Opinion page gives delight to reader
To the editor:
The Opinion Page of last week’s Observer was the most fun reading I’ve done in years.
Ex-Mayor Dennis Boback’s letter implies that the whole ugly business of the firing of Town Manager Scott Janke somehow came about because Mayor Larry Kiker and Vice-mayor Herb Acken really wanted Jack Green as town manager. The idea they would be gunning for Janke (“I told him to watch his back . . .”) does little more than confirm how much better off the town is without Boback in its government.
Boback equates Mrs. Janke’s profession as a porn star with “our Councilwoman” (Jo List’s) profession of singing in local eating/drinking establishments by saying “Bottom line is they are both entertainers. What makes one any better than the other.”
(Wow! If he doesn’t understand the difference, we were in bigger trouble with him as mayor than even I thought. Reading this diatribe from Boback, dripping with the juice of sour grapes, brings back memories of the good old days when this kind of cheap shot was standard fare from him and other council members. Whether he’ll admit it or not, he decided not to run for re-election when it became clear he wouldn’t win.)
He asks, “Would Mr. Janke have been fired if he had married someone like Sally Fields or Kim Bassinger (sic). . . I think not.”
This doesn’t mean a lot until you turn the page and read the letter from his buddy, former campaign manager and head cheerleader, Lee Melsek. In it, Melsek ends by wondering, “If Scott Janke had married Meg Ryan or Meryl Streep, would he now be without a job? Why do I think not?”
Coincidence? Why do I think not? I know great minds are supposed to think alike, but come on here. Who’s really writing this stuff anyway?
What a ridiculous connection! The only similarity between what Mrs. Janke does and what Meryl Streep does is that cameras are present.
I have a proposal for Mr. Boback: Since sitting down and having a beer together has become a fashionable method of settling differences even at the national level, let’s meet at a local bar, preferably one where Jo List is performing. Let’s say, for the purpose of discussion, that Janke had already been married to Anabela when he interviewed for the job here and had said, “Oh, by the way, my wife makes her living by performing a variety of sex acts with a variety of men in front of a camera for international distribution,” If you can look me squarely in the eye and say that you would have voted to hire him anyway, I’ll buy you all the beer you’d care to drink. If you wouldn’t have voted for him under those circumstances, perhaps you can explain what makes the current situation different.
I make the same offer to Lee Melsek.
Jay Light
Town Windbag
(Appointed by Mayor Dennis Boback, Feb. 2008)
Fort Myers Beach