Letters To The Editor
PEOPLE IN SOCIETY
Answer to our ills lies in parenting
I’m at a loss. This “parenting thing” seems to get tougher each day.
Two recent stories in The Spokesman-Review pushed me past the realm of reality:
A child goes to the school bully in order to get his belongings back. The bully shoots the child.
A local couple, having taken in two fellows and providing room and board for work exchange, are found shot to death. The suspects are the two live-in workers.
My first thought is to cry out for gun control. Both of these stories point to the easy access and all too frequent use of handguns to solve our problems.
My next thought goes deeper than a political activist reaction. I have to think of parenting as the issue.
In “Reviving Ophelia,” a current bestseller by Mary Pipher regarding raising teenage girls, Pipher points out what she (and others) consider the best parenting combo: lots of affection and lots of clear limits.
Last night, I attended my son’s birthday party at a local roller rink. Amidst the many 12- to 15-year-olds left to rumble and rock among themselves, I overhead one boy comment, “I wish my dad would try and skate.” Maybe he had the answer.
We parents need to be present more often and take some risks. We might look stupid and we might fall, but our kids will sure love it. Edie Rice-Sauer Spokane
Rotting from the top down
A man killed one, wounded several others and then turned the gun onto himself.
Radical religious activists blew up an abortion clinic and then a gay bar.
Gangs are invading quiet, peaceful, backward Spokane, and appear to be taking over.
What’s wrong with America?
I believe we have a serious moral problem: a lack of morality in the boardrooms of our nation.
When people in power - be it economic, social, political or even religious power - treat their constituents as nothing more than a resource, these constituents lose respect for themselves and those around them. After that, the above problems become worse.
This is the other side of the Bible, the side our literalist brothers don’t like to study or quote. You can find this teaching in the ignored chapters of Isaiah, Ezekiel and Jeremiah, the ignored book of Amos and the ignored or misinterpreted sayings of Jesus as recorded in the four Biblical gospels.
I’m not trying to dismiss the importance of individual responsibility. Nor am I dismissing the power of an individual commitment to Jesus Christ. These two factors have always been in low supply throughout the history of the Christian faith.
In quieter times, exercised individual responsibility and individual commitment to Jesus Christ were made far more effective by at least a minimum of morality practiced by our power brokers. The result was the same, even if that morality was forced upon those occupying the boardrooms by law. Art Seaton Spokane
HIGHER EDUCATION
Child care issue hardly being ignored
Re: “EWU must face child care crisis” (Opinion, Feb. 4):
It is true that Eastern Washington University is having a child care crisis because of the large percentage of nontraditional students on campus and that last year’s student council voted to end the child care subsidy that comes from student activity fees.
However, staff writer Elana Jefferson’s editorial gave the impression that the only people at EWU who care about child care are the students with children. This is simply untrue.
This year’s council consists of different members than the council that ended the subsidy last year. This year’s council, however, also feels that the subsidy is a Band-Aid to the child care problem, not the solution.
The current Associated Students council and its assistants have worked diligently to find ways to solve this crisis. We have attended dozens of meetings, researched child care facilities, interviewed parents, met with administrators and city officials and testified in Olympia. Hours have gone into making sure that the students of EWU have acceptable care for their children.
The Washington Student Lobby, university administrators and Cheney city officials have bent over backward to help students find a solution.
On Feb. 7, a child care bill drawn up by WSL with student input from EWU, was submitted to the Legislature. This bill’s main goal is to increase funding for child care on university campuses.
As a senior and a proud member of this year’s student council, I suggest that the next time you write an editorial disparaging the reputation of EWU, you gather all the information first. Tiffany LaMonte Cheney
HEALTH AND SAFETY
Don’t make game of risking lives
I wish the people in Spokane would stop playing this game of beat the light on our city streets. It puts others in danger of being killed by a car speeding through an already red light. I do not think that any person in this town is that rushed or that important, that they should feel a need to disobey the law.
