Letters From the Issue of Thursday, December 6, 2007

Phoenix's finest?: The sheriff is an idiot. Even the Phoenix police act like a criminal gang.

I personally was arrested and detained (and put in Sheriff Joe's jail for two days) for calling the cops (by using 911 because a police dispatcher hung up on me three times) to stop the drug dealing on my corner, Fifth Street and Portland. The cops steadfastly still refuse to do anything about this.
Dave Brook, Phoenix

Yes, there should: Is there any legal redress for the abuses by Arpaio and Andrew Thomas? Should there not be a federal investigation into the attempted subversion of the Constitution?
Name withheld by request

DOGTOWN

J.T. is definitely puke-worthy: How can the state's Republican Party allow this buffoon of a neo-Nazi in their ranks? J.T. Ready would have had no place in the AZ GOP when Goldwater (Barry, not doofus Don) was around ("Racist Daisy-Chain," The Bird, Stephen Lemons, November 22).

But with the party run by the likes of Randy Pullen and State Representative Russell Pearce, it's turned into a gutter filled with racist trash like Ready. I'm so disgusted I could puke.
Jay Adler, via the Internet

When you lie down with dogs: What have Maricopa County Republican Party circles come to when a neo-Nazi thug can infiltrate party ranks? It truly speaks to the kind of leadership the party has nowadays.

It also speaks to the kind of cretins there are among our local GOP ranks: Sheriff Joe Arpaio, County Attorney Andrew Thomas, State Representative Russell Pearce.

The party needs a housecleaning, but I won't be holding my breath for that to happen, because there's a perception that these guys are so popular they can't be stopped. And, based on the most recent elections, that may be true. But the New Times case has put a big chink in their armor. It has made them very vulnerable. If local Republicans with scruples were to step up now and challenge them, they could do us all a huge public service by unseating these SS troopers.

White supremacist J.T. Ready probably has no real power in the little position he holds, but he is a metaphor of what is going on. You know the old adage: When you lie down with dogs. His politics are not far removed from those of Thomas and Arpaio. As The Bird pointed out, Joe recently said he had no problem being called a KKK member, and both he and Thomas are publicly supporting Pearce [in a Congressional bid], who's shown in your photo arm-in-arm with Ready.
Liz DeMarco, via the Internet