Letters To The Editor

IN THE PAPER

Payne cartoon nonsense

Henry Payne’s cartoon (Sept. 12) is one more of the nonsensical attempts to blame this summer’s forest fires on President Clinton. As if one person, in only eight years, could institute a policy that could create decades worth of poor logging practices, subsidies for the timber industry and the demise of the Northwest’s forests.

Let’s look at the record since 1952. In that period we have had a Republican in the oval office for 28 years and a Democrat in the same position for 20 years. In the immediate 12 years before Clinton the presidents were Republicans.

If we are to assume the president is to blame for the fires, as Payne and our own local forest guru Edwin Davis suggest, then let’s put the blame for the catastrophes on the persons who have controlled the presidency for the majority of the last half century, the Republicans. It makes just about as much sense.

It’s the weather, stupid! Ted Wert Spokane

Addiction to crude harms planet

Re: “Greed wins at the pumps” (Letters, Sept. 18)

The world’s addiction to crude oil is worse than our addiction to drugs and alcohol because our planet is also suffering. We have the means to cure the addiction but we choose to remain in denial and quietly pay any price to our very rich dealers, OPEC and oil companies.

Until we break this cycle of dependency and realize how much it is costing us all, we will remain controlled and poisoned. Maybe some day we will be telling our grandchildren we were once addicted to crude, but we learned the error of our ways. Steve Carpenter Spokane

Is domesticity no longer acceptable?

Lynn Gibson’s article (IN Life, Sept. 10) encouraging girls to pursue careers in the scientific and technological professions was interesting. It is also interesting that boys seem to not be encouraged to do anything.

While reading this article a question occurred to me: To whom and why is it so very important girls be proactively dissuaded from seeing life as centered on marriage, family and motherhood? Leonard C. Johnson Troy, Idaho

Pray courts uphold BSA position

In Peter Dolina’s Sept. 13 commentary, he admits to being confused about vocabulary yet accuses the Boy Scouts of being discriminatory, irrational, cruel, hostile and even perverted.

I have closely followed the homosexual assault against the Boy Scouts for some time. The only cruel accusations I have heard come from homosexuals who seem intent upon attacking anything that does not support their deviancy. It is irrational for homosexuals to demand presence in any organization that wants to exclude them and vice versa. The Boy Scouts can be very proud of its behavior as well as its courage to uphold its beliefs.

It is my prayer that all future Supreme Courts will uphold the Boy Scouts position and that America will never allow homosexuals the privilege of open access to our children. Elton Carswell Nine Mile Falls

SPOKANE MATTERS

Key to road repairs in ballot box

Citizens of Spokane, as a nonresident of your fair city I continue to be amazed at the articles in The Spokesman- Review regarding the poor condition of your roads.

I am a native of another “cash strapped” Eastern Washington city, Yakima. A number of years back the Yakima city fathers begged and pleaded with the citizens to pay for the repair of long-ignored roads. The good people said no to the bond issue that November and there was the wailing and gnashing of teeth by the same city fathers.

Miraculously, the following summer road crews were out in force repaving streets that had not been touched for 10, 15, 20 or even 30 years.

Where did the money come from? The city was “strapped.” They needed tax revenue to fix their mistakes. To this day, it isn’t clear to the average Yakima resident where the money came from. We can only guess that the state, the feds and even the cash-strapped city of Yakima paid for street renewal.

The moral of our story is this: You don’t need to increase your taxes to get road repairs. You must threaten the job security of city leaders in the ballot box. You need to demand reallocation of city funding to street maintenance and repair. You need to demand a road repair schedule that will not waiver on the whim of an intellectually challenged leadership.

To accept any tax to fix roads is equivalent to accepting responsibility for the mismanagement of road maintenance. And, you are not responsible for the lack of road maintenance. Jerome C. Parmentier Pullman

Consider safety, reject fluoridation

I was born, raised and lived in San Francisco for over 25 years. The water quality there is probably one of the worst in the country. San Francisco decided to fluoridate their water in the late 1940s. A problem was noticed sometime after. The combination of fluoride and chlorine caused a severe corrosive effect in the plumbing infrastructure for the entire city. The solution was to add other chemicals to neutralize the corrosive effects caused by this combination that irreversibly damaged the city’s water supply lines. However, it was too late and the problem continues to this day. The children in San Francisco are encouraged to not drink city water.

