How to Talk to a War CriminalGreeting Rumsfeld in Taos by Jeff Conant

It was one of those crisp, clear 50 degree winter days with hard-packed snow that makes Taos, New Mexico a world-class ski resort and brings a steady stream of celebrities to this remote mountain hamlet. I'd taken the morning off to ski with a friend from out of town and two of his kids. Our wives had planned to meet us for lhttp://www2.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gifunch at a restaurant at the base of the ski-hill, so when lunchtime came we glided in, unbuckled our skis, and headed in to eat. But before I entered, I was stopped in my tracks when, from the corner of my eye I noticed a familiar-looking white-haired and bespectacled old man sitting with two others at an outdoor table. Among those whose names are regularly invoked as testament to Taos's celebrity appeal is former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, and indeed, here I was, face to face with Rummy himself. Knowing that the former Secretary of Defense frequented the Taos Ski Valley, I had fantasized this moment many times. To my good fortune I was surprisingly prepared to greet him...
JEFF CONANT
aka Beau RedBox, RingMaster
THURSDAY NIGHTS CultureJam
host,Zapatista Home Companero
on radio(fuckW!)NRK

jeff, you ignorant boor!

Not all Taose-os are ‘ignorant boors’
I was upset recently when I read the Albuquerque Journal North article about the “icy treatment” Donald Rumsfeld has been subjected to at Taos Ski Valley by a couple of boorish, discourteous people. I became even more upset this morning when I read the five letters in the editorial page of the March 28 Journal North.
The writers don’t just chastise the rude characters who were responsible, but blame the entire town of Taos for a “lack of tolerance” saying Taos could “use some manners,” etc.
Taos is full of well-bred, decent citizens who don’t treat their fellow residents, part time or otherwise, in a rude or impolite manner such as the rantings of one Jeff Conant.
Who does he write for anyway? Please don’t categorize us all as ignorant boors.
Regardless of how one feels about a person, it is not proper nor civilized to insult them in public.
SADIE KNIGHT
El Prado

4/26/07 editionTaos News/Letters

Mind Our Manners?
To quote Sadie Knight’s letter in the April 5 edition of
The Taos News: “Regardless of how one feels about a person, it is not proper nor civilized to insult them in public.”
Am I to glean from your letter that it is, in your opinion, “proper” and “civilized” to publicly dismiss the Constitution of the United States as well as the Geneva Convention, United Nations and majority (it’s true) wishes of the American people to condone, encourage and order marauding, pillaging, illegal incarceration and torture, and the deaths of hundreds of thousands (that we know of ) of innocent people — including “our own” for profit — what, as long as we say “please” and “thank you?”
ISABEL SCOTT
Ranchos de Taos