Letters To The Editor
SPOKANE MATTERS
Boot foster parents victims, too
With the prolonged trials of Kevin and Jerry Boot, the family name of the Boots has been disgraced. They need to be vindicated by a consideration of the facts.
Jerry and Mary Kathryn Boot are highly respected by the priests and members of St. Patrick’s Parish in Hillyard. As their pastor for seven years, I know them well.
Kevin and Jerry Boot are not their sons. They were homeless, nameless boys to whom the Boots gave foster-home care, love, training, education and their name. They were two of the 73 foster children that the Boots cared for in a period of over 40 years.
The Boots also adopted six children. All have become good citizens and good Christians.
Kevin and Jerry are prime examples of base ingratitude. Rev. R.M. Bickford, S.J. Spokane
Spokane earned ugly distinction
This letter is in response to a comment quoted in The Spokesman-Review by Janet Stevenson, chairwoman of the Spokane Human Rights Commission, on March 23. In the article concerning the hate letters received by the African American law students at Gonzaga University, Stevenson stated that her group hears reports of racist incidents “every week.” She continues to be quoted as saying, “That may be true in every town.”
I moved to Spokane from Seattle last June. During July, I was walking along a very congested street in the Valley, to pick up my car that was being serviced. As I walked, I heard a deep, loud angry voice coming from one of the cars speeding by yell “Nigger!”
I suddenly became aware that I was alone. I didn’t know if I could count on help from anyone if I needed it. I was afraid. I have not returned to the Valley since that incident.
During the 15 years I lived in Seattle I was never afraid to go into an area of the city merely because of my race.
I’d like Stevenson to know that no, it does not happen in every city. And even if it did, that does not justify or defend it happening in Spokane.
I know that I will not know, in my lifetime, the peace of living without racial prejudice. However, I hope and pray that my grandson’s children may. Nancy J. Nelson Spokane
WASHINGTON STATE
Senn’s sin is not being a puppet
Re: Justin Childers’ letter, “Skipper better choice than Senn,” Skipper and Childers are both talking through the insurance lobbyists’ hats.
The insurance companies’ idea of a free market is a cartel that allows them to manipulate the market to meet the fat-cat salaries and large profits they would like to report to their stockholders.
In 1993, legislation was passed to attempt to correct the many inequities of health insurance. In 1995, thanks to pressure from the insurance companies, the legislation was rescinded.
Now it’s time for the middle class to make its wishes known to the Legislature. We in the middle class are having a hard time keeping our noses above water as it is.
If Skipper were to contact any of the hundreds of persons who are contacting Senior Health Insurance Benefits Advisers every day to get information on affordable health insurance, he would find that it’s truly as the insurance commissioner’s office states: It’s a jungle out there.
Before you condemn the Washington Basic Health Plan, find out for yourself what it costs for a person under 65, and/or disabled, and unable to join a group plan. Find out how many live at the edge of poverty and aren’t eligible for Department of Social and Health Services help, yet are unable to afford insurance company premiums.
Senn is the first person of this office not to kowtow to these companies. I take my hat off to an intrepid lady who is fighting a hard battle for us middle class and poverty-level citizens. Dottie Butler Cheney
PEOPLE IN SOCIETY
Teach manners in the home
About teaching table manners in our schools:
I feel sorry for the children who haven’t been taught at home all these things that a person needs to learn at a very early age in their life about manners, politeness and respect for others. I am a senior citizen and I deplore the way some children act.
I thank my wonderful mother who taught us all these things at a very early age in our lives.
Parents, please start to do this for your youngsters. Dora M. Berry Colfax, Wash.
No one has right to judge Weaver
In response to Martin Kridler of Spokane (“Weaver the culprit, not officers,” Letters, March 23):
I happen to live up on Ruby Ridge and I know Randy Weaver. From what I know of him, Weaver is a good man. His wife and kids adored him.
You and everyone else have no right to judge Weaver for his beliefs or for anything else. Who are you to say that he was hiding behind his family? Were you there?
