Henry L. Welch, Editor, The Knarley Knews
welch@msoe.edu http://people.msoe.edu/~welch/tkk.html
Just reading thru the lettercol of Challenger, and was amazed at how clueless Hank Reinhardt sounded. Indeed, he makes me wonder, much more than I have regarding Joseph Nicholas in other letter columns, why anyone would want to send him a copy of their fanzine. Not only are his views so wrong-headed, but he is personally abusive to you as well. The main thrust of his letter seems to be repeatedly justifying current American military brutality by pointing out how brutal people and the world are, in general. His final message for you is to "grow up" and accept the brutality without whining about it. No doubt about it, the human race will never evolve with people like Hank Reinhardt thinking the way he apparently does. If "Joseph Joseph Nicholas" is indeed correct that the exploration of space is dead, which has been stated before, and seems to be the case, that is indeed unfortunate, as that also represents the end of human evolution. If human life is to survive, we must eventually leave this sphere - someday it will no longer be habitable. Plus, the law of probability states that some time, sooner or later, some other celestial body will collide with our little planet. If we're not able to escape the planet, we won't be able to escape that catastrophe. Not even roaches would be able to survive that!
I just wanted to add to the above by saying that it's people like Reinhardt who give so much lip service to our spreading "democracy" to Iraq who don't care that in reality what we are really spreading there is tyranny and torture. Moreover, there are some Americans who insist that there has been no torture of political prisoners in Iraq; that abuse and humiliation do not amount to torture. Meanwhile there are claims by prisoners who have been beaten and/or have had dogs set on them - pretty harsh treatment for someone for whom it isn't even known if they are an "insurgent" or not. As far as I know, these claims have not been investigated.
Must disagree with Dr. Craig Hilton when he says, "It is unknown in our society," when referring to rheumatic fever and, presumably, strep throat, which he also refers to, although not specifically by name. Strep throat does still occur in America, and, according to my current doctor, if not treated effectively, eventually leads to defective or leaky heart valves.
I see that Brad Foster misinterpreted something I said in the email of mine you published about finally remembering my "little" cousin Joe (which, as I said before, made little sense without the previous one, where I referred to not remembering Joe), perhaps in order to launch off on his own rant about lying out under the sun. My skin is such an unnaturally pale color that I usually try to get at least a little tan in the summer - it just doesn't look right for me to go through the entire summer with such a (seeming) deathly pall on my face. That is why I spend time under the sun, not to "get hot," and I certainly never made any reference to leaving New York because of the heat! That was a projection on Foster's part.
Great lettercol; thanks for the words from Arthur C. Clarke. Like much of fandom, I had been wondering what had happened to him after the tidal wave hit.
Guy, I acknowledge many of the problems with this country that you point out. It is so easy for us as Americans to become complacent and not care about our government slaughtering peoples in other countries. In this day and age in which we have made our individual lives so complicated, many times it seems to be all we can do just to get through the day, without time for worrying about what our government, which we obviously cannot affect, is going to do. The only words of encouragement that I can offer you are that you and I are at least doing something - fanzines are obviously becoming one of the last vestiges of the free press.
Just reading thru the lettercol of Challenger, and was amazed at how clueless Hank Reinhardt sounded. Indeed, he makes me wonder, much more than I have regarding Joseph Nicholas in other letter columns, why anyone would want to send him a copy of their fanzine. Not only are his views so wrong-headed, but he is personally abusive to you as well. The main thrust of his letter seems to be repeatedly justifying current American military brutality by pointing out how brutal people and the world are, in general. His final message for you is to "grow up" and accept the brutality without whining about it. No doubt about it, the human race will never evolve with people like Hank Reinhardt thinking the way he apparently does. If "Joseph Joseph Nicholas" is indeed correct that the exploration of space is dead, which has been stated before, and seems to be the case, that is indeed unfortunate, as that also represents the end of human evolution. If human life is to survive, we must eventually leave this sphere - someday it will no longer be habitable. Plus, the law of probability states that some time, sooner or later, some other celestial body will collide with our little planet. If we're not able to escape the planet, we won't be able to escape that catastrophe. Not even roaches would be able to survive that!
I just wanted to add to the above by saying that it's people like Reinhardt who give so much lip service to our spreading "democracy" to Iraq who don't care that in reality what we are really spreading there is tyranny and torture. Moreover, there are some Americans who insist that there has been no torture of political prisoners in Iraq; that abuse and humiliation do not amount to torture. Meanwhile there are claims by prisoners who have been beaten and/or have had dogs set on them - pretty harsh treatment for someone for whom it isn't even known if they are an "insurgent" or not. As far as I know, these claims have not been investigated.
Must disagree with Dr. Craig Hilton when he says, "It is unknown in our society," when referring to rheumatic fever and, presumably, strep throat, which he also refers to, although not specifically by name. Strep throat does still occur in America, and, according to my current doctor, if not treated effectively, eventually leads to defective or leaky heart valves.
I see that Brad Foster misinterpreted something I said in the email of mine you published about finally remembering my "little" cousin Joe (which, as I said before, made little sense without the previous one, where I referred to not remembering Joe), perhaps in order to launch off on his own rant about lying out under the sun. My skin is such an unnaturally pale color that I usually try to get at least a little tan in the summer - it just doesn't look right for me to go through the entire summer with such a (seeming) deathly pall on my face. That is why I spend time under the sun, not to "get hot," and I certainly never made any reference to leaving New York because of the heat! That was a projection on Foster's part.
Great lettercol; thanks for the words from Arthur C. Clarke. Like much of fandom, I had been wondering what had happened to him after the tidal wave hit.
Guy, I acknowledge many of the problems with this country that you point out. It is so easy for us as Americans to become complacent and not care about our government slaughtering peoples in other countries. In this day and age in which we have made our individual lives so complicated, many times it seems to be all we can do just to get through the day, without time for worrying about what our government, which we obviously cannot affect, is going to do. The only words of encouragement that I can offer you are that you and I are at least doing something - fanzines are obviously becoming one of the last vestiges of the free press.
posted by ;-p at 7:42 PM
1 Comments:
Hank is Hank.
Once you realise that he formed his political opinions while he was Stratgic Advisor to Attila, you sort of get him in focus.
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