During the current fluoridation controversy, there has been no mention of the other chemicals that must accompany the fluoride for use in the city’s water. I believe the voters should be informed of their presence.

Despite assurances by the chemical producers and delivery system administrators, there have been instances where too much fluoride has been accidentally placed into a city’s water supply and the result was acute fluoride poisoning for the entire community. An accidental mass fluoride poisoning and death in Hooper Bay, Alaska, occurred in May of 1992.

Is this what we want for our citizens and especially our children? If given the choice of a few cavities over the potential for an accidental poisoning, however remote, I’ll err on the side of safety when it comes to children’s health issues and vote accordingly. Cavities can be fixed, fluoride poisoning cannot. John Lucassen Spokane

Let professionals control fluoride

The level of fluoride that will reach the individual is of grave concern in public fluoridation. The ingestion level of fluoride from 16 ounces of city water whether drank by a 275-pound adult or used for infant formula would be the same amount.

Dental procedures endorse caution when prescribing fluoride. They sanction checkups, identification of caries risk level, sealants when needed, adjusted levels of fluoride to age and size, constant dental care training and avoiding bad habits.

Canadian dental authorities have initiated a program to help people identify risks of ingesting too much fluoride. This action indicates that even though public fluoridation has been around for more than 50 years, the levels of ingestion are still in danger of being out of control. Humans come in all kinds of shapes, sizes, and habits. Some drink a lot of water, some barely drink a glass of water per day. Who is going to teach each individual how to avoid over ingestion of fluoride when they have reached their maximum safe level of daily ingestion? The Surgeon General’s report urged better dental programs to include targeted treatment to individuals at high risk of dental disease. Targeting those in need of dental treatment without endangering individuals at-risk of health problems from public fluoridation is the least costly treatment for all concerned.

To obtain healthy teeth and an overall healthy public, we should keep fluoride out of public water and in control of the proper medical professionals. Jurene E. Mason Mead

GOVERNMENT AND POLITICS

Lieberman lacks conscience

I don’t understand all the hoopla about Joe Lieberman, the “conscience of the Senate” being the Democrat vice presidential nominee.

Sen. Lieberman made a big speech about Bill Clinton’s sexual escapades, defining them as “personal,” while pointedly ignoring the real issue of Clinton’s proven lies before a federal court. These lies deprived one Paula Jones of justice in a court case, by keeping important truths from the record. This Senate speech is still construed by Democrats as proof that he is a man of deep religious convictions, and therefore ethical and honorable.

By this speech, Lieberman actually became a part of the team of spin doctors (propagandists) who tried to convince we, the people, that this was about a private matter rather than about the serious criminal acts committed by the president. Instead of voting for removal from office, as his brave words had first implied, Lieberman refused to even consider the evidence, and voted to let the president commit perjury (a felony) and remain in office.

What convictions? What conscience?

Lieberman, the “conscience of the Senate“? A self promoted conscience, I should think. He and Al Gore are a matched set; their words rarely match their true agenda. J.G. Post Moscow, Idaho

Bush can restore national pride

Congratulations to George W. Bush for pushing the envelope and proving to America what a man stands for, or should stand for.

Not only does this man have to campaign against Al Gore, but he has to campaign against the media puppets, right up to the first lady. He has been backed against the wall with tough questions, only to show strength and integrity in standing by his beliefs amid all the pressures to fail.

He has shown time and time again that he has what it takes to turn this pathetic Clinton/Gore administration into something we can finally take pride in again - America, folks!

God only gives us so many chances in this life. We need to take advantage of the gifts that are sent our way. In George W. Bush, I believe we can. Jeanie Smith Nine Mile Falls