'First Fridays' farcical
I'll start with the requisite sucking up: Lucia [Bill] is a great columnist who more often than not hits straight to the core of the matter...That's why I was so amazed that this intelligent, young reporter would be taken in by the farce that is First Friday. ("First Fridays bring culture to Phoenix," The State Press, June 7) ...Yes, First Fridays is simply the Phoenix middle class attempting to show the world that it's culturally on par with the other big cities...So let the middle class and the ASU students pretend to be refined at First Fridays, but take it at face value: local artists promoting a local-art scene, and little more.
-Matthew Helmers
Student
Martori's admiration of France misguided
So our government should now kiss and make up to the French? (Arthur Martori's "Give a toast to France," The State Press, June 7) Put down the crack pipe and come back to reality...You refer to them helping us in the Revolutionary War. True, but they did this after the outcome had become apparent. In the interim, they rode the fence by actually selling supplies to both sides...As far as renaming our food, [the French] initiated this war of words themselves. They have a government ministry devoted to protecting their sacred language...If the American tourists they despise so greatly would no longer visit, it would literally crush their economy. We are still paying that debt back to this day.
Now, I ask you, who should kiss up to whom?
-Josie McGwire
ASU Alumnus
