Letters for September 5
Friedman best for Stevens County
In these times, we need steady, experienced leadership more than ever. Malcolm Friedman will bring just what we need to Stevens County. I have known Malcolm since we moved here in 1990. I started a work-study program for high school students at a small school. While many businesses wouldn’t let 14- and 15 year-olds work in their establishments, Malcolm believed in trusting and training young people, enabling them to get a solid work foundation. While the kids were at work at the old Excel grocery store in Colville, they saw in Malcolm a wonderful role model of not just a boss or a leader, but also a hard worker. No task was beneath him. He could often be seen pushing carts in from the parking lot or doing other “menial” tasks, even though he was the owner. He cared about how the kids were doing and was active in mentoring them.
Malcolm brings a wealth of experience for this job. He has served as Stevens County commissioner, owned multiple businesses and managed 200 employees at one time, served on various boards and foundations … the list goes on and on. Check his website and Facebook page for more info.
Here’s the bottom line: Malcolm is a man of honesty and integrity with an amazing work ethic. He believes in conservative values, even though he is running as an Independent. He is the man for the hour for our county. He has my support and deserves yours.
Shelley Bacon
Colville
Fluoridation supports families
Thank you for your leadership and endorsement in favor of the City Council taking action on Community Fluoridation (Aug. 9).
Better Health Together is proud to stand with Providence, CHAS, Premera, Multicare, Kaiser Permanente, Molina, SNAP, NAACP, Empire Health Foundation and dozens of Spokane dentists, hygienists, doctors and nurses to support the effectiveness and safety of community water fluoridation. We’re inspired by the council’s responsiveness to the crisis of oral health in our community made worse by COVID-19, poverty and systemic racial inequities.
Four in 10 kindergarten-age kids in Spokane have had a cavity, and 3 in 5 Spokane children experience preventable cavities by third grade. We must do more to support our kids’ and families’ oral health. At a time, when so many choose to focus on what they disagree with or oppose, we see our City Council coming up with real solutions that will have a big impact on our community’s health.
The fact these solutions are supported by 75 years of science, based on good public health policy and enacted with the intent to eliminate health disparities, makes us proud to call Spokane home.
Alison Poulsen, executive director, Better Health Together
Spokane
Wasteful fluoridation
Without getting into the many other objections to fluoridating Spokane’s water supply, I would suggest the City Council question the wisdom of having the general population use expensive fluoridated water to flush their toilets, keep their lawns green, wash their cars, dogs, laundry, using only a tiny percentage of the total to bathe their teeth.
How about promoting the topical application of fluoride, such as with toothpaste and mouthwash, instead?
David Nelson
Spokane
Information misleading
Your Aug. 21 story on sex trafficking was confusing and misleading. The founder of the Jonah Project claims his organization has “helped rescue and stabilize 300 victims of trafficking, almost all in their teens.” A reader is led to believe those 300 “victims of trafficking” are from the Spokane area. However, according to the Jonah Project website, those 300 persons are not Spokane teens: “As of June 2020, The Jonah Project has served more than 300 women and children, everywhere from Michigan to North Carolina to Rescue Operations across international borders.”
Sex trafficking must be clearly defined and reported in order to be addressed and eliminated. The community needs clear, accurate reporting so we may understand and respond. Unfortunately, the Aug. 21 story was inappropriately sensationalized which only added confusion.
Mark Hernick
Spokane
Problems of the new equity
In recent Spokesman-Review issues, Shawn Vestal’s column, Judge Moreno’s guest opinion and at least two articles focused on “racial equity.” Fair-sounding phrases such as this are being used to foster public support for systemic changes in our government, and malign those who oppose such changes. However, neither are their meanings logically defined, nor their implied administrative changes described.
Judge Moreno seemed to say that people commit crimes for various reasons, and that equity means the justice system operates differently for each reason. This philosophy is old. The conundrum it creates was humorously illustrated in 1957’s “West Side Story” song “Gee, Officer Krupke.”
Since inequity is deduced by statistics, equity will be determined by statistics. Equity’s goal will be equal ratios. Hence, “racial equity” will be administered by a quota system in order to produce the same proportion of Blacks arrested, prosecuted, convicted and given like sentences as Caucasians in relation to their respective population percentages. The proportion of crimes or criminal actors within each race’s population won’t matter.