I personally don’t agree with Weaver’s racist views, but who am I to judge someone for what they believe in? That is what is supposed to make America so great: freedom of religion, freedom of speech and the right to live your life how as you want to, as long as you don’t infringe upon other people’s rights or lives.
Sure, Weaver was probably wrong for selling that sawed-off shotgun. But who are we to judge him when we were not up there and when we do not know the whole truth about anything that happened up there? Daniel S. Wise Ruby Ridge, Idaho
CHILDREN’S BOOKS
Better to set example, teach
I am writing in regard to the “Goosebumps” article of March 27. I agree with Anita O’Brien when she calls the “Goosebumps” series “schlock.” I can also understand how the books gave her children nightmares. That is why I don’t allow my children to read them!
Instead of demanding that these books be taken off the school library shelves, she ought to monitor what her children read and teach them how to make good choices of reading material.
O’Brien explains how she “scours” the library for appropriate books for her younger child. That is how it should be. The responsibility belongs on us as parents, not on the librarians. I, too, am troubled when I hear of the books and movies that some of my son’s classmates are allowed to read and watch. But I’m not responsible for his classmates.
More than once I have had to veto a book, which naturally led to explaining why. Now, my son and daughter are learning to use a critical eye and good judgment when they visit the library.
It is always a dangerous thing to initiate censorship of any kind, no matter how offensive we may find the material. Our job as parents is to raise our children so they can live in this less-than-perfect world equipped with strong morals and good judgment. Banning books, which is really what O’Brien is rallying for, is not a means to that end; teaching our children to make good choices is. Connie L. Ruble Fairfield
Who gets to choose is key concern
Concerning the “Goosebumps” situation in a District 81 school, I want to lend my support to Associate Superintendent Dr. Cynthia Lambarth, the school district and school librarians in the hope that they do not bend under the pressure of censorship.
Parents have the right and responsibility to help their children select books that are appropriate. But please don’t let them decide what is appropriate for my child.
My son also had a problem with “Goosebumps,” “Scary Stories” and other horror books in the third grade. We decided, as a family, that he would wait until he was older or more comfortable with those kinds of books before he checked them out. He is now in the fifth grade and uses his own allowance to buy them. I am excited that he has found something he wants to read.
Censorship has a snowball effect and it will only continue if we let the parents of a few make decisions for the rest of us. As librarians and educators we should continue to encourage the parents of our students to help their children make the best choices for themselves.
Good luck and remember, there are many out there who will support your decision to stand against censorship. Tracey Rice, library technician Chewelah, Wash.
Removal of books not the way
I have recently read negative articles about the John Newberry Medal award-winning book, “The Giver,” by Lois Lowry. This medal is not given in haste to children’s literature, but after a lot of thought and review by the Children’s Librarians section of the American Library Association.
I am 12 years old and attend Saint George’s School. As a classroom assignment to choose a book for a book review, I chose “The Giver.” I thought that Ms. Lowry presented very well the characters and the plot of the book. The book is well written and easily understood.
It is the story of a boy “who experienced something incredible and undertakes something impossible.” It is meant to jolt our conscience in our value and belief systems.
I think that our values and beliefs are worth thinking about, not shutting out the unpleasant things in life.
I do agree that perhaps some children might not understand it, but to remove if from the library totally is not serving the students who might enjoy this book.
I know our world is not a perfect one, but taking certain books from libraries is not the answer.
Let the book stay in the library and give parents the opportunity to monitor their children’s reading choices and explain things in their own way. Janet Sonneborn, seventh grader Spokane
GOVERNMENT AND POLITICS
Corporate economy serves us badly
France, like most Western nations, operates under a social economy. Its telephone system, one of the world’s finest, and its electric powerplants are state owned and operated, as is its health care system, which cares for the ill and aged.
The high ratio of hospitals and doctors to patients helps account for lower infant mortality rates and higher longevity rates than ours.
Unemployment is a social failure, so the state provides welfare without guilt. In addition to subsidized housing it provides cinemas, museums, libraries and cafes for people in poorer areas. Education is free though college and graduate school.
