Letters To The Editor

IDAHO VIEWPOINTS

Find another form of opposition

Many letters lately in The Spokesman-Review have gone on about how we cannot, or must not, have another Aryan parade in Coeur d’Alene because of image, bomb scares, danger or disgust. It is bad enough that United States high schools graduate students who don’t know physics, but that they pump out so many who don’t know civics is really sad.

How do you get out of high school without understanding that the First Amendment is there for what is unpopular, not what is popular? Like it or not, those fascist-wannabe-types have a right to march, as long as they comply with the same local laws and regulations that apply to the rest of us. We may not like their doing so because what they believe is loathsome hatred and ignorance. But, if we are sincere in believing civil rights are for all of us, our opposition to bad ideas must be something other than attempts to suppress what we do not believe. Fred Glienna Coeur d’Alene

Speak up about term limits

When I moved here in 1992, the lawmakers in Boise spent around $900 per year per person of our tax money. This year it looks like they’ll spend almost double that. There is no need to double the spending in six years unless you spend just to spend. It’s not their money, so they don’t care.

This is the reason I voted for term limits. I think the power brokers in Boise and Washington are out of touch with the people’s will. The lobbyists hold way too much sway. The biggest lobbyist in Boise, Idaho Association of Commerce and Industry led the fight against the last term limits vote. That tells me a lot.

Four times in four years I have voted for term limits. Now I am told the Legislature is going to repeal them. What arrogance. Call Boise and tell them to listen to the voters. Their toll free nubmer is (800) 626-0471. We said `yes’ on term limits and we meant it. Let your voice be heard. Violet Morgan Post Falls

Term limits serve important role

The importance of term limits can be greatly underestimated. Limit opponents claim success of the existing system. If you conclude it is a success to put a burden of $50 thousand in federal debts, all within a few decades, on each working member of this society, then this is an alarming and horrifying result of propaganda, but definitely no proof of achievement.

Some say the real obligations are three times as high. When state and local debts are added, amounts in excess of $150 thousand in public debt for each worker are no exaggeration. Many of these forced debtors could not even get a bank loan of $1 thousand. Each workers debt of $100 thousand requires at five percent interest a yearly payment of $5 thousand until eternity that includes payment by their children and their children and so on, just for interest alone.

As a consequence, middle class people have been furtively and smoothly made into tax-slaves, apparently mostly without their general awareness or approval. If you hear, this is only on paper, you may want to ask who receives the several hundred billion dollars of tax money each year that the government pays out for this debt. On the other side, there are still some politicians serving the tax paying public well and it is unfair to remove them automatically.

The solution is easy and impartial: Introduction of no-votes for candidates. Each yes-vote cancels a no-vote. The candidate with the most yes-votes wins. This shifts more power to the people. Those who do not want their control diminished, will fight it. They obviously believe they are smarter and better. Are they? What is your opinion? G.E. Milow Coeur d’Alene

Willing to take chances with beetles

I am opposed to increasing the logging in order to get rid of the bark beetle. It is just like what happened at Yellowstone. Let it burn. It was here before us and it will be here after us. The bottom line is that I’ll take my chances with the beetles. Timothy Kell Hayden Lake

SPOKANE MATTERS

Stupidity - there’s a lot going around

I was watching the news the other night and was appalled at what I saw. A guy who was doing something good for the community (the bike man) had his tools stolen out of his backyard. It seems as though people get stupider and more idiotic every day.

Some guy goes speeding down the road to avoid a traffic ticket, ends up in a high-speed chase and in more trouble than he was before.

Stupid people older than I am can find nothing better to do than egg people’s houses.

Maybe if people would quit being selfish, self-centered and egotistical, this city would be just a little bit nicer and my mother wouldn’t worry about me walking down the street at night, which I can’t even bring myself to do. You have to be afraid of the murderers, the serial killer, the muggers, and most of all, the rapists, since we have so many of them running free in our town. Hell, we ship them in from other towns.

I’ve never been an activist for anything but all of this is just stupid. People should start using some common sense and get a job. Rhonda K. Anderson, 17 Spokane

OTHER TOPICS

Exclusionary educating not our way

Washington State University student Jack R. Thomas’ concerns over United States’ high school grades versus those in other nations are not fully informed. Most nations that mandate the redirection of academically subpar teen students toward industrial training also limit their citizens’ access to many more of life’s opportunities as well.

Who decides who the ones with the promise are? Their parents? Probably not. To tell a C-average student they cannot go to high school or college because they aren’t good enough sells all of us short. Do you know how many subpar performers in junior high or high school go on to become inspired high performers once they find better direction in their life?

Are we to tell 12-year-olds they’d better get focused immediately or they will never be allowed the chance to discover their calling at age 16, 22 or 35? Does that sound like the land of the free?

Yes, higher education isn’t for everybody, but who should make that choice? Many students at all levels should choose another path, not be forced to. That would be pretty totalitarian, wouldn’t it?

Perhaps the problem lies in the one-size-fits-all approach of the United States public education. Too often, public schools don’t teach students how to learn. Many confuse propaganda with education. If things are so peachy in those other countries, why are so many dying to move to America? Watch out for the socialist claptrap!

Time to rethink this one, Thomas. Kevin W. Tighe Sagle, Idaho

Raise went to the wrong people

Tom Cameron hit the nail on the head with his letter (“Good job, Priggee,” Feb. 2).

It’s great the senators and representatives can vote themselves a nice raise because the United States citizens sure wouldn’t.

We seniors have to be satisfied with a $12 a month cost of living raise, which doesn’t cover much. I’d like to see them do it. Alice M. Miller Hayden, Idaho

Union members mad at wrong people

United Steelworkers of America does not have many supporters among unskilled laborers who have been laid off from, or who’ve have never had good-paying factory jobs. Those struggling to feed and shelter their families have little tolerance for the “poor me” cry of the striking Kaiser employees.

It is the shutdown and moving of factories abroad, not other workers, that has reduced the bargaining power of the unskilled labor unions in the United States. For 30 years, my father was a union man. He had neither skills nor experience when hired by Bethlehem Steel in Seattle. With a good paycheck and benefits he provided well for his family, taking home three times minimum wage. But when he sang the Steelworker’s Anthem at his retirement party, I did not join in the chorus. There was no job for me at Bethlehem; the factory had closed down and moved overseas.

The United States has sold its domestic sovereignty as labor-intensive industries move to foreign countries. Some unions can survive even with the resulting displaced labor force. Skilled workers of the construction, shipping and trucking trades are not easily replaced and therefore are likely to remain unionized. But as these trades become more automated, requiring less experience and individual skills, their unions will be threatened, too.

It is time for the unskilled striking workers at Kaiser to wake up and smell the U.S. industrial decay. Frances Crabtree Spokane

Tribe has lost a great leader

As the news article penetrated my morning consciousness, deep sorrow washed over me; Henry SiJohn, Coeur d’Alene tribal elder found dead.

Much can be written about this man of pure heart. All that he did for his tribe and community was done with a straight arrow. No games, just promises kept. Our president knew him as did the people of North Idaho.

Henry, your spirit arrow will continue to inspire the youth to be the leaders in the new millennium. I have lost a good friend and I will miss you. With deep sympathy to his family and tribal members. Lee M. Ray Coeur d’Alene