme crisis that exists among our people.
Mr. Mfume has a rich record of developing coalitions of diverse groups and has handled his responsibilities in a statesmanlike manner. We are extremely satisfied with his leadership.
During the annual meeting of the Congressional Black Caucus, Chairman Mfume reached out to Minister Louis Farrakhan of the Nation of Islam in an effort to develop a coalition to address the crisis in the black community.
This was applauded by some caucus members and national black leadership; support reverberated throughout our community.
Reaching out is risky business, as evidenced by what happened to Andy Young, and leaders with this type of courage should be commended rather than repudiated.
Coalition building is not new to Mr. Mfume or other responsible leaders, in the black community and throughout the world.
Former enemies in the Eastern and Western blocs embrace one another; East and West Germany have merged; the United States embraces Russia; the white-dominated government of South Africa has embraced Nelson Mandela; the government of Israel and the leadership of the Palestine Liberation Organization are attempting to resolve their differences.
These efforts all appear to be laudable, as are those of Representative Mfume.
However, because of highly publicized excerpts of a speech given at obscure Kean College by Khallid Abdul Muhammad, a top associate of Minister Farrakhan, the focus immediately changed from Mr. Mfume's noble efforts to Minister Farrakhan, the hateful rhetoric of his associate and efforts to hold Representative Mfume hostage to this action.
There was very little vocal opposition to Chairman Mfume's efforts until excerpts of Dr. Muhammad's speech were publicized by the Anti-Defamation League.
We and all well-meaning persons condemn the vicious and unacceptable remarks attributed to Dr. Muhammad.
However, we take strong issue against Representative Mfume's being held accountable for something outside of his control.
He has taken a properly strong position opposing Dr. Muhammad's comments but has been relentlessly badgered by certain journalists and pressure groups to take a position acceptable to them.
This constant harassment takes the form of paternalistic, presumptuous efforts to spoon-feed unacceptable political Pablum to an extremely bright, well-trained, conscientious and committed black leader.
Apparently, those forces have erroneously perceived an intellectual and political dependency by African-American leadership.
It is an insult for our leaders to be constantly confronted by the sheer arrogance of those who have determined that the litmus test of our allegiance is political subservience and for us to walk in lock step with those who would attempt to control our thought processes for their interests.
Equally important is insult to the constituency that supports courageous leadership.
Therefore, we will continue to aggressively reject forces which attempt to define who our leaders should not be, and we will no longer accept efforts by outsiders to write apologies for our leaders.
Parenthetically, we are gravely concerned that these forces appear to become adversarial when our leaders are unwilling to accept externally prepared apologies.
We applaud the courageous leadership of some of our church leaders, the NAACP, our newspapers, our radio commentators, the Maryland Legislative Black Caucus and others who have taken a stand on this critical issue.
We would encourage everyone, including members of the Congressional Black Caucus, to continue to support the chairman and other persons in efforts to develop coalitions to constructively address the crises confronting our community.
We would also ask forces outside of the black community to fulfill Representative Mfume's challenge to become "equal opportunity repudiators" and publicly censure persons spewing race hatred and bigotry, such as Sens. Ernest Hollings and Jesse Helms, comedian Jackie Mason, Messrs. David Duke, Rush Limbaugh and Howard Stern, who make unacceptable racial remarks that continue to go unchallenged.
We doubt seriously whether members outside of the African-American community fully understand how deeply insulted the African-American community is with this imbalance of assumption of responsibility.
Finally, we go on record abhorring and rejecting this cancer of hate in all of its forms that is metastasizing throughout our society. It threatens Americans of all races, religions and ideologies.
It strikes at the heart of the basic efforts of people of good will to live together with total respect for the rights of all.
It must not be allowed to destroy the values inherent in our diversity as we seek justice for all. We must work together toward the common goal of a society that rids itself on this cancer.
The all-out attack on this venom must come not only from Blacks, Jews, Catholics, whites, gays, Native Americans, Hispanics and Asians, but from all Americans of good will who seek racial, ethnic and religious harmony.
May God bless us all.
Calvin Burnett
John B. Ferron
Michael Graham
Rodney Orange
Baltimore
Pay a book
Baltimore's schools and libraries need books.
Baseball fans would like a chance to see a game at Oriole Park.
How about killing a few birds (sorry) with one stone?
Stage a game at Oriole Park on an off-day, between the Orioles and their farm team, with the price of admission being one new book suitable for the libraries.
The libraries get thousands of new books, the wannabes get a taste of the Bigs, and those who can't get tickets at the box office get to see a game at Oriole Park.
And if the concessions toss in their profits for the Ripkens' literacy program, it gets even better.
Thomas A. Lilly
Lutherville