Letters To The Editor

BUSINESS AND LABOR

WWP on top of Y2K problem

Re: recent letters describing the Year 2000 computer problem and references to associated power supply issues.

Washington Water Power has a comprehensive Year 2000 readiness project in place. The company has developed several project activity teams that are on schedule for bringing WWP into Year 2000 readiness. Our highest priority is service continuity - customers must be able to expect continued excellent service.

Because our transmission and distribution networks are interconnected, we are also sharing research and solutions with other regional and national utilities, to enable a smooth transition to the next century.

We also recognize that the potential impact of the Year 2000 extends beyond WWP’s electric and natural gas infrastructure. To help broaden community understanding of Year 2000 issues, an ad hoc group of local companies has come together to develop a Year 2000 awareness and educational campaign for the Inland Northwest. Organizations participating to date in the planning include Washington Trust Bank, Spokane Area Chamber of Commerce and WWP. Other area businesses and organizations have provided valuable input.

For more information, call Jay Hopkins at 482-8586 or myself at 482-8506. Jeff Brune Year 2000 project manager, Washington Water Power Co., Spokane

Will public fall for propaganda again?

The sociologist in me has his interest piqued by the latest radio advertisements by the tobacco companies. They are using Pavlovian conditioning techniques to get voters to turn against their congressman. “They will raise taxes.” “They will waste your money.” “They have lost sight of the everyday fellow” (but we didn’t lose sight of him/her). This conditioning has been repeatedly used by everything big (big business, Big Timber, Big Mining) and it has proven to work.

This, however, is going to be a particularly hard sell. They are trying to tell you that the organization that put a man on the moon, won major wars and developed institutions that work, like Head Start, can’t do anything. And that you should trust the organizations that developed research to prove that smoking didn’t cause cancer and cured their tobacco so it could be more addicting (while claiming that smoking wasn’t addicting).

Will the conditioning win out and will people call their member of Congress and tell them to back off those poor tobacco companies? Or will people resist this well-ingrained conditioning? The sociologist in me awaits that answer. Richard T. Cote’ Spokane

Tobacco defender clever, wrong

In his smokescreen attempt to defend the tobacco industry, Joseph P. Bell (Letters, July 7) bought into the industry sham argument by switching the bad guy role from big tobacco (where it belongs) to a very easy, convenient although not entirely innocent target: Congress.

Bell, along with the tobacco ads, failed to mention that only tobacco users would pay this new tax. If you think, the “these guys are bad the other guys are much worse” argument, Bell cleverly switches the problem of addiction from tobacco use to taxation and then concludes with his noble theory: “equal protection under the law should dictate equal taxation of the commodities.”

This should qualify this to be published in the Limbaugh letter, rather than The Spokesman-Review. I suppose that next we should also call for equal taxes on card rooms, pulltabs and casino gambling, not to mention luxury taxes. Richard McInerney Spokane

SPOKANE MATTERS

Finke outshines Sterk any day

These who are enamored with Mark Sterk’s record in Olympia should insist he stay there. What he did there has nothing to do with being sheriff.

Would you feel safe with Sterk performing surgery on you? Why not? He was a “good” legislator. Would you feel safe with Sterk piloting your 747? Why not? He was a “good” legislator. I wouldn’t feel safe in these instances, as I wouldn’t feel safe with Sterk being sheriff. He hasn’t paid his dues and doesn’t deserve it, not when we have a highly qualified sheriff’s lieutenant as a candidate. Compare the two candidates. Sterk has about 25 years in the police department, is a sergeant and supervises a squad of about six officers. Jim Finke has about 25 years with the sheriff’s department and is a lieutenant, the highest merit rank in the department. He commands about 30 deputies.

Sterk probably had training in the police department. Finke has participated in every facet of the sheriff’s department, has Criminal Justice Training Commission management certification and is the only candidate honored by nomination to the prestigious FBI National Academy in Quantico, Va.

Sterk relies on a dubious record in Olympia to propel him to the sheriff’s office. Finke relies on his proven record within that office. There’s really no comparison. Ed Meadows Spokane

ABORTION

Abortion at core of American rot

Recent history gives much attention to the extermination policy of Hitler’s Nazi regime. Several million Jews, Catholics, Gypsies and others were eliminated.

