Seriously, the first six times I read this I thought it was from the Onion:
Telling her mother that she wanted to come to the aid of a library
under attack, 11-year-old Sydney Sabbagha stood at the podium before
the Oak Brook village board.“I used to go to the library
knowing there were people there to help me find a book. Now there is no
one to help me,” Sydney said solemnly. “It will never be the same
without the people you fired.”Sydney nestled back into her
seat, but that didn’t stop 69-year-old criminal attorney Constantine
“Connie” Xinos from boldly putting her in her place.“Those who
come up here with tears in their eyes talking about the library, put
your money where your mouth is,” Xinos shot back. He told Sydney and
others who spoke against the layoffs of the three full-time staffers
(including the head librarian and children’s librarian) and two
part-timers to stop “whining” and raise the money themselves.“I don’t care that you guys miss the librarian, and she was nice, and she helped you find books,” Xinos told them.
“Don’t
cry crocodile tears about people who are making $100,000 a year wiping
tables and putting the books back on the shelves,” Xinos smirked,
apparently referencing the fired head librarian, who has advanced
degrees and made $98,676 a year. He said Oak Brook had to “stop
indulging people in their hobbies” and “their little, personal, private
wants.”
Personal, private little wants. Likelearning to read. If ever anyone deserved to make $100K, it’s a librarian, but naturally things like learning are for pussies. The only people who should earn six figures are professional athletes and members of Congress!
I swear, every time some cop or teacher or firefighter’s in the news for making slightly more than whatever the reader thinks he or she should make, this argument comes up. Everybody gets in a mad rush to justify and apologize and negotiate just how big a pay cut people who perform vital community services should have to take to make their existence palatable to smug assholes like this Xinos twit. Truly, the argument ought to be how much MORE the librarians should be making, and how you can afford an extra five bucks on your tax bill to make that happen:
“Everybody thinks Oak Brook is rich and has all kinds of resources, but
we don’t,” Niemeyer says. “Oak Brook has very low taxes and that’s a
point of pride in this town.”
The Chicago suburb of Oak Brook is near where Mr. A works. It has low taxes because it has a gazillion strip malls, shopping malls, and hotels. When you have immense commercial revenue you can afford to ease off homeowners somewhat, but you should recognize that that being the case, maybe a library isn’t an insanely luxurious thing.
Also, this guy is just a total butthole:
“I understand that my philosophy is conservative,” Xinos says, adding
that government just needs to catch bad guys, put out fires, fix the
streets and make sure buildings are sturdy.He campaigned,
successfully, against a plan to bring subsidized housing for seniors
into town by declaring, “I don’t want to live next to poor people. I
don’t want poor people in my town.”
Maybe the Republicans have finally found their presidential candidate for 2012.
A.
We appreciate the opportunity to work with the Village of Oak Brook and the Oak Brook
Public Library. We believe that our recommendations will provide Oak Brook with a
solution to achieve the goals of decreasing costs and increasing workflow efficiencies in
your library.
If you have any questions related to the findings and recommendations in
our report, please contact Elisa Topper directly at (630) 232-8457 ext. 233 or via email at
etopper@libraryassociates.com.
That sounds like a REALLY good idea.
Tommy
Constantine Xinos? A disgrace to my ethnic group like that can only be called one thing: a malaka.
Now y’all know why I’m no longer working as a librarian. I have an advanced degree from a pretty good school (UC-Berkeley) and I can’t tell you the number of times I was asked, “You need a master’s degree to check out books?”
[bangs head]
Holy shit.
No libraries.
And NO fucking planetariums!
And shut yer cryin’ pie holes!
People like Xinos force me to rethink my ideas about the proper allocation of violence.
.
See, he got through law school AND HE DIDN’T READ ANY FUCKING BOOKS!
What a douche bag.
Yeah, maybe some of his law firms clients should start haggling over HIS paycheck!
Hiya, Susie.
I’m a fan.
(blushes)
Tommy
Wow. I’m ready to rearrange this assclown’s face with a coal shovel.
