Shayna needs wheels

 

     Good evening, 919 Gang. Someone needs help.

 

     RONI BREITE writes:

     My daughter Shayna’s car died yesterday and she’s in dire need of one ASAP. She was starting her drive with a packed car to move out of state last night and it died on the 805 in San Diego. The location of the breakdown is the only good part. She has a deadline to reach her destination.

     If you know of anyone selling a used small or mid-sized pickup, or any car, for up to about $3,000, maybe $4,000, please let me know immediately. It has to be in reliable working order but the appearance is not important.

     Feel free to give my email or phone number to anyone who might have a vehicle. 619 288-8246

Thanks so much.

 

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GLENN GRANT writes:

Bernie Hunt: Bugsy Siegel was my grandfather.

Well, not that Bugsy Siegel, but there were similarities. The mobster’s real name was Benjamin Siegel, born in Brooklyn 1906, died in 1947 in Beverly Hills. My maternal grandfather was Morris Benjamin Siegel, born in 1897 in Rypin, Poland, died in 1975 near Beverly Hills. Once that Bugsy Siegel gained notoriety, my grandfather was teased constantly, with some people wondering if he was the mobster. After the other Bugsy was gunned down, the teasing stopped. But Zeidi (Yiddish for grandpa) always delighted in telling family and friends how people thought he might be the tough guy. Nothing could have been farther from the truth, as he was a kind, generous, funny kibitzer who definitely influenced my sense of humor. One of my prized possessions is his wooden back scratcher, which he probably bought in the ’40s. I always have it out in plain sight to remind me of him.

     Coincidentally, Zeidi loved driving to Las Vegas a few times a year and staying with my grandma Rose at The Stardust. In fact, the first time I ever went to Vegas was with them at age 13. I saw Buddy Hackett standing in the lobby and got his autograph, which I still have. Zeidi loved to play keno. He claimed to have won most of the time. He even said he won $5,000 once downtown, then walked to a nearby bank, opened an account while Grandma was playing the penny slots, and tapped into the money each time he went back to Vegas, never telling her about it.

Here’s a photo of him in front of the famous Binion’s Horseshoe Casino display of $1 million in 100 $10,000 gold certificates, a Vegas landmark from 1964 to 2000. This is as close to a huge jackpot as many visitors every got.

 

PRESTON TUREGANO writes:

The way I read it once or twice: Las Vegas originally was a fort (Spanish outpost) established by explorers and later Mormons during the mid 1800s. Las Vegas is Spanish for “the meadows.” Eventually, members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints saw a way to make money by establishing gambling casinos in Las Vegas, particularly while the Hoover Dam was being built in the 1930s and workers on the massive project needed some sort of amusement during their free time. Gambling is among Mormon no-nos. Enter the Mafia that exploited gambling, prostitution and other things. In 1964, Elvis Presley immortalized the city’s popular culture allure with the catchy tuneful song, “Viva Las Vegas.” (Long live Las Vegas)

 

     REBER: Bugsy Siegel’s roots represented the Jewish mob, but through personal friendships he built ties with the Italians. After a meeting of gangland leaders in 1929 animosities were put aside, and Siegel said "The yids and the dagos will no longer fight each other." Siegel’s greatest success was as the Los Angeles mob boss. Later he planned to develop Las Vegas. He muscled his way to control of the Flamingo and ran up huge debts in turning it into a first-class operation. He was on the right track, but he was costing the mob a lot of money. In 1947 rifle shots through his girlfriend’s window ended his life.

 

JONI HALPERN writes:

I just wanted to say I really enjoyed Bernie Hunt’s contribution about the Azerbaijan-Armenian conflict. That’s the best summary I’ve ever read. I just wondered if Bernie has any thoughts on what makes these hatreds among neighbors run so long and deep. Is it the fact that so many people have suffered the death or injury of loved ones and the loss of homes and possessions, that simply banish all desire for peace? Is it that both peoples have given up on the possibility of peace? Or is it that bitterness and anger have made such a trench in their psyche that even over generations, they cannot climb out and see other possibilities?

     I think of the Arab-Israeli conflict and other long-lived enmities. I know they all had their start in hard facts, and that they continue to accumulate innumerable wounds on both sides. But doesn’t every mother who bears a child grieve in advance over the likelihood of losing that child to the conflict? I know these questions are simplistic, but I was just wondering whether a thoughtful person like Bernie has pondered them and has an answer.

 

 

Jack J. Reber

P.O. Box 2239

Ramona, CA 92065-0938

United States

 

A Bugsy Siegel fan

 

          Good evening, 919 Gang. This year, for the first time in 56 years, Mary and I did not take a family vacation. In 1964, “family” meant two of us. In recent years it has meant nine. We also have abandoned our habit of visiting Las Vegas every three months. I know, we’re all in the same boat. I enjoyed Bernie Hunt’s piece which combined far-flung travel and Las Vegas.

 

BERNIE HUNT writes:

          When British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain sacrificed what was then Czechoslovakia to Adolf Hitler in 1938 in return for “peace for our time”, he dismissed the situation as “a quarrel in a faraway country between people of whom we know nothing.”

          A year later, he presided over Britain’s entrance into World War II when Hitler’s Nazis invaded Poland. But he was quickly replaced by the more resolute and realistic Winston Churchill.

In our own turbulent times, both Chamberlain’s Britain and the United States have managed, so far, to stay out of another “quarrel in a faraway country between people of whom we know nothing”.

The nations of Azerbaijan and Armenia in the remote Caucasus are embroiled in a bloody war over the territory of Nagorno-Karabakh, disputed between the two former Soviet republics since the USSR dissolved in 1991-92 and fractured a fragile peace enforced by Moscow.

          Nagorno-Karabakh lies within the territorial borders of Azerbaijan, but is populated by ethnic Armenians, who claim allegiance to the historic and truncated nation of Armenia, which borders Azerbaijan on the west. More than 30,000 were slaughtered in a war over the territory between 1988 and 1994 as the Soviet Union disintegrated. In recent weeks, as the dispute erupted anew, attacks and bombings have killed hundreds.

          But while this faraway place and its arcane violent arguments might not strike a chord with most Americans, this Sin City resident finds there’s a Las Vegas angle.

          A couple of years ago, I was crossing the Georgia-Azerbaijan border on a night train from Tbilisi to Baku when immigration officers entered my compartment. I proffered my U.S. passport containing the Azeri visa and a grim-faced functionary flipped through it. At one point he stopped, glowered, and hissed an accusation in pretty decent English: “You have been in Armenia!”

Gotcha!

I was fully aware that because of the Nagorno-Karabakh contretemps, Azerbaijan takes a dim view of people who have visited Armenia. But I honestly had forgotten the Armenian stamp in my U.S. passport. Had I not been such a dolt, I would have made sure the Azeri visa was in the British passport that I, as a dual citizen, also own.

My head raced with thoughts that I was going to be dumped off the train into a midnight rainstorm on the Georgian side of the border and dispatched back to Tbilisi. (That was not entirely a bad thing, all things considered – I love the Georgian capital.)

I stuttered an explanation: I was in Armenia for just a few days, I pleaded … I didn’t like it there much … I intended to spend two weeks in Azerbaijan … I was very interested in the magnificent Azeri culture and history … and whatever other exculpatory fluff and bombast sprang to mind.

The immigration guy fixed me with a steely look as I blathered.

          “Where do you come from in the United States?” he asked. “Las Vegas,” I replied.

The trace of a smile formed on his face.

“Bugsy Siegel,” he said.

“I’m sorry? I don’t understand,” I responded.

“Bugsy Siegel … he founded Las Vegas,” he said vehemently.

“Well,” I began feebly, “he certainly was a major player in the early history of Las Vegas.” Siegel founded what became the Flamingo Hotel, a seminal feature of the Las Vegas Strip. As we talked, it slowly dawned on me that what we had here was a man who had a fascination with American gangsters.

          I played along and we had a roistering old chat about Siegel and other hoodlums, the history of Las Vegas, gambling in the United States, and what it was like to live in Nevada. His English was fantastic … certainly a damned sight better than my Azeri.

          We were getting along like a gambling den on fire when his colleague came along and told him –in his own language -- what I assumed was that he’d better stop lollygagging and get on with checking other peoples’ passports.

          The official smiled at me, stamped my passport, shook my hand, and bid me welcome to Azerbaijan. I thanked him and said we’d keep the light on for him in Las Vegas. As the train pulled out of the border station on its way to Baku, I waved at him on the platform. He cheerily waved back.

          Last year, I attended a World Affairs Council lunch in Las Vegas at which the speaker was the Azeri consul for the Western U.S. When he asked who in the audience had visited Azerbaijan, I was the only one to raise a hand. I told him my story and he laughed.

I hope I didn’t get the immigration guy into trouble.

 

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LEE GRANT writes:

On David Farmer spotting the L.A. Times using the phrase “people experiencing homelessness” instead of “homeless people”: I’m a first-grade volunteer at a school in the East Village. It is, as we say, for kids “impacted by homelessness” not “homeless kids.” Respect!

And, I share Frankie Green’s memories of listening to Vince Scully and Jerry Doggett (not Dogget) on the Dodgers games. Growing up in L.A., there was no greater sports pleasure than “Vinny’s” call of a Sandy Koufax game. Or describing a home run: “Back goes (fill in the blank) to the wall, it’s gone!”

 

PAMELA DUGAN writes:

          Re David Farmer's post on "people experiencing homeless" vs. "homeless people," and "former felon" vs. "felon" after the penalty is served: A similar change that I applaud is the use of "enslaved people" rather than "slaves." It subtly but effectively puts the onus on the people responsible for slavery. No one chose to be a slave.

 

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DAVID FARMER writes:

Along with other LA Times subscribers, I got an email from executive editor Norman Pearlstine extolling the two Pulitzer Prizes the paper won this year. That's standard self-promotion.

But what really caught my eye was Pearlstine's mention of "...our efforts to rebuild The Times under local ownership..." You seldom see such an admission of decline during a chaotic period of multiple ownerships.

I hope The Times can regain its former status as a national newspaper belonging in the company of The New York Times and The Washington Post. I'm not sure that's possible with the head start of the others, and The Times's awkward location so far outside of the governmental and business centers of the country.

 

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          REBER: It’s the biggest birthday party of the year. Happy Birthday, Oct. 31, to Priscilla Lister, Toby McDaniel, Charlie Starr and Kelly Thornton.

 

Jack J. Reber

P.O. Box 2239

Ramona, CA 92065-0938

United States