Equity couldn’t fairly stop with Blacks and Caucasians. All demographics must receive equity. There will have to be equal quotas for every race, age, religion, income, self-identity, citizenship and sex. To account for everyone’s overlapping demographics, government may assign everyone an equity rating. A new equity system is more likely to further socialism than justice.
The Federal Bureau of Prisons published that current federal inmate populations are divided 93.2% men to 6.8% women. Sarcastically I ask, “How’s this not an inequity problem?”
Duncan Bean
Spokane Valley
Proper representation
Lori Feagan is the right person to represent us in Washington’s 4th legislative district. She’s a nurse practitioner who understands our need as a community to collectively stop the spread of COVID-19 to be able to restore our economy. She’s endorsed by workers, retirees, educators, conservationists, and all of us who know she listens, learns and will represent us well in Olympia.
Madonna Luers
Mead
The great equalizer
According to the book “Putin’s People,” by Catherine Belton, Russia has tried to sow propaganda throughout the Western World to undermine alliances, erode American influence, make governments more dysfunctional, and damage reputations and even democracy itself.
Russian operatives have been involved with the Trump organization for many years, bailing him out financially, offering “deals,” buying expensive apartments. Before he became president, he was considered just another “amoral Western businessman,” one of many the ex-KGB elite such as Putin has sponsored around the world with the hope they might become of some political use.
They hit the jackpot with Trump. It is amazing that the Republican Senate continues to deny that any of this has happened or is happening.
Trump is becoming more and more like Putin, ignoring laws, silencing critics, lying constantly, and trying to be an authoritarian leader who pits people against each other so he can stay in power.
The great equalizer is we are a legitimate democracy. Remember to vote.
Paul Piper
Spokane
Culp’s competency
Loren Culp is the Republican candidate for Washington governor in 2020, but is hardly a well-known name. People need to know who he is. Mr. Culp is the chief of police of the small Eastern Washington town of Republic.
As chief of police, he has announced that he will not enforce certain gun laws that are currently on the books in Washington. It is the job of the state legislature to write and enact laws. It is the job of the state supreme court to determine if laws are appropriate or if they must be thrown out for violating the constitution. It is the job of a police chief to enforce existing laws. It is not the job of a police chief to enact or determine if laws are valid or invalid, or to decide which laws to enforce and which to ignore.
If Mr. Culp has so little understanding of his appropriate role as police chief, he is unlikely to understand the proper role of a much bigger job – that of state governor. This has nothing to do with politics; it has everything to do with competence. Culp has made it clear that he is not competent in the job he currently holds, and is unlikely to be competent in the job he is seeking.
Bruce Barnbaum
Granite Falls, Wash.
Which party “gets it?”
Today we are faced with a pandemic caused by the COVID-19 virus and changing planetary conditions caused by global warming. If mishandled, either of these massive global problems will have profound negative impacts on our environment.
In addressing them, we have seen two very different approaches favored by our two political parties. The Democrats have tended to favor approaches that take into consideration the predictions of modern science. The Republicans, on the other hand, “deal with” these problems by ignoring them and denying the validity of our scientific literature.
In assessing which of these distinctly different approaches to our environmental problems is the better one, we can already see which one has been superior in addressing the COVID-19 problem. By ignoring the advice of our scientific experts, the policies implemented by the Republicans have been disastrous – we now have a full-fledged pandemic on our hands. At the same time, by following the advice of the scientific community, many other countries have avoided that dreaded outcome.
So, in answering the question posed in the title of this piece, need I say more? Only the Democratic party takes our fields of science seriously. Thus, no less than the future of mankind on this planet requires that Democrats be brought into positions of leadership in November.
Eric Grimsrud
Liberty Lake
Trump’s soldier
I am sure that it was no surprise to those who track all the current election threats and issues raised by Trump, that Cathy McMorris Rodgers would continue to be a loyal soldier and despite what the general population feels about the USPS, would vote not to fund it, while many of her GOP House members voted the opposite.
With what may be lean times for the people of Eastern Washington, with many concerned about actually feeding their families, having no job or small incomes, I would commend McMorris Rodgers’ vote to add a couple of more Air Force tankers to Fairchild. The problem is that they do not make a good family dinner. We need a congressperson who has Eastern Washington and the welfare of its people as her priority, not Donald Trump’s demands.