If it’s illegal to run red lights, why don’t police actually give out tickets for running red lights, speeding and endangering the lives of others? I have sat at many red lights next to or behind a police car, watching one, two or even three cars run through a red light while our light was green. The officers did not pursue those individuals at all.
So, why doesn’t everyone just keep running those red lights, since there seems to be no penalty for doing so?
I have also seen city buses running red lights. That is a real tragedy. If a bus driver wants to endanger his or her life, that is fine. But it is not fair to put the passengers in undue risk of injury because the bus driver doesn’t feel like stopping.
This is a real problem in Spokane. I am ashamed to live in a town where nobody seems to respect the law. Brian Meyers Spokane
Dumb drivers need wider road
Re: “Quit blaming roads for driver errors” (Feb. 21). Jim Barrett says Highway 395 isn’t dangerous and that it is the drivers’ fault. I totally agree.
Drivers are stupid and are constantly passing where they shouldn’t be. They pass where there is one lane on one side of the highway and two on the other. The two-lane side can pass but the one-lane side is not to pass. Unfortunately, the drivers are dumb. That is why there are laws.
If the road was corrected and widened, there wouldn’t be so many accidents on Highway 395 and that would minimize the deaths on this road. Angela Hardin Deer Park
PEOPLE AND ANIMALS
Birth control program for wild horses
With the best of intentions, Congress passed a law in 1971 to protect America’s free-roaming wild horses. Since that time, the program has been woefully mismanaged by the Bureau of Land Management, as The Spokesman-Review has reported (“Horses adopted, then sold for meat,” Jan. 6).
The latest findings of investigators reveal that horses are routinely adopted to individuals and corporations that send the animals to slaughter, in order to profit from the foreign market for horse meat.
There is a better way. The Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) is already undertaking successful birth control programs for wild horses at Maryland’s Assateague National Seashore and at two sites in Nevada.
Some of the taxpayer money now being used for the failed adoption programs should be redirected to contraceptive programs in the field. This will reduce the reproductive capacity of herds, maintain relatively slow-growing populations and diminish the need for roundups and adoptions.
HSUS stands ready to work with the government to implement a new, humane, cost-effective and sensible plan. Wayne Pacelle Humane Society of the United States, Washington, D.C.
No sense hurting animal care agency
I am not a member of SpokAnimal CARE, but after reading “Shelter accused of obtaining drugs illegally,” it seems to me that anyone working in a busy office can relate to record keeping and procedural problems.
SpokAnimal, the Humane Society and the county shelter are all doing the dirty work that society demands but we all refuse to accept responsibility for, and they are doing it with inadequate budgets. To fine SpokAnimal $25,000 will accomplish nothing but the further reduction of funds so desperately needed for direct animal care.
A more reasonable solution is for the Drug Enforcement Agency to make SpokAnimal implement a plan to ensure that this does not happen again.
As for the employee who ordered the Premarin and diet pills, rather than disciplining her, director Gail Mackie should give the poor woman the Spring 1997 issue of Animal Times. There is an excellent article on the cruelty involved in Premarin production and another article by a medical doctor about drug-free, cruelty-free alternatives to Premarin.
Rather than disciplinary actions and fines, why not help the employee make the necessary lifestyle changes so she can kick the Premarin and diet pill habit? Kerry Masters Liberty Lake
GOVERNMENT AND POLITICS
‘Republican poster girl’ a fowl choice
Times are tough when some people get their ideas from a duck. I refer to Mallard (I have only one wing and it’s right) Fillmore.
In his most recent quacking, he glorifies Republican poster girl Paula Jones. He compares her to Anita Hill and Mary Matalin. To a duck, humans probably all look the same, but one of these humans was featured in the January 1995 issue of Penthouse. It sure wasn’t Matalin or Hill, and those weren’t pin feathers she was showing off.
A duck hunter couldn’t have done any more damage to Mallard as Jones’ family did to her in the article. Trailer trash - this pinup girl will have to go a ways to reach that high. Bob Anderson Spokane
With IRS, turnabout’s not fair play
Re: “Courts let IRS keep ill gotten gains.”
