Two nights ago in the lobby of the De Vargas 6 cinema, I stopped an attempted holdup. After buying my senior ticket for $6.60, the next stop was a small bag of popcorn. At the crowded counter a perky young lady passed a hot bag to me. "How much?" I asked. "Six dollars," she said casually.

Stunned, I bellowed, "Six dollars!" I looked for a handgun pointed at me. The woman next to me whispered, "Can you believe it?" I glanced up at the price list on the back wall. A large bag? Eight dollars. I bellowed again, "Eight dollars?"

People stared. I returned the small bag. In disbelief I muttered, "Six dollars." Salted popcorn has become an instrument of corporate greed. The movie was lousy, too.



Regarding "Cut school budget," Alma Parker's Nov. 9 letter: Parker might want to conduct research and check her facts before offering an opinion — something her teachers, obviously, neglected to teach her. School personnel are not paid for the 10 weeks (not three months) they have off in the summer; nor are they paid for holidays or breaks the district gives students.

Teachers are paid only for those days (182) they report to work to teach children or to attend required district training. We realize it must be daunting for Parker to provide her own day care during the summer, on holidays, weekends, and evenings when teachers are not available to care for students; however, that is her job, isn't it? Parker's "opinion" suggests the motive for her uninformed remarks — disdain for the teaching profession, in general and, more specifically, anger for the teachers who work at the school her children attend.



"Protect living wage," Tomás Rivera's attempt to reinterpret what mayoral candidate Asenath Kepler said at her Oct. 22 town hall meeting concerning the living wage misses the point. It may be difficult to make ends meet at $9.85 an hour, but it is even harder to do so if your employer lays you off because he/she cannot afford to pay the higher wage.

We all want people to have jobs, but Economics 101 teaches that we do not raise taxes or wages during a recession. As an attorney, Asenath Kepler knows she must enforce the law. The question is whether or not the policy behind the law is beneficial to all Santa Feans. The jury is still out on that question.



In the Nov. 7 article, "GAO: Trust lacks solid plan," about Valles Caldera National Preserve, Caldera Action board member Tom Jervis stated, "You can't manage the elk herds up there without hunters."

Of course you can. Wolves and cougars have done it for untold years. They are the hunters needed for elk "management." The best hunters aren't human.



The Santa Fe County commissioners have played fast and loose with taxpayer money by loaning a small-time film studio $6 million to build a new movie studio in Santa Fe. The studio has had difficulty finding funding elsewhere, yet the county commissioners were willing to risk our money on this venture.

As reported in The New Mexican, the commissioners said that the film workers union would assume the debt if the studio defaults, yet the union said it agreed to no such thing. Interestingly, omitted from the reporting of this is that a principal of the studio is the chairman of the Democratic Party of New Mexico. At the same time the county commissioners are willing to loan a small film studio $6 million, they refuse to fund the Fire Department's $2.2 million needs for important equipment that will save lives and protect our homes.