ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1995, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, December 17, 1995 TAG: 9512150060
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: F-3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BETTY STROTHER EDITORIAL WRITER
IT HAS fallen to me to write about our first "Matter of Opinion" continental breakfast, a little get-together the editorial staff had Wednesday with readers.
No big agenda. Just coffee and a doughnut and a chance to schmooze.
We loved it, and most everybody who came seemed to enjoy it, too.
This was their chance to ask about how we do our jobs and to personally deliver any complaints, compliments or suggestions.
And what did we hope to get out of it? After all, we do hear from you guys. People write. People call. People buttonhole us on the street. Because we work on the one part of the paper where readers get to have their say, my colleagues and I have the pleasure - and usually it is a pleasure - of regular communication with readers both of our pages and of the newspaper in general.
But nothing quite replaces straightforward, civil conversation, face to face, to reassure all that those who disagree with you are not the enemy, as people sometimes might imagine, and those who agree are, indeed, the incisive, thoughtful, honest, brave and true people we always knew they would be. Like Bud Goehring.
Goehring was the first fellow through the door Wednesday, and he clearly didn't come to gripe. He was going to clip a commentary written by a dying smoker that appeared in last Sunday's paper, and the newspaper's accompanying editorial, and send them both to Rep. L.F. Payne, he said. Maybe Payne, who represents a lot of tobacco growers - and votes accordingly - should see that he has anti-smoking constituents, too, and they just might outnumber the farmers.
A longtime colleague had just died of lung cancer, Goehring said sadly. He never could quit smoking. He had been addicted.
Soon after Goehring, Bill Van Appen loped in. I'd never seen him before, but I knew the name on his name tag. We had talked a year or so ago. He had called, saying that he seemed to recall from my column that I was from St. Louis, and he and his wife were going to be going through there on a trip to Oklahoma, and could I suggest where to stay and what to see?
Editorialists are never short on opinions, so I could, of course. He was nice enough to call back after the trip, and we had a good old time talking about the only big city I love. He reminded me Wednesday to eat at Cunetto House of Pasta - his own discovery - the next time I'm there, and asked how my mom was getting along. Some readers get to feel a lot like friends.
Not surprisingly, some folks came to complain. Richard Rakes wanted to know why the editorial staff doesn't come down harder on disinformation being reported about the Republican Congress regarding Medicare and Medicaid. Democrats are using scare tactics in talking about reductions, he said, when Republicans are talking only about slowing the growth of the programs. Our editorials have said the same thing, actually. But I told him I think both parties have been putting some political spin on the issue.
We agreed completely that we like Ray Reed, a columnist at the newspaper whom Rakes knows from a church-mission trip to Mexico that they both took part in.
Barbara Duerk, a recent City Council candidate, and David Lisk, a onetime council member, focused on local issues - funding for neighborhood projects, council's meetings. (It is meeting less, Lisk said, which means it is abrogating more of its authority to the city administration.)
I remember you, I told Lewis Goyette. You came into the office a few days ago wondering if you were among the first 50 to reserve a spot at the breakfast. (A little communication problem: People signed up for the breakfast by responding to an advertisement. It wasn't entirely clear from the Infoline message that if callers were asked to leave their names and the numbers in their party, their places were reserved. When we reached the maximum number, we changed the message.)
"You made a mistake," he said with a laugh. "You told me to come." He had promised me he had lots of opinions, and he obviously relished sharing them. "I'm disgusted with developers who say we need to grow. ... They're not gonna be satisfied till they blacktop the whole valley." "The biggest problem in the world is the pope." Goyette wants no growth - worldwide. The pope obviously is at philosophical odds, and has a larger platform from which to speak.
As Goyette decried anti-abortion activists, Bo Chagnon jumped in on the conversation. He is pro-choice, too, but he had gotten to know an abortion protester and they now have lunch together every week. When they clarified the meanings of the words they use, he said, they found the same things were important to them.
Some people will insist on listening and seeking common ground. There's one in every crowd.
And so it went. Jean Hammond wanted to know why we suppress Ellen Goodman's column when we publish the full-page Reader's Forum feature on Tuesdays. (We don't suppress it. We just don't run it.) And Susie Fetter wanted to say how much she likes Reader's Forum. "It's really fun to hear what people are thinking."
Absolutely. If you think so too, we hope you'll try to make it next time we throw one of these wingdings.
LENGTH: Medium: 91 linesby CNB