Category: Opinions

Dear Gavin,

I will order the book.

A subject to tackle in your next book is how to run a balanced budget long term, City, State, Federal while giving the needy services, without stifling initiative of other people by inappropriate use of assistance. Interview twenty solid Democrat and Republican Mayors and Governors you respect, as well as business leaders you now know personally and respect.

Get the message across that you built businesses, you worked your way up (I remember you personally delivered wine to my friend Norman Wechsler), and you balanced budgets in business. At the same time, you have a big heart.

Southern Californian’s and Valley Californian’s know you mostly as the good looking, “nice young” guy who dealt with gay marriage and homeless.

Let them know you as a fiscally sound moderate. That means you might have to talk tough to unions. See what the Democrats are doing in NY state and Massachusetts. Cuomo and Patrick are looking to Christy and Walker.

Warmest regards,

Peter Dwares

Letter to Editor

SF Chronicle

Dear Editor,

Re: Tad Taube and Koret Foundation – “The Koret Outrage” printed on Sunday, November 22.

I am the Founder of Pathways For Kids. Pathways brings inner city kids to businesses including Google, Ritz Carlton, US Bank, to open their eyes to the world of business possibilities. Koret Foundation at the request to Tad Taube has given us money. Our cause is neither liberal or conservative. It’s pragmatic. And our beneficiaries are economically poor, inner city most often kids of color. I knew Joe Koret. He would have liked it.

I am aware of the lawsuit against the Koret Board and Tad Taube by the widow of Joe Koret, Susan Koret. I was practicing law in the 1970’s when the Foundation was set up and represented another Koret Board member who while competitive with Tad, had a great deal of respect for his ability. I recall that Susan was a relatively recent immigrant who needed guidance and Mr. Koret specifically selected Tad to guide her.

I also remember the 70’s when Koret Corporation stock price was way down. Tad helped turn the company around, and the stock appreciated accordingly. In addition he invested in Peninsula real estate for Mr. Koret and helped build Mr. Koret’s estate. That estate went to the Foundation.

My guess is Tad and others may have advised Mr. Koret to create the Foundation as a planning method for the Estate and a way to do a good. How it did good was up to the Board. If Tad as a strong leader made decisions Susan Koret and the Hebrew Academy and a group now apparently influencing her have remorse about, it’s after the fact. Tad and the Board had been given certain discretion. A Polish Museum showing positive contributions of Jews to Poland which at times was Russian and all Yiddish speaking will be an antidote to anti Semitism for millions of visitors. Mr. Koret would have loved it. I might add there are causes any Foundation gives to that the donor may have not thought about when alive. The Board sometimes does cypres, i.e. interpreting the donor’s intent. But when you pick a leader to take over when you are gone, you buy their judgment.

The suit of course does not address all the good Koret did under Tad’s leadership, not only Jewish causes and youth, but fiscally oriented causes in line with what a businessman like Mr. Koret would espouse are a part of giving.

I believe the Foundation started with about $160 million and would not have grown to the degree it has all the while giving funding, and would not have attracted the Board members and donors it did without Tad, who has the rare capability to attract talented people.

Tad Taube along with the Koret Foundation has done a lot of good for a lot of people. Unless the money was invested well and given well by Tad and Board, the recipients would never have gotten it and many nonprofits would no longer be here, and thus Mr. Koret would not have achieved his goal. The Polish Museum is completely compatible with the wishes of the Trustor.

Distinguishing between Russia and Polish Jews is ridiculous, self serving, hair splitting under cypres doctrine.

The Polish Museum is a positive reflection of Jewish history in Poland and all of Russia and Eastern Europe by extension. Millions of non Jews and Jews will visit this museum which is a very positive thing for Jewish people and in line with what Mr. Koret would want.

Mr. Koret would say that giving under $10 million (out of hundreds of millions Tad Taube and the Board created after Mr. Koret’s death) of the Foundation’s money was well spent.

Sincerely,

Peter Dwares, Esq.

March 18, 2015

To: Boycotters of Israel

BOYCOTT ISRAEL AND PERHAPS NOT GET BEST TREATMENT FOR CANCER.

A distinct possibility for those who are serious. Israel is developing major breakthroughs in this area and boycotters will not be able to access them by refusing to buy them. Instead of worrying and angering over 500,000 Jews living and creating jobs in a probable future state of Palestine, especially given 1.5 million Arabs are living in Israel and living well, boycott places that are killing a lot of people. Focus on the 200,000 dead in Syria, three million killed in Central Africa. Compare this to ten a year in the West Bank. Focus on Lebanon which could fall into revolution. Worry about the Gulf States treatment of Filipinos and Palestinians, Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood and treatment of Coptics, Iran and North Korea’s development of a nuclear bomb and the means to deliver it here. Focus on China’s treatment of Tibetans, Turkey for its treatment of its Kurds. Just be fair and not single out Israel who educates and creates employment for its 1.5 million Israeli Arabs, far better than do most of the Muslim countries in the region.

