Letters are posted as we receive them during the week, and before they are printed in the paper, so check back frequently to see new letters. If you'd like to send a letter to the editor, use this postmarks submission form, or email your letter directly to mail@austinchronicle.com. Thanks for your patience.

Dear Editor,
    Richard Whittaker covered the Formula One story very well with a couple of minor misconceptions [“How Do You Formulate a Grand Prix?”, News, Nov. 19] The FIA is definitely not the “ruling body for motor sports.” The FIA has virtually no presence or authority in the U.S. NASCAR, IRL, SCCA, NHRA, IHRA, AMA, SCTA, NASA, Monster Trucks, Tractor Puller's, and other sanctioning bodies in the U.S. and the venues at which they compete are completely independent of the FIA. It is important to understand that both Daytona International Speedway and the Indianapolis Motor Speedway provide two different venues at their locations. Each has an oval and a road course. The road course at Indianapolis was upgraded at great expense in order to qualify as a F1 track. The major change required to make Indianapolis qualify for a F1 event was to build enclosed pits/garages to protect the F1 drivers from the fans.
    There is no way that the course at Monaco could be graded higher than the one at Indianapolis.
    I and a lot of my friends are enthusiastically supportive of F1. We all realize the value it will bring to Austin and the surrounding areas.
    But Formula One is governed at the whim and fancy of one individual. Someone should talk to Tony George about his dealings with that person.

Dear Editor,
    Re: The review of Cool It [Film Listings, Nov. 12]: “Clear-eyed” no; “commonsensical” maybe, based on the public’s disconnected understanding of climate science, “poleaxed by the fear … that we are, in effect, immobilized” hardly. These three comments from the Chronicle’s movie reviewer sum up the disinformation being propagandized by nonclimate scientists today, whether their interests are vested in money, false authoritarianism, ego, innocence, or ignorance.
    The nonscientists are outnumbered 30:1 to 45:1. The vast majority of scientists do not know how to speak in plain English and will not talk to the public (the opposite of the Cool It crowd). They are exceedingly conservative. Publish or perish is real. If scientists are wrong, the academic journals will not publish their work.
    Academic publishing is more stringent than a murder trial. One can be put to death based on circumstantial evidence. Circumstantial evidence is, by far, not allowed in academia.
    For nearly a decade, climate has been at the bottom of America’s priority list. The time frames are too long, the changes perceived to be small, and the conflict perceived to be large. There is no incentive, especially when our leaders are just as apathetic.
    All of this would be mute however if there were a clear understanding of dangerous climate change. Just a few degrees of change, as has happened many times in our ancient past, can create a sea of sand in the Great Plains, raise the sea level by 15 feet per century for centuries on end, or kill forests across continental regions.
    But most people have an exceedingly poor understanding of the science. What understanding they do have is tempered strongly by propaganda (however innocently created) like Cool It.
    We have dozens of viable, worthwhile, and profitable solutions already, and more are revealed every day. Who do you trust, climate scientists or talk show hosts?

Dear Editor,
    Every year since 1970, Native Americans have gathered near Plymouth Rock to commemorate a National Day of Mourning on the U.S. Thanksgiving holiday. To them, this day (and Columbus Day) is a reminder of the genocide of millions of Native American people, the theft of their lands, and never-ending repression. They want everyone to know the truth about this myth, that, in fact, the pilgrims were very cruel and not friendly to the Native Americans who helped them survive those first harsh winters. On Thanksgiving Day, Native American people from throughout the Americas will speak the truth about their history and about current issues and struggles in which they are involved. I believe apologies and reparations should come in the form of making history books truthful and honoring all treaties, including the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo.

Dear Editor,
    Michael Ventura’s Nov. 19 “Letters at 3AM: The Palin-Obama Convergence” is lacking. So Palin and Obama are typical politicians who lie and dissemble. And so? It would be infinitely more important for Mr. Ventura to objectively discuss how their respective ideologies, i.e., Obama’s leftism and Palin’s conservatism, affect us.
    Indeed, while he touched on the war in Afghanistan and corporations and Obama being in bed and Palin’s resigning as Alaska’s governor, and so on, he never explores their ideologies. Why not? After all, that’s what will determine whether America and the free world become cultural anachronisms or thrive.
    So allow me. First, a clear definition of these ideologies is necessary. And then a description of what each dogma means for America is appropriate. After that, Mr. Obama and Ms. Palin must be identified with their associated ideological makeup.
    Leftism advocates equality of cultural value and economic outcome be dictated by government in the name of subjective leftist defined “social justice.” Conservatives believe cultural importance and economic success be driven by objective individual liberty – not government. Leftism restrains liberty. Conservatism champions it.
    A leftist America would no longer be the world’s leader. A power vacuum would form and be filled most likely by authoritarian China, Russia, and tyrannical Islam. America would be relegated to former superpower status. The U.N., the UK, Europe, Japan, Canada, India, Brazil, and so on would become economic colonial spheres of interest for the new powers. The free world would be fundamentally undone. Humanity would be subject to the tender mercies of the new feudal lords.
    Conversely, a liberty-centric conservative America would retain its leadership role. Liberty and the free world would be protected from those dark forces. Prosperity would soar.
    Barack Obama is a leftist Democrat. Sarah Palin is a conservative Republican. Choose. That’s reality!