Hitler was really a piker compared to Stalin and the red menace. There can never be an accurate count, but records show the communists exterminated many millions. China is expert at extermination since the communists gained control.

Unfortunately, our United States has become a contender in this race for extermination supremacy.

With the efforts of the noisy pagan left-wingers, the underground communist influence and our Supreme Court destruction of many constitutional guarantees, our abortion method of extermination has surpassed the 37 million mark and grows with a daily average of 4,400. This program is dedicated to the propaganda melody of “free choice.”

Presently, we are witnessing the devaluation of life by abortion and the fallout results such as street gang terrorism with no value of life; school children, reared in the atmosphere of our decadent society, think nothing of murdering their classmates and teachers; and the entertainment media dish out their method of violence by misusing the public airways to conduct their daily crime school.

Progression could indicate that our government may soon dictate abortion for population control, such as our economic ally, Red China.

If your life is priceless, why is another’s life of no value? We are all guilty to allow this bloodshed. May God have mercy on us! Joseph P. Bell Spokane

Priggee, come to terms with reality

It appears, from the July 10 cartoon, your staff cartoonist Milt Priggee needs some education on the factions on the abortion issue. No group calls itself “antichoice,” no more than any group calls itself “anti-life.” Those who favor murdering unborn babies for being inconvenient call themselves “pro-choice.” And those who oppose it call themselves “pro-life.’

If this is too difficult for Priggee to understand, we could call a spade a shovel and identify the two sides as pro-abortion and anti-abortion. Mike Storms Spokane

Pro-choice is really anti-life

Again, you show your true colors. I am speaking of the political cartoon of July 10. Here we see our poor President Clinton once again fighting the evil House Speaker Newt Gingrich. How noble you are to label Clinton as pro-choice. That, of course, only leaves Gingrich the label of anti-choice. How loud would you protest if I were to re-label Gingrich pro-life and Clinton anti-life?

How easy it is to cast away an unwanted child by labeling that child a choice. Put any pretty label you wish on it, it’s still death.

If you can sleep easier at night by condemning those who take a stand on morality, so be it. Remember, no matter how you protest, no matter your lofty ideals, pro-choice is anti-life.

Please, in the future refrain from such blatant prejudices, even on your editorial page. Tammy Namet Spokane

BELIEFS

Learn about God, you’ll love him

Re: “Your Holy Bible is not everybody’s.”

As I read the July 2 letter by a 13-year-old, I was surprised at how much he knew about history. He is apparently well read and somewhat knowledgeable. My hat is off to you, Alan Chatham. Most people don’t take the time to investigate the things they hear but take them for the truth almost immediately.

I am a born-again Christian and also had believed nearly everything shown on TV, in newspapers and magazines as being the truth. Not too swift on my part. But I eventually did investigate these sources, as well as the Bible.

To my surprise, the Bible told me there is right and wrong but that God does love me. TV and other sources told me I was a mistake of nature. The Bible told me I was made with a purpose and that I had worth apart from what I accomplished in my lifetime, even if I wasn’t the smartest, most handsome or coolest guy around. I have worth because God created me and he wants to have a loving relationship with me.

I’ve done my fair share of rotten things and I surely don’t deserve heaven. But Jesus has paid for my sin by dying on the cross. This is surely more than I deserve and in turn I love God and try to learn to love my neighbor.

Keep checking things out and God bless you. Mike A. Matiska Spokane

Critical teenager ill informed

I was troubled by Alan Chatham’s anger toward Christians and the historical inaccuracies in his July 2 letter.

Can a 13-year-old boy know anything about the history of Western civilization - that pagans killed Christians in the Roman Colosseum or the Crusades began as a counterattack against an Islamic Jihad? It’s understandable that a child mistakes the ruthless bombing of an abortion clinic by one crazed man as indicative of Christian Fundamentalism’s right-to-life movement. However, can this young man be expected to realize that Christian Fundamentalism is a very small portion of Christendom? Can he possibly know Christendom includes people who oppose abortion and others who support choice?

