Letters To The Editor
SPOKANE MATTERS
End the fiasco in Colbert now
The Colbert composting plant is an embarrassment to the entire community. It’s time for the Spokane City Council to close the plant down and search for the right solution to composting.
This plant was wrong in the beginning and it’s wrong now. The Solid Waste Department, with Phil Williams, forged ahead with the plans even though there were problems from the beginning.
Councilman Joel Crosby supported the project, with city dollars going to a large monopoly from back East. I wonder if Mr. Crosby is worried someone might report to the citizens the amount of money that has been wasted?
Citizens in the Colbert area have a right to be incensed and angry enough to sue. They have pleaded, presented their case time and time again, only to be put down and humiliated. I’m embarrassed for our elected officials at City Hall.
Please, end this fiasco and start over. Sheri S. Barnard Spokane
Don’t underrate our city
I get very tired of hearing people bad-mouthing Spokane, especially when it’s always destructive criticism.
I recently had the opportunity to (and was proud to) show some guests from Indiana our area. There are so many great sights to see here. We started with the City Drive because that’s always a must. We can be proud of the citizens who take such fine care of their yards and have such colorful displays of flowers.
We also drove along the river, both Upriver Drive and down through the state park. They liked the fireworks concert and seeing the support people gave. We saw all the gardens at Manito also. They said we’re fortunate to have such a great park system and town.
Yes, I feel sorry for the people who can’t say anything constructive when they talk about our city. We have great city planners and they’re making Spokane a great place to live. Just compare Spokane to the early 1970’s for its many truly great accomplishments.
Let’s give the old town a break and look at its good side. Personally, I like it here. Bob Brotherton Spokane
Recyclables: Where does money go?
I totally agree with the idea of Carol A. Belisle on recyclable stuff (“Recyclables: Look at alternatives,” Letters, Aug. 18).
City government should be thankful we’re doing our best to help it any way we can. We pay it to collect and make use of our trash. What do we get?
City government accuses independent people of theft because they compete for the recyclables. What nerve!
Where does the city government put the money it has earned from our recyclables? Does it have a budget allocation for such projects? Just asking. Almario C. Rosario Spokane
Center helpful to my child
After reading “Game Plans” in the August 12 Region section, I hope Spokane teachers and the public realize what a local resource we have here. PCS Centers for Enriched Learning has a branch right here on Mission near Division.
My daughter went to PCS weekly for almost three years and learned hands-on science. At the PCS Center she manipulated lasers, Legos, different gears, designed a hill climbing vehicle, and strategized in chess matches. Science was indeed fun as the professors in your article showed. For a public school science project on invertebrates, she and a friend used PCS knowledge to show movement in a dragonfly by a pulley system.
The PCS Center is an outstanding enrichment facility for science, math, computers, music and more which we discovered right here in Spokane. I hope Professors Turner and Taylor met Patrick Mitchell and his teachers from PCS. Pat Siemens Spokane
Safety first? Not with Eugster
The city has long been advising us the Post Street Bridge should be replaced. The city has inspected it, designed a replacement and jumped the hoops to receive badly needed federal funds to assist with its replacement.
Then along comes a publicity-seeking lawyer who files a lawsuit, and stops the project. Why? Because he wants to keep the view of the river.
What a piece of work he is. I’ll bet he seeks a political office soon.
Let’s all remember him as the man who finds scenery far more important than safety and our lives. S.P. Lindsey Deer Park
IN THE PAPER
Cartoon ‘most unfeeling’
Staff cartoonist Milt Priggee did it again. Sunday, Aug. 20, he put both feet in his big mouth with his most unfeeling, sarcastic cartoon.
Vicki Weaver is gone and her family has paid the price. Too bad it had to be with lives on both sides. Thelma Richter Spokane
Can Fillmore stand competition?
Thank you for moving Mallard Fillmore from the comics page to the editorial section, where it belongs, if anywhere.
I’ve complained in the past about the blatantly political nature of this strip, which is usually somewhere between rude and vicious. Coming across it on the comic page was like stepping on a nail. It’ll be interesting to compare Mallard Fillmore to its new neighbor, the Pulitzer Prize-winning Doonesbury. Jim McDonald Spokane
Wiccan Rede misstated
In response to “Wiccan inmates claim right to worship” (Aug. 15), I am glad to hear that these people are fighting for their right to practice Wicca. The goddess and god are everywhere - even jail - and humans should be allowed to honor them, if that is their wish.
Let me point out that I said “honor,” because true Wiccans don’t worship idle images or figures.
I would also like to point out that in the article it was stated that the Wiccan Rede was, “Any action that harms another will come back, threefold.” This is not true. The actual Wiccan Rede is, “An’ it harm none, do what thou wilt.” That simply states that you may do whatever you want as long as it doesn’t harm anyone or anything, including yourself. There is a law that does encompass the threefold effect.
I am glad that knowledge of Wicca is becoming more clear and available to the public. There is more curiosity than fear on the streets now. Mark McGee Spokane
GOVERNMENT AND POLITICS
Power-greed link endures
Frank Bartel’s recent column regarding corporate greed fueled by the Republican Congress is both timely and accurate.