The state transportation system is a dream. Metro, the Paris subway, is outstanding; quiet and fast. Regional Express moves 1.5 million people a day within the greater Paris area at 80 to 90 mph. TVG is a showpiece. At 186 mph, soon to become 220, it’s smooth and quite. Imagine, Wenatchee to Spokane in 45 minutes!
These state services and facilities are the means a social economy uses to instill national pride and solidarity of classes.
We have a corporate economy. Corporate taxes decline, individual taxes increase. Corporate welfare balloons, Medicare faces cuts. Corporations control Congress and have captured the health care industry. Parasitic health insurance companies and HMOs roll in cash while care suffers.
People want the single-payer system but politicians, obeying their corporate masters, vote no. Corporate controlled media promote the failed and unwanted system. France shows the way to save democracy and capitalism. Arch Jaecks Wenatchee
Defense secretary bears watching
The hammer and sickle of the Communist flag is again being flaunted in the face of the United States and the world.
Unfortunately for the United States, it comes at a time when our political acumen is poorly represented, both by lack of experience and moral will.
Remarks made by Secretary of Defense William J. Perry to China’s leaders in a speech before Pentagon planners at the National Defense University on Feb. 13 sounded as though he was challenging China to become a “responsible world power.” However, it seems as though he has something more than his tongue in his cheek.
His association with John W. Lewis and SC&M, a Chicago-based company, regarding a joint venture with a Chinese entity controlled by the People’s Liberation Army has raised some questions regarding his sincerity of purpose. More recently, there was his discreet visit to the Pentagon’s war room with Tiananmen Square Gen. Xu Huizi, who ordered the student killing.
According to Ken Timmerman who publishes the Iran Brief, a monthly investigative newsletter, Bill Perry has benefitted enormously from his many visits and cooperative alliances with Communist China in the past.
Perhaps Perry should order a pair of steel-toe shoes to prevent shooting himself in the foot. Lee C. Barton Colville, Wash.
LAW AND JUSTICE
Court set troubling precedent
Having been involved in the citizens’ revolt against the proposed county noise ordinance a short time ago I must complain about the recent ruling in Hick vs. Dog Patch and Tasker.
Reading RCW 7.48.110 and 7.48.120, referred to in findings of fact and conclusion of law no. 95-2-00126-1, I find no clause or wording that stipulates that a legal business “conducted in such an unreasonable manner that it substantially annoys the comfort or repose of others” is a nuisance. Therefore, I must assume that the presiding judge has imposed this stipulation and by so doing has created a Washington state noise ordinance.
I question his authority to do this and also wish to advise everyone of the potential for harassment by lawsuit from disgruntled neighbors that this ruling will qualify.
Extreme case in point: In 1955 my wife and I built our house next to a county road that was not maintained and had little if any weekly traffic. Today the road is surfaced and well maintained, with heavy traffic within 100 feet of our house at all hours of the day. Shut it down! It is a nuisance. H. Riley Stephenson Colville, Wash.
Dog Patch decision unjustified
In response to the court ruling regarding the closure of Dog Patch, it is hard to imagine how this ruling came about.
Dog Patch is located in the county. There is no law specifying the number of dogs a person may keep in the county. Does this mean that the courts can now write their own laws and rule as they please?
I personally visited Dog Patch last year. The place was immaculate, inside and out, with no bad odors, no unsightly messes and no excessive noise. The grounds resembled a park, with flowers and benches to sit on. I saw 45 clean, happy, well-groomed dogs and it was obvious how much Joyce Tasker cared for them.
I heard only slight - not continuous - barking. I have lived in many areas where dogs were kept outside and barked continuously, and there were no lawsuits being filed because of it.
The real bottom line is she is taking are of an overwhelming problem, yet she’d doing an absolutely fantastic job, one most people wouldn’t touch. If Tasker loses this battle, the whole community loses, as do all the dogs - the strays, the sick and the abused - thrown by the wayside.
Is this what our society has come to now? Punish those who try to make things better? It makes you feel ashamed - or real proud, depending on which side you’re on. Nancy Keith Chewelah, Wash.