How could he know that modern philosophical debates on the nature of God include discussions about the inherent worth of all human beings? Hence, Methodists, Quakers and Congregationalists said slavery is wrong. And many of these same religious groups ran the underground railroad or fought to end slavery.

And can a child be expected to know that the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitutions, which establishes freedom of speech, is indebted to Virginia Baptists?

So, in painting Christendom with broad generalities and historical inaccuracies, Alan is guilty of the same intolerance he disdains in Christian Fundamentalists. But, freedom of speech is freedom to speak - nobody said it had to be informed speech. Angel M. Fitzpatrick Fairfield, Wash.

Without God, it’s Armageddon ahead

Re: James A. Nelson’s insightful letter of July 7. I couldn’t agree more.

Based on today’s evidence, a day will come when a certain segment of our population will run and hide in fear of another segment, that which has guns, knives, clubs and no conscience. This will probably be the norm rather than the exception.

We continue to indulge our children in the name of personal freedom. Without a conscience developed with an emphasis on the concept of shame and personal responsibility, our freedom will be forfeit. It is no wonder that the wise men of old created God, for without him we are lost. No black no white, no day no night, no evil no good, no hell no heaven, no shame no joy. Barry M. Lychak Deer Park

OVER THE LINE

Pollution’s all political - yeah, right

Thanks to Coeur d’Alene’s mayor, Steve Judy, who explains that the pollution in Lake Coeur d’Alene is not the heavy metals of zinc, arsenic or cadmium. What is polluting the lake is not the mining waste of 100 years of pilings, nor 100 years of neglecting water quality and health standards.

No, the real pollution in Lake Coeur d’Alene is politics, and the muckraking politicians from the Environmental Protection Agency and Washington D.C.

Thank you, Judy, for clearing the muddy waters of this debate. Those of us who live downstream from the mining industry and drink our water from the Spokane aquifer now feel safe and reassured. That bit of muck floating in my water glass is not runoff from Smelterville, but the residue of political sludge rolling downhill.

Mayor Judy, you’d fit right inside the loop back in D.C. Terry Hughes Spokane

EPA late expressing concern

Re: “EPA faces critics in North Idaho,” (July 7). If the EPA has suddenly decided it needs to “take charge” in verifying the alleged existence of heavy metals in lake Coeur d’Alene, then why so late?

Growing up on Lake Coeur d’Alene, I remember when the scare of pollutants from mining runoff was first voiced in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s. Where was the government at that time or any time nearer to that point of concern?

When the question of pollution in Lake Coeur d’Alene was first publicized it was widely suggested that all use of the lake be suspended. Since then the lake has proven to be a clean source for human use, sport and pleasure, with very little need for concern 30 years after the fact.

The EPA should look somewhere else for Superfund pork spending and leave government to the people of Idaho and Washington. David L. Johnson Spokane

Let EPA do its testing

Re: “EPA faces critics in North Idaho,” (July 7). I am relocating my family to Coeur d’Alene next month. I think it is important for the EPA to test as well as pay for the contamination. It is not the responsibility of the taxpayer. Let them do their job. I am sure taxpayers would like to know the waters are free from contamination. Tracey J. Hamlen Redmond, Wash.

Flood-damaged homes - surprise, duh

Re:”Should Idaho stop paying for flood damaged homes?”

This has been going on in other states and I find it just as idiotic there as in Idaho. It’s time that people who like to live in a flood plain accept the consequences of their actions. It may be nice to have the river flowing by, but when it comes through the living room, it’s not so welcome. That’s what nature does.

Man continues to put cement and blacktop over the land and then wonders why there are floods. Ron A. Rolla Spokane

PARTING SHOT

And God made woman - different

Re: “Topless walkers vow fight,” (July 16). Fact: People are male or female; these are not the same; females have more private parts, have you noticed?

Reason: God knows it is good to have variety in his creation, so he made different creatures. Not everything or everyone is equal or all would be the same. This is OK; don’t worry about it; God did not screw up.

Practical note: Thinking it is not fair to have any differences and pretending that there are none does not change the fact. Stephen M. Gerads Post Falls