Letters

America is regressing

Years ago, a co-worker and I were sent to a Latin American country for a short period of time. As we waited outside the hotel for our ride to work, he turned to me and said, “Look at this. These people and this country are striving to be like the USA.”

I replied that the USA is becoming more and more like this country: people homeless, beggars on the streets, roads and infrastructure crumbling, a country where the rich become richer, the middle class is shrinking, and there’s a large population of the poor. Maybe I was looking at the glass half full.

Recently, the GOP (of which our Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers is an active member) is urging food stamp cuts, hoping to forestall cutbacks to the Pentagon budget. I immediately thought of another Third World country the USA may now emulate: North Korea.

By spending on its million-man army and missile program, many North Korean citizens are going to bed hungry and sick. Cutting domestic agencies in the USA will do the same.

So maybe I am looking at our country as a glass half full, or maybe others are looking at it through rose-colored glasses.

Gregg Young

Colbert

Green deserves to keep seat

Please support Dan Green for Kootenai County commissioner. He is intelligent and a successful businessman, which is extremely important in running a large business such as our county government. He understands governmental accounting and its concepts of designated funds.

Having seen the rhetoric and negative campaigning, I had concerns about some of his plans and wrote to him. He promptly responded with clear answers and explanations. I feel that he has and will continue to represent our county in the best manner possible. I feel there is no other choice. He is the candidate with a clear and concise plan.

Please do not support an opponent who only attacks and offers no clear vision of his plan. Dan has proven, effective leadership. At recent forums, Dan has addressed concerns with intelligent and articulate responses that were easily understood. He obviously understands the issues, concerns and pertinent facts necessary for running the county.

He has done the research and studied for the job. He has great family values, a successful marriage and two intelligent, well-educated sons, supported by involved and committed parents. We need a commissioner with proven success and leadership – that being the incumbent, current Commissioner Dan Green.

Cathyanne Nonini

Coeur d’Alene

Object to Tutu selection

I join the many who object to Gonzaga University’s selection of Desmond Tutu as commencement speaker. It is wrong when a bastion of Catholicism invites an avowed supporter of abortion to speak to its graduates, alumni, staff, faculty and students.

Most of us realize the sixth of the church’s Ten Commandments is “Thou shall not kill.” I disagreed in 2009 when President Barack Obama gave the commencement address at the University of Notre Dame. To me, this is worse because I have closer ties to Gonzaga.

I am fine with the ecumenical movement among Christian churches. However, abortion supporters are not considered to be Christians. I understand that money and power seem to rise above all, but it should not and cannot usurp God’s law.

Joe S. Destefano

Spokane