Holocaust Account Important

In January 1987, I heard then-Coeur d’Alene-mayor Ray Stone give the speech of his life, in New York City, before the world’s assembled press. He spoke eloquently of his commitment to human rights before receiving the Raoul Wallenberg Civic Award on behalf of Coeur d’Alene. Until Friday night, however, I’d never heard him discuss what it was like, as a young World War II private, to liberate a concentration camp. I took my 13-year-old along because I wanted her to hear the awful story from an eyewitness. After all, we have revisionists among us who deny the Holocaust happened. Stone left our small gathering with a haunting question: Who’s going to tell this story when his generation passes?

`Ruby slipper’ not good fit for Al-ttila

Twenty-three acres of rare lady slippers near Clarkia are safe, no thanks to Attorney General Al Lance. Al-ttila the Hun foamed when the U.S. Forest Service asked that the purple-and-green orchid be protected as part of a land swap with the Idaho Land Board. Before the apopletic Lance reached for a herbicide, however, the patch of “ruby slippers” - his term, not Hot Potatoes’ - was removed from the swap. And the state thinks it can manage public lands better than the federales?

You can’t `assassinate’ Fido

I sympathize with state Rep. Jim Stoicheff’s bill to stop neighbors from trespassing to kill pets. But using the term “animal assassins” to describe such a lowlife is too much. An “assassin” is someone who murders a politician or someone else of prominence. Not a dog - even one good enough to go to heaven.

Hey, it’s only money - ours

Let’s see. We’ve spent (read, wasted) $20,000 to learn eventually that we can’t stop the Aryans from marching. And $100,000 to fire a good city administrator. And $181,000 to hire two waterfront consultants, including one who thought buildings would spruce up McEuen Field. Silly me. I thought fiscally conservative Republicans ran our City Council.

Judge Haman beat the new millenium - barely

In fall 1984, I covered my first story for the IS-R: watermaster Otis Wuest’s attempt to build a recreation area off Hayden Lake’s Dike Road. The effort deteriorated into a court battle between Idaho Forest Industries and the state. At issue was the lake level. Now, long after Wuest died, District Judge Gary Haman has decided - finally - he doesn’t know where Hayden Lake’s level was when Idaho became a state. So, he doesn’t know who owns what. Why Haman couldn’t make that ruling years ago is beyond me. But it sure fuels cynicism about our court system.