“I don’t want to live next to poor people. I don’t want poor people in my town.”
====================
Or readers.
make sure buildings are sturdy.
F*ckin’ RINO. Who is the town of Oak Brook, that it gets to tell me how to buildmy building onmy land.
Hitler was in favor of building codes, you know.
yup keep us stoopid. that IS the plan.
Obviously, Constantine was never suckled as a child with the milk of human kindness and ended up with a heart as cold as a witch’s tit. Each day I seem to come across some anecdotal news item that reaffirms my reasons for not being a Republican.
Sparrow, contrary to what you would think, Witch’s tits are actually quite warm – believe me, I possess two of them. Thanks for the slur, tho’.
Hmmm…criminal attorney. I think his fellow attorneys meant that appellation ironically.
And Elspeth, haven’t you ever heard the aphorism, “Cold tits, warm heart?” ;-P
My community had trouble approving a library which already had 40% of the cost privately donated. It will now be an issue in the upcoming aldermanic elections. I’d move, but these days it’s the same everywhere.
You know, the one thing I will say about the far-flung suburb where I used to live is that when they went for a library referendum to spend like 20 million to build what turned out to be an absolute palace to books, it passed by 67 percent.
And gyma, good God, people are so fucking rude. When I used to tell people I was a newspaper reporter they’d say, “You can make a living doing that?”
Raised by wolves, I’m telling you.
A.
Definition of a nutjob: anti-information Republican.
Look it up on Google and the picture is Xinos.
What a jerk.
Entry into the library world is a Master’s of Library Science (ALA accredited). Avereage pay of an experienced Medical Reference Librarian is about 1/3 of the amount listed in the article.
My guess for the $100k is that the person would have had to have been the head of a very large metro network. Even then, that is an anomaly.
Today’s conservatisim is incompatible with human survival and respect in general.
Xinos sure does have that wife beater mentality down pat. He’s arrogant, belligerent, mean and nasty and tries desperately to humiliate a kid so he can feel powerful.
In my experience, libraries are always expendable. ALWAYS. Every place I worked (multiple states) library funding was the first to be cut if said funding derived from the general fund. The only way to escape was to get a library district formed come hell or high water.
I often heard folks claim they shouldn’t have to support a library if they didn’t use it. I’m pretty sure these same people believe they shouldn’t have to support the educational system if they have no children or their children are grown.
And for the record, I’ve never been paid to check out a library book! [not in the job description, after all.]
I love the part where the guy tells the 11 year-old to chip in if she wants the librarian back. Apparently, Oak Brook isn’t above taxing children!
God, I wish I’d been there. I would have said something like, “Shelving books and wiping down tables? That’s not what a head librarian does and you know it! If you had a job that entailed…[list of seven different job responsibilities of a head librarian, framed in non-library terms], wouldn’tyou want to be paid a lot of money? Of course you would, and shame on you for insulting the librarian like that.”
“Doesn’t want to live next to poor people”? Yes, because “rich people” like you, Mr. Xinos, are obviously just treats to have as neighbors. And services like libraries and public schools and student loans don’t do anything like, say, help people of lower income better their standard of living and become “middle-class people.” ‘Course not.
*headdesk*
And also, as daughter and granddaughter of librarians. YOU SIR HAD BEST STEP OFF OF THE LIBRARY PROFESSION. *is now looking forward to probably going into debt to get herself a MLIS, just because it will piss guys like that off*
Sigh.
Does the dumbing down ever stop?
These folks won’t stop until we are all returned to the serf roots from whence we came. Funny that, but my guess is that our man Constatine Xinos comes from fine peasant stock.
SP
12 years ago, this same guy filed suit to stop construction of…a library.
Weird.
Obviously he’s a self-hating illiterate. He sounds like a greedy, stingy bastard. I think we need to take action.
Wow. Lawyers are assholes.
😉
As I once heard a teacher say…”you don’t have to ban books if nobody knows how to read them”.
With people like this, we’re more than halfway there.
:Xinos” means “sour” in Greek- is this a real character or made up? The last name could not be more appropriate…