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Show last one) took ss long as two weeks. It took a week Just to reach Salt Lake City. are not getting all their Issues, please write and tell me. And thanks Mr. Duncan for your great letter. If Dear Jim: want to point out to you that there Is a program of disinformation or "paper monkeywrenchlng going on n Moab, but It Isn't being done by the environmentalists. In the April 19 XL there were letters from two of the three victims of a fake Incident directed at the Red Rock Four Wheelers' Inflammatory flyer and garbage-scatteriIn Safari. same Issue the of the paper, there was a letter signed by "Mike Heyrend, Jeep V.P. Southern Utah Wildlife Association." This letter pretended to be an Indictment of Ken Sleight for horse pack trip Impacts on Arches National Park by an officer of an environmental organization. Like the flyer, the Heyrend letter Is a fake. Mike Heyrend is the staff attorney of the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance of which l am Secretary of the Board. We and the Utah Wildlife Federation have (SUWA), never heard of a "Southern Utah WlldUfe Alliance.1! The of SUWA Is Janet Ross of Monti cello. Mike did not write the letter, and has no knowledge of the adverse Impacts to Arches alleged In the letter under his name. If such Impacts actually exist, the complaining party should bring them to the attention of the Arches administration, which should, and would, take disciplinary action to stop abuses. The common thread In these two, and a third "fake flyer" Incident earlier, Is trying Ken to put Sleight In a bad light The Jeep Safari flyer, for example, has huge block letters on the top saying "Oppose the Jeep Safari. Stop the Rapists; then has Earth First! (with the wrong logo for Earth First!) below, concluding In crude lettering that people contact Tom Till (wrong address), Back of Beyond Bookstore, or Ken and Jane Sleight for more Information. Most of the flyers were littered along with garbage In a Jeep Safari campsite: a most discrediting action for "environmentalists. Ken Sleight has declared as a Democratic candidate for State Representative, opposing Incumbent David Adams. Apparently, somebody feels a need to create a myth that hes a ringleader for a bunch of environmentalist bogeymen. In politics, this sort of In fact, Ken, SUWA, and the various active behavior Is called "dirty tricks. environmentalists around here agree on an ethical standard of truthful public dialogue and civil respect for our debating opponents. Well maintain that standard because we believe In It We also think that perpetrating dirty tricks harms ones side because most people, like us, find that sort of behavior repellent I ng Vice-presid- Its only a rumor because the border area had been evacuated as Invasion seemed readers ent Lance Christie Imminent There were several Ironies here. At that time the Guatemalan army was American trained and armed. Actually Jimmy Carter had cut off military aid to Guatemala a year earlier, but the Israeli's had stepped In In our stead with arms and training. Back then and today we gaveglve more than 3 billion dollars of military aid to Israel every year. Why were our tax dollars buying guns to point at British soldiers? Those guns were not only Ironical, but they could have been deadly. My taxi drivergulde who was telling me about the attack helicopter was amazed I knew about the Israelis. He's taken a lot of American tourists up there, but most of them In are Interested Mayan culture. The Mayans built this pyramid more than 1000 years ago and they are all dead. My taxi driver was very concerned about some of his family who live In a sleepy Guatemalan village across the border from the pyramid. It seems that the Guatemalan army rolled Into that town a couple of years ago and announced there was a crime problem (there wasn't), and there would be a curfew from dusk until dawn. When the sun rose the next morning there were a dozen bodies lying In the streets, naked and dead. At least one of the victims was a schoolteacher .... knowledge can be a dangerous thing. The army was gone with the dawn. My conversation with the cab driver was overheard by a couple of other tourists, who were catching their breath and the view. They looked down on the same border, but I could see from their eyes that they were still watching television and not taking In the long view. My own eyes were getting a little misty as I looked south towards El Salvador which makes Guatemala look like Disneyland. I thought about something I read about Vietnam and the black war memorial In Washington. If they listed the dead Aslans who died In the Vietnam war, the wall would be several miles long. I thought about my dead classmates from Texas A&M University where I was a military cadet, class of '68. I thought about Mlkhael Gorbachev, Ronald Reagan, George Bush, Dan Quayle and the Contras. I thought of Kurt Vonnegut, the American author who wrote Slaughterhouse Five. veteran of the Battle of the Bulge and a Nazi prisoner of war camp. Kurt thinks the reason we have a pyramid with an eyeball on the top of It on the back of the dollar bill Is to remind us every day whenever we try to conduct business that we have no Idea whos actually running things. Fortunately I had a good cab driver who led me down the pyramid. Your tax dollars may be at work, but I don't want to study war no more. Back Of Beyond Bookstore Is offering a $100 reward for Information leading to the Identity of the person or persons who distributed the bogus flyers. Constructively, Walter Sohl, Port Aransas, Texas Dear Jim: Editor's Note: Seaman, philosopher, and good guy Walter Sohl Instructed me how to dock a 42 foot Ketch with a 5 mph current Damage to the boat and dock was fortunately minimal. chain-smok- have been wanting to write to the Editor with every Issue of The Zephyr that comes my way m because (a) the growth Issues youre experiencing in Moab now are very similar to what we went through here a few years ago, and (b) Moab Is the place I would consider moving to when I leave here, so Im Interested In what happens there. Which Im sure you hear a lot o- f- Just like we do here "everybody wants to move here. What prompted me to write today Is that I am Just now reading the April Issue of TheZeohvr and I have gotten to page 4, which Is your Interview with one of your Illustrious county commissioners. What got me excited enough to finally write to you was the remark about It being proper to fill up Death Valley (one of my favorite places) with cornfields, as long as It was economically feasible. AARRRGHII! When will these people learn that there are some Important things that cant be quantified In dollar amounts? i cant help wondering If anybody there In Moab (whether an official planner type or not) has bothered finding out from other communities how they are dealing with growth problems? Some towns (yes, even the despised Aspen) are coming up with some pretty innovative and creative solutions. I was recently In the hell known as central Florida, and It saddens me to think that Utah could end up similar to that, If the folks have their way (yes, I know Florida has more water, but water canT be considered that much of a limiting factor ... I mean, look at Phoenix. And recommend Cadillac Desert to everyone you know.) I money-ls-all-that-cou- er, all-aro- und nts Sincerely, Colleen Thompson, Jackson, Wyoming Editor: few weeks ago I was standing on top of a Mayan pyramid called Xanantonlch. border and the only The pyramid Is on top of a hill and It overlooks the road connecting the two countries. Rumor has It that during the Faulklands war, the British Army parked a fully armed attack helicopter on top of this pyramid. This tactic was to remind the Guatemalans that Belize used to be called British Honduras and that although Guatemala may claim Belize, the Belizeans don't want any part of Guatemala. A Bellze-Guatem- ala Tino Kister and Terry Knouff would like to make an announcement: SUBSCRIBE NOW WE ARE GETTING MARRIED! an annual subscription is only $12.00 THE CANYON COUNTRY name address ZEPHYR P.O. BOX 327 MOAB, UTAH 84332 will You are invited to share this special day with us. A potluck Reception be held at 6:30 p.m., May 6 at the home of Jayne and Retsik Belnap 4401 Stocks Dr. 3 |
