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Huckleberries: Confederate flag protest still attracts barbs

Confederate flag sympathizers in the Silver Valley continue to bash Jon Ruggles for linking their beloved symbol to – racism.

Ruggles? He’s the Wallace man who complained to Shoshone County higher-ups when he saw a county employee’s pickup parked in a prominent spot at the transfer station, sprouting two Confederate flags. On Martin Luther King Day, of all days.

For his troubles, Ruggles and his wife have been scolded in the public square.

The latest attack came in a half-page letter to the Shoshone News-Press Thursday by Patricia Wolford of Mullan.

Wolford defended the Confederate flag as a historical symbol of the proud South and told Ruggles to get lost. She concluded her wordy rant: “Maybe it is time for you to consider packing up your hybrid car with all your ‘earth friendly’ material possessions and your ‘degree’ in multi-nationalism and head back to the state that is populated with enough stupid people to re-elect Jerry ‘Moonbeam’ Brown as their governor.”

This, from a woman who was born in Florida and obviously brought her Old South biases and flag with her to non-Confederate Idaho.

Why, oh why?

Why, wonders Post Falls Councilwoman Kerri Thoreson, “is gas at the pumps routinely so much higher in Post Falls than it is in Coeur d’Alene, a mere eight miles away?” (On Tuesday, gas was selling for $1.64 in Coeur d’Alene and $1.98 in Post Falls. On Friday, gas was $1.59 at the Mobil station near the S-R’s Coeur d’Alene office.)

BTW, Spokane readers of Huckleberries might know Councilwoman Thoreson better as her alter ego “Vera” from those Coeur d’Alene Casino billboards, TV commercials and Spokane International Airport advertisements.

Huckleberries

Poet’s Corner (two-fer): Old Uncle Harry often states/he’s not a fan of those debates:/“With all their posturing and hasslin’,/they’re pretty much like TV wrasslin.’ ” – The Bard of Sherman Avenue (“Political Debates”)

And: “A Paul Bunyan burger,/a couple of Coors;/will you be my Valentine/if I will be yours?” – The Bard of Sherman Avenue (“CdA Valentine’s Day”)

Two signs of spring Wednesday: An old man with Lenten ashes on his forehead walking an equally old dog at McEuen Park. And: A middle-aged man carrying a bag of golf clubs into the Coeur d’Alene Resort Plaza Shops.

HomeSnacks.com matched the education systems of the 50 states to equivalent ones in other countries. Idaho meshed with Colombia. Washington with Hong Kong. Game, set, match – Washington

Tweetable: “The Idaho House is honoring Pulitzer winner Anthony Doerr less than an hour after House Education Committee tabled a literacy bill” – Clark Corbin, Idaho Education News, on Friday.

Keith Erickson, a former city of Coeur d’Alene spokesman, is exchanging his snowblower for sun screen. On Leap Year Day, he will become the managing editor of the Garden Island newspaper in Kauai, Hawaii. There, he’ll join editor-in chief Bill Buley, another former Coeur d’Alene Press staffer.

Parting shot

Here’s some good news for North Idahoans tired of Rep. Heather Scott’s uber-patriot shenanigans.

Sandpoint Chamber of Commerce President Kate McAlister plans to run as a Democrat for Scott’s House District 1A seat.

Scott, the Confederate flag-waving Blanchard Republican, and Rep. Judy Boyle, R-Midvale, played hooky from the Legislature on Thursday to travel, for a second time, to Malheur National Wildlife Refuge. They wanted to witness the surrender of the last four occupiers. They were prepared to serve as human “shields” – Boyle’s word, not Huckleberries’ – if need be to protect the last holdouts.

Mebbe Idaho was better off with Scott grandstanding in Oregon rather than exerting what little influence she has on the Legislature.

Follow David F. Oliveria on the Huckleberries Online blog, www.spokesman.com/blogs/hbo, and on Twitter, @HucksOnline.

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