‘Revolt Brews in France’

Re: “Revolt Brews In France,” Editorial, April 18, 2005. Wavering French support for the new European Union Constitution may have as much to do with growing antipathy for Jacques Chirac as it does with distaste for the Euro-ties that would bind them. Despite continuing claims of national glory by Mr. Chirac, the pompous French president and his merry band of Elysee musketeers have led their nation into what may be the deepest malaise it’s faced since the end of World War II.

France’s current unemployment rate is double-digits and economic growth drags behind much of the rest of Europe. Urban crime is on the rise while suburban housing projects have become gangland battlegrounds. A growing cultural/religious conflict with France’s 6 million strong Muslim community hangs over the hexagon like Saladin’s sword.

Even those old faithfuls of French pride – art, music, and cuisine – are in the doldrums. As best-selling French author Nicolas Baverez bluntly puts it, France is wallowing in “economic, political and social stagnation. “The French have an ingrown fear of change. Add to that Mr. Chirac’s own vacillation about sharing power in Europe with the likes of arriviste Poland and other pro-Americans, and you can see why France faces a possible Non vote.

RICHARD Z. CHESNOFF
Manhattan

‘Bloomberg’s Soul’

Thank you for The New York Sun editorial on Mayor Bloomberg’s acceptance of the radical Independence Party line [“Bloomberg’s Soul,” Editorial, April 15, 2005]. It is truly remarkable how a candidate such as Michael Bloomberg, who can afford all the good advice that money can buy, can support the likes of a Lenora Fulani, a woman whose group sponsored a play about the slaying of Yankel Rosenbaum, a Chasidic scholar in Crown Heights, and actually blamed the young man and his own community for his tragic murder.

ALICE LEMOS
Woodside, N.Y.

I gave The New York Sun my first serious read this morning. I was pleased to see really good coverage of the Tribeca Film Festival, something the Times hasn’t yet done. I was unhappy, though, with the rather heavy-handed bias against Mayor Bloomberg, against Eliot Spitzer, and for President Bush.

GEORGE NICHOLAS
Manhattan

Lawyers Riding With Disabled

Re: “Lawyers Are Riding Along with Disabled,” Alicia Colon, New York, April 12, 2005. Many people who use wheelchairs, myself included, do not use Access-A-Ride, an unreliable service, which requires advance reservations (and costs $2, not $1.50 as stated in the article). We, like all other citizens, do not plan our days around transportation, but choose instead to plan our transportation around our days by utilizing buses and subways, which are available on demand. Public transportation is a right afforded to all citizens of New York City, regardless of race, ethnicity, or disability. Surely you wouldn’t assert that all buses should not accommodate blacks, so why then it is it okay to say the same about people with disabilities?

Retraction, anyone?

MICHAEL A. HARRIS
Mr. Harris is the campaign coordinator of the Disabled Riders Coalition and chair of the New York State Young Democrats Disabilities Issues Caucus.
Brooklyn

Funny, but I didn’t see Alicia Colon last week testifying at the City Council’s Transportation Committee’s Oversight Hearing on MTA maintenance. I was there; having traveled from Washington Heights on the A & E train to address broken bus lifts, subway elevators, and intercoms, and the MTA’s failure to include the disabled in their emergency and evacuation planning.

It seems her complaint is the poor job the MTA does in maintaining the lifts but was for her easier to write about the older couple and the Americans with Disabilities Act than the failings of the MTA.

So what if the couple was only going a few blocks, would it be any different if they’d ridden from the beginning of the route and the lift jammed as they were getting off? Does she know how far they wheeled to the bus stop or where they’re wheeling after leaving the bus? Does she raise her eyebrows at ambulatory passengers who get on and off in a few blocks?

EDITH M. PRENTISS
Board member of Disabled In Action, Disabilities Network of New York City, Transportation Committee Chair & Taxis For ALL Campaign
Manhattan

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