Dear Doctor Hawking and co-believers,

Let me make several points. Palestine is not a state. No passport is required. If it were, why should it not have 400,000 Jews, and 400,000 Christians, as Israel has 1.5 million Arab Muslims.

Boycott won’t hurt Israel. People buy its products. Some to live, given the pharmaceutical industry. If a boycott were to work, it would also hurt Israeli Arabs who work for Israeli companies and send funds to West Bank Arabs.

If boycott of Israel is what you want because Jews are living in the West Bank, why not boycott Turkey whose people have kept millions of Kurds from having a country. Boycott the Congo whose governments have killed 3 million people. Sudan for its treatment of minorities, Nigeria, Spain over its Basque population. China regarding its treatment of Tibetans. All these actions are killing, not settling of people.

You get the idea. It’s not about settlors it’s about Jews. There is no mass slaughter as there is in Syria. Or bomb explosions which Suni do to Shiites and back, or political repression like Afghanistan, Egypt, Iraq and Pakistan.

Israeli is good fodder. Yet its citizens including its Muslims have more rights than most every Muslim in the Middle East.

I ask why should a future state of Palestine not have a protected minority of Jews and Christians. Is it because as in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Egypt, Syria, Iraq, Algeria the majority of Muslims (not all) can’t live with non believers?

The Turks controlled the Palestine area for centuries. It was the backward area of the Ottoman Empire. Then Jordan controlled. Now Israel. Palestine has never been a country. It’s inhabitants had chances to be recognized as such from 1948.

By the way, I sympathize with poor and downtrodden everywhere. But Israel or West Bank Jews did not cause the condition, in fact they better it by hiring Palestinians and by joint venturing with Palestinians.

Many of the Arabs came to Palestine from Yemen, Egypt, like Arafat to work for Jewish businesses. And some Muslims left Israel in 1948 after a war they started. Some still are in relocation camps in Arab countries. Why have they not been integrated like we do in the US? At the same time, an equal number of Jews were evicted from Arab countries, a quid pro quo. They have long since been resettled.

Sincerely,

Peter Dwares, Esq.

Dear Mr. Ivens,

I find Mr. Scarfe’s cartoon highly offensive and in fact, disgusting and tasteless. It’s not funny or accurate. Where are his mean spirited cartoons on 60,000 dead Syrians, 3 million dead in Congo, Sudan, Somalia or 70,000 dead in Mexico? Or maybe Arabs blowing up old grandmas playing cards with bombs before the fence/wall was put up. But for terroristic acts like that, there would be no fence/wall. How about a positive cartoon showing West Bank’s economic 10% growth rate attributed in large part to Israel’s economy?

I’ll leave you with one more thing to think about. The Israeli while defending himself against terrorists built his wall. People have died in relatively small numbers. Jews and Arabs. But the Arab terrorist after he takes out Arab moderates, he will ultimately try to take you out because he doesn’t like free expression of any kind including cartoons.

Sincerely,

Peter Dwares, Esq.
San Francisco, CA

What kind of society are we moving to where so many of young people copy the baggy “Butt crack” revealing slacks and full body tattoos dress of prisoners rather than the clothes of businessmen, lawyers Cary Grant, Duke Ellington, Fred Astaire or President Obama.

Since there are 1.5 million Arabs living in Israel, quite protected, being educated, having rights, worshipping as they please, not being attacked and not being terrorists, why can’t there be hundreds of thousands of Jews living in West Bank when it’s a country, some who trace their roots for decades, some centuries, and all with a lineage predating Muslims by 2,000 years? The press refers to these Jews as Settlers. Yet Muslims in Europe or United States have moved and been received and they settled. Why can’t Muslims live with Jews or Christians for that matter and protect them and benefit from their skills. There is plenty of empty land in the West Bank.

Settlements Are The Boogeyman. 300,000 Jews have settled in a non-country that housed their forefathers. We expect it will become a Moslem Palestinian State one day when the Palestinian Arabs want a state more than they want destruction of Jews in Israel.

When it does, why can’t 300,000 to 500,000 Jews live there in peace protected by a largely Muslim nation who also should protect its dwindling Christian population. After all, there are 1.5 million Arabs living in Israel in peace now, beneficiaries of Israel’s rising tide, going to school, operating businesses, etc.

The government is asking the customer i.e. the public to buy a pair of shoes without telling the size, the color about how the customer will pay. People over 65 are leery. People nearing 65 are leery. 15 million illegal immigrants will still not get services unless emergency. I’d respectfully suggest incrementalizing and simplifying. 1,000 mobile well appointed say $500,000, 5,000 ft. clinic health centers in shopping centers and urban shopping areas bring health to people with doctor (or nurse resident), nutritionist, scanner to be used only if appropriate, blood tests at an affordable out of pocket cost.

Legislate you can take insurance from job to job.

Open every state to every insurer who wants to sell and is legitimate. And say it in plain language, one page. That will sell to Republican’s and Blue Dog Democrats.

Peter Dwares