What would happen if the shoe was on the other foot and we owed the Internal Revenue Service $7,000? Would there be any legal deadline? I don’t think so. We would have to pay that money back, with interest.
When will people finally wake up and discover that what the IRS is doing is tantamount to fraud. It is nothing more than coercion for us to give them our hard-earned money. Mark Daniels Sandpoint
Notch folks roundly ignored
In response to Mike Bascetta’s Feb. 23 letter regarding Social Security shortchanging those born between the years of 1917 and 1923, I say, go to Tom Brokaw, please. You would be doing those of us who are left a tremendous favor.
I was born in 1922, and for the past few years I and a friend have written numerous letters and made many calls to our senator and members of Congress. We also have contributed to the fund to help fight this unfairness.
Talk about the fleecing of America, what about us oldies, many of whom went to war to fight for our rights and to defend our country?
Is Congress waiting for the last one of us to die off? Saul Bornstein Spokane
OTHER TOPICS
I’m pulling Vatican’s money chain
I deeply appreciate Robin Moody’s Feb. 15 editorial, “I have faith I’ll see women priests at altar.”
Several years ago, I realized I have a moral obligation to withhold financial and emotional support from a group of men (the Vatican) who continue to oppress and abuse me and my sisters in Christ, spiritually, financially and emotionally.
Consequently, I stopped knowingly making any monetary contributions to the Vatican. I do financially support my local parish and other church-related family and social justice ministries in the diocese and throughout the world. I have no intention of leaving the Catholic church.
Can you imagine the changes in doctrine that would take place in the Vatican were all Catholic women to withdraw their financial support? Peggy Hoffman Spokane
Note about cartoon added to insult
I, too, was incensed at the editorial cartoon of Feb. 12 indicting the military in general for the misdeeds and crimes of a few.
In peacetime (if there is such a time), the military seems to be fair game for any hypocrite with a pen or pencil, and The Spokesman-Review seems to have more than a fair share of that ilk. That, in spite of the community and regional efforts to retain the military in our midst. It seems to me that a community paper would reflect more respect and support for an organization that provides such a great national service and significant contribution to our local economy.
In spite of my initial feelings concerning the cartoon, I considered the response by many of our citizens to adequately express my own outrage. That was until that pathetic attempt by the editor’s note following the response by the chairman of the Armed Forces Committee of the Chamber of Commerce. In spite of the obvious and pointed caricature of a member of our armed forces bragging about criminal activity, the editor’s note is an apparent attempt to back away from and minimize the paper’s responsibility for such an ill-conceived and unfortunate representation.
You should not - nor can you - avoid your responsibility to your readers and community by such a sophomoric effort. You owe the military in general, and the men and women of Fairchild Air Force Base specifically, an apology for such slander. Irving B. Reed, brigadier general, Air Force, retired Spokane
Priggee has it all over his critics
Regarding the Feb. 22 letters by Anthony Gurnari, Erich Bruhn, Keith Cress and John Madri about staff cartoonist Milt Priggee’s cartoon of Feb. 12, it’s a pity the writers of these critical epistles had no opportunity to read the letters of Julian Powers, Laura Keeton and Michael B. Harmon - also in the issue of Feb. 22 - before taking up their pens.
Priggee possesses exactly what his critics once made admirable themselves: courage. Clearly, Priggee’s cartoon intended to bring no ignominy on the profession of men at arms. On the contrary, the cartoon obviously lamented the recent absence of just the sort of honorable, dutiful and patriotic virtues that Priggee’s critics purport to represent.
Priggee is both more clever and more thoughtful than his critics. And, of course, those traits are exactly what he is paid to perfect.
His cartoons frequently declare the simplest of home truths: Do right and one’s image will take care of itself. The cartoon of Feb. 12 was no exception to this humble truth. Leo J. Mahoney Spokane