Dear Editor,
    So we can add Michael Ventura [“Letters at 3am,” Nov. 19] to the list of disenchanted liberals who are piling on Barack Obama after his midterm drubbing? If you don't think things can get any worse, then you have a very short memory: Iraq invasion? Secret energy meetings? Dick Cheney? I'm not surprised that Obama has turned centrist; in fact, I expected it. He got through a health reform bill that just a couple of years ago everyone was clamoring for. He got through a stimulus package that for all its flaws (and considerable resistance from the Mitch McConnells of the world) kept our country afloat and saved GM from bankruptcy. Instead of abandoning Mr. Obama, why don't we for once act like Republicans and support our president that we elected? I doubt that Mr. Ventura or any of the numerous commentators from the left or right have the stamina or intelligence to actually deal with the drudgery of making the laws in this land. As usual, the liberals are their own worst enemy.

Dear Editor,
    It's a shame that when everyone wants something, the price will always be outrageous.
    I'm alluding specifically to the Austin City Limits Music Festival, how profiteers buy blocks of tickets, selling out the event all too quickly. Then where must the public turn to get tickets? To the very same profiteers who buy out the event. This way, people unprepared are coerced into dealing with middlemen, shady vendors who hustle on the pathway to Zilker Park. Nothing ensures these marked-up prices aren't for illegitimate tickets.
    This problem didn't occur at this year's Fun Fun Fun Fest – perhaps this was due to the festival's underground nature. Right in the middle of Downtown, it certainly felt more local than our city's title festival, which now only lingers on billboard advertisements. There were no men clutching signs proclaiming “I need tickets” while hawking wristbands, because all tickets were picked up at the gate. Furthermore, Fun Fun Fun Fest allowed people to simply walk up, pay, and enter. While this caused congested lines near noon, everyone who wanted to got in. So while ACL may be an event for the masses, perhaps they might take note from another festival that's doing music right, as opposed to just selling it.

Dear Editor,
    Regarding the Formula One developmental deal [“How Do You Formulate a Grand Prix?,” News, Nov. 19]: If flashy upstart C3 Presents was running the racetrack project and using its own lawyers, it wouldn't be too far-fetched to imagine this corporate-welfare infrastructure request being approved. In a perverse way, it might be lucky that a lawyer with a history of working for tainted, developer loot is carnival barking down at City Hall on behalf of Formula One Austin. We can only trust the city won't play sugar daddy with our money on this one. Or will the citizens have to say it again? No more damn taxpayer money for private enterprises and their for-profit, messy, behemoth bread-and-circus events!

Dear Editor,
    Wow, I can't believe the Chronicle used Richard Craig's statement for half of the article [“Planting a Place in the Shade,” News, Nov. 12]. He doesn't speak for me … and I am a friend of Pease Park.
    There has been a huge oversight of the fact that the park department has failed for years in the maintenance of Pease Park – no, emptying trash cans doesn't count. I mean regular ground maintenance associated with a park that has huge traffic numbers – no aerating of turf, no temporary pulling of baskets during wet weather or the lack of, no fertilization of the heritage oaks.
    Yes, I have heard the parks department cry about lack of money, yet it's so willing to whore out Zilker in the name of a music fest that a lot of people can't afford. On a side note, why is the city so willing to let corporate money fund our park maintenance? Whatever happened to judicious budget management?
    As a landscaper with a degree in horticulture, I can appreciate the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center's assessment of the park, but let's not take it as gospel – half of the disc golf course is in a flood plain that gets saturated with litter not associated with the disc golf traffic. The other half is inundated with cedar trees and invasive species.
    As for Mr. Craig's statement about a herd of elephants at a golf course, that's irresponsible.
   Pease is a public place that lets everybody use it for free, not one that caters to people of Mr. Craig's financial background. Disc golf is a sport that is affordable for everyone, not just white-collar workers. If anything should happen, how 'bout firing the upper levels of park management and getting some competent, down-to-earth people to run it?
    Yes, let's pull the course and let the park heal, but let's bring it back in some form and put in a course at Roy G. Guerrero Park, too.