It’s obvious the real intent of House Speaker Newt Gingrich’s “Contract with America” is to increase corporate profit - regardless of how that affects the average working Joe or destroys the environment.
Changes are certainly in order for this country. The Republican Party hasn’t changed one iota over the last 70 years. The rich are getting richer and the rest of us suffer for their gain. Rick Riley Spokane
Older Americans’ benefits targeted
Regarding Stephen Taylor’s Aug. 6 letter, “Help Republicans prevent disaster”:
What? Another Republican, like House Speaker Newt Gingrich, who wants to revamp Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security? Why not just line recipients up against the wall and shoot them? Or, perhaps, just lock them away, out of sight and out of mind?
These people worked hard all their lives and paid into these services for the privilege of a comfortable retirement pension. Now, people like you want to take it away and put it in the pockets of already rich politicians.
Why not cut programs such as those to save the spotted owl, save the trees, stop air pollution and do away with drugs? To date, these programs haven’t worked anyway, except to eliminate thousands of jobs.
On C-SPAN, I see people arguing about every issue possible and getting nowhere. They never seem to agree on anything except that they want to line their pockets with other people’s hard-earned money. Harold E. Moyel Moses Lake
JUDICIARY
Elect Sanders to high court
How do you vote for a judge?
The Judicial Forum editor, Justice William C. Goodloe, explains his evaluations after he has read volumes of writings in search of opinions by the judge up for election. The principal standard is based upon the concept that a judge’s writings reflect that he/she is either an activist or strict constructionist, i.e. an activist is a judge who either legislates or invents his own law, as opposed to a strict constructionist judge who interprets the laws and Constitution strictly.
Judge Roselle Pekelis was appointed to the Washington State Supreme Court by Gov. Mike Lowry. She is the author of the decision that approved the adoption of a 4-year-old boy by two middle-aged homosexuals and is the author of opinions that destroy private property rights.
Attorney Richard Sanders is running against her in September and has many times the legal experience, is a strict constitutionalist and has all the qualifications to be approved by the Judicial Forum.
We need men like Richard Sanders on the Supreme Court, so please vote for him. We need to get control of the judicial branch of our government. Karen Hanson Newport, Wash.
OTHER TOPICS
Grass smoke critic makes me sick
About your Golden Pen letter of Aug. 21, written by Mike Cannon: What a fakey, stupid letter.
Does this man have a wood burning fireplace? Does he have a car that he drives? Does he have pets? Does he live in a pollen-free environment? Wood burning stoves and fireplaces put out more pollution, and for a longer time (five months).
If he made as much money as he said, every one in Spokane would be walking around with an aerosol bronchial dilator in each nostril. Come on, get real. Eugene Fields Electric City, Wash.
Bible has terrible dark side
Dorothy Catlin (Aug. 6) criticizes Jack DeBaun (July 31) for suggesting Biblical morality is a “mixed bag.” She admonishes, “Read your Bible more carefully.” The irony here is precisely that.
A careful reading, which reveals how dubious, often dreadful, Biblical narrative can be, and scholarly exegesis are full of the kinds of issues raised by Mr. DeBaun.
The key question: Can any unambiguous moral code be derived from the Bible, particularly the Old Testament - so popular with fundamentalists? It’s difficult to read many Old Testament books without experiencing revulsion; in so many places cruelty, brutality, slavery, deceit and murder are condoned.
Consider the machinations of Joshua, whose lust for slaughter, for murdering children, for utterly destroying cities, appears insatiable. Or Moses’ instructions to kill all captured male children but spare female virgins for the Israelite soldiers. Who, but the highly indoctrinated can look into their conscience and not repudiate such things?
One can only hope most of the claims of mass murder and debauchery are boastful distortions. But throughout the texts, the Hebrew God’s complicity is clear and no number of footnotes or lengthy apologies can explain away the savage vindictiveness and unmitigated cruelty of the ancient Hebrews and their deity.
If just once a minister or preacher would stand up at the pulpit and say of Joshua or Moses (or numerous others), these men did terrible things and we ought not to venerate them. Then, there might be hope for a more ethical, humane, morality emerging from Bible study. Thomas Parslow Sandpoint
Evolutionists’ faith amazes
As I read the Aug. 17 front page article reporting that fossil remains found in Kenya theoretically indicate man walked upright far earlier than previously theorized, I was both amused and saddened. It has to be one of the seventh wonders of the world that thinking people still embrace and believe in macro-evolution (primordial soup to man) in spite of overwhelming scientific evidence (not to mention common sense) which flies right in the face of Charles Darwin and those who would hold dear his theories.
Using proven methods of mathematical probability, the odds of evolution occurring are zip. Anyone who has been watching the O.J. Simpson trial got a real lesson on DNA and what an incredibly complex molecule this fundamental building block of life is.
Try explaining to the average, unindoctrinated third grader that the metamorphosis of a caterpillar into a beautiful butterfly is the result of a random “big bang” explosion that occurred billions of years ago and you will most likely get a “yeah, right.”
Thank you, anthropologist Meave Leaky, for inspiring me with your great faith, for that is what it must take in order to go on searching for the “missing link” when the basic laws of the universe and even creation itself say your faith is in vain. David Westermann Kettle Falls, Wash.