Bob Sanborn
Colbert
Some virus knowledge
As a retired battalion chief (35 years in the fire service), it is sad to see the improper donning, doffing and wearing of face masks by well-meaning folks convinced face coverings offer protection. As a bioethicist, I am disheartened with the incomplete data being offered to the public. Ill-fitting masks, masks worn under the nose, improper mask material, and people constantly adjusting and touching their masks is a recipe for failure.
What we are not being told is numbers associated with mask compliance opposed to noncompliance are statistically inconsequential. Comparing countries like Brazil (89% mask compliant) and the USA (72% mask compliant) with Denmark (3% mask compliant) and the Netherlands (11% mask compliant), one finds the chances of contracting COVID-19 statistically lower in the noncompliant countries (Brazil, 1.71%; USA, 1.79%; Denmark, 0.28%; Netherlands, 0.39%).
Does this mean that masks don’t work? That would constitute an irresponsible scientific conclusion. It may be that masks are ineffective, but it is just as likely that the improper wearing of masks renders them ineffectual or that the wearing of masks causes carelessness with other precautions – social distancing, hand-washing.
Maybe we ought to be more gracious to our neighbors who don’t wear masks, especially if we don’t know their reasons. Or kinder to kids playing in the park who avoid being around compromised groups (those over 60 and those with comorbidities). If the goal is love of one’s neighbor, let us not judge prematurely especially when our knowledge of this virus is woefully incomplete.
Michael Muñoz
Spokane Valley
Who’s supporting Eastern Washington?
Twenty-six Republicans stood with the democrats to protect and support the House USPS relief bill that just passed Congress. Where was Cathy McMorris Rodgers, you might ask? She was still supporting Trump and not supporting the people of Eastern Washington that need the USPS.
It’s time for McMorris Rodgers to go along with Trump, before we lose our democracy. Vote because our lives depend on it.
David Robinson
Curlew, Washington
My role model
One hundred years after the ratification of the Constitution’s 19th Amendment, I am turning 18. This November, I will be proud to cast my ballot for Congresswoman Cathy McMorris Rodgers.
Representing Eastern Washington in the U.S. House of Representatives, our congresswoman’s principled leadership continues to reach across party lines and inspire the rising generation of leaders to work together to tackle problems. Ranked in the 94th percentile for bipartisanship in the House of Representatives by the independent Lugar Group (2019), our congresswoman continues to stand out as a role model and lead by example in the midst of fierce partisan division crippling the legislative process.
By reelecting McMorris Rodgers, Eastern Washington will be ensuring that we have a passionate collaborator and public servant representing and advocating for us in the People’s House.
Katie Kenlein
Spokane
Discrimination
If a candidate running for the office of president of the United States announces weeks in advance that he will select a running mate (vice president) who will be of a specific gender and have specific racial qualifications … is that not discrimination?
How do the Democrats get away with such a blatant contradiction to their claims of “equality” when their leader eliminates selecting the most qualified in order to appease racists?
David T. Bray
Spokane
New doesn’t mean better
It has been said an extensive research has been done on Joe Albi Stadium. The taxpayers have never been informed of this research and should know what the cost would be to renovate Albi compared to tearing it down and building it in the same general area.
Tearing down Albi would be expensive and the money could be better spent to renovate it. Adding a track would make an additional use of Albi and save money each year . Every other year the regional track meet could be held there and the possibility of a state meet. Without a doubt there are cracks in the concrete, which is common in construction, but these can be fixed.
There is a reason why several schools such as Notre Dame, Washington, Eastern Washington, Gonzaga and Whitworth have renovated instead spending money to destroy facilities. When things were built in the earlier years, they were constructed to last. An example is the Gonzaga Administration Building, which was dedicated in 1908. It has been renovated and will be used for many years to come. The same is true with the other schools that have renovated.
A stadium should hold a minimum of 7,000, so people wouldn’t have to be turned away on spirit games or other important events. The decision on this project will not only affect our athletes for years to come, but also our committee.
Joe Schauble
Spokane
High Drive diversion
I completely agree with Mark Silver (“High Drive at 20 mph?” Aug. 26).
I, too, have walked countless times