Letters

All the Way Hom
George Cothran, is a good journalist. I didn't realize he had talent as a fiction writer. The quote attributed to me -- "I ain't saying it ain't true," to the question of whether I am an "operative" of the Willie Brown campaign ("Mail Bomb," Bay View, Oct. 25) -- sounds like Mickey Spillane. I don't talk like that. I didn't say it.

I am a consultant with the Ben Hom for Mayor campaign. I don't work for any other S.F. campaigns, formally or informally. For the record, Ben Hom is not a "stalking-horse" for Brown, or anyone else. That charge, being so liberally thrown about by the Jordan campaign, reflects the bigoted stereotype that Asians in San Francisco politics are pawns. Jordan, as some may recall, unjustly fired Hom as president of the Redevelopment Commission in 1993 in the belief that Ben would not fight back. Ben did fight back.

Ben Hom is running as the only Asian, the only Republican, the only citizen-candidate, to send a message to City Hall.

Paul Shinoff
San Francisco

George Cothran replies: I stand by the accuracy of the quote in question.

Willie Wash?
Your excellent article summarizing Willie Brown's checkered career ("The Last Seduction," Oct. 18) went wishy-washy at the end. The conclusion should have stated that after a quarter-century of Brown's leadership, it is clear that he has failed his community, state, and party. In San Francisco, the needs of the Bayview-Hunters Point District remain neglected, and African-Americans are fewer with correspondingly less power. And because Brown and his Democratic cohorts have sold out to the special interests, Californians have repeatedly had to turn to the initiative process for reform. Indeed, the last reform -- term limits -- forced Brown himself out of office.

Following Brown's years in power as speaker, the Democratic Party has gone from the majority party in the Legislature to the minority party, with little prospect of regaining power in the near future. Brown's argument that his taking millions in contributions from the tobacco industry was OK because he used the money to elect Democrats is specious. The truth is that his taking this tainted money was a reason Californians turned against Democrats. It is time to return Willie Brown to private life so that he may take stock of the Faustian bargains he has struck.

John M. Kelly
San Francisco

Legal Wrangling
George Cothran misquoted me in his Willie Brown story ("The Last Seduction"). I never said Willie just stopped short of being illegal. I did say what he does is always within the law, because he has acted legally.

I have known Willie Brown for more than 40 years. Over that time, I have watched racists, right-wing Republicans, and, most recently, two of the other candidates in the mayor's race attempt to link Brown with breaking the law. They have never been successful because Willie Brown has always acted legally.

John L. Burton
Assemblyman, 12th District
San Francisco

George Cothran replies: A review of my notes shows that the quote in question is accurate.

A Vase in Place
One letter printed in response to "Color It Gone" (Oct. 4) was of interest to me as director of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco. Bob Freeman (Oct. 18) registered concern for Poeme de la Vigne, a bronze vase modeled by the French artist Gustave Dore (1832-1883). Freeman is troubled by the placement of the object adjacent to the exterior of the M.H. de Young Memorial Museum in Golden Gate Park.

Many of your readers may be aware that the huge vase first came to the U.S. at the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893. Michael de Young brought the vase to San Francisco the next year to be exhibited at the Midwinter Exposition. The vase continued to be on view at the de Young Museum, and was formally accepted into that collection in 1931. It remained there until moved to the California Palace of the Legion of Honor in 1976 with the installation of that museum as an institution devoted to French art.

The official guide to the exposition noted that "The vase, however, will only be located in the Museum temporarily, as it is part of the plan of the Park Commissioners to place it ... in an advantageous location in the Central Court and convert it into a fountain."

The Central Court referred to is the Concourse, that area between the de Young and the California Academy of Sciences, which is less than 100 yards from the present placement of the vase. Fortunately, the vase was never converted into a fountain.

Harry S. Parker III
Director, The Fine Arts Museums
of San Francisco