Payback: A Reader's Thoughts

Monday night we got this e-mail at WhatsLeftOfMaplewood@yahoo.com, which I thought I'd share:

Payback sucks. It really sucks for the little people. People like all of us on our little street in the South End of Maplewood. Thanks to an apparently idiotic action by our apparently stupid Deputy police cheif, we will be losing one fine member of our police department who apparently did nothing but listen to the radio. The problem is not that the Deputy Police Cheif is tuned to the wrong station. Quite the contrary. It is the three musketeers who need to adjust thier dial. I can't help but think once the services start eroding due to the current joke of a budget, how difficult it is going to be to get someone down here to check out the wholesale/retail operation we have going next door. Let me give you one clue...They aren't selling bubble gum. If it was just me, I would have to reserve judgement. However, when I have every neighbor down the block with the same independent opinion as I do, then how can I be wrong? It is so bad that someone outside of the neighborhood asked me if it was what I thought it was. As it is now, I have trouble getting someone to do something. What's it going to be like next year when there is no one there to listen? (As I write this, two more cars have pulled up to pick up thier "goods" at 11:13 PM. They are gone by 11:15 PM)

Government . . . it's a balancing act. That difficult choice between getting vengeance on the guy who researched the details of Emperor Copeland's stark nudity, versus little things like having the police staff level to respond to complaints of drug dealers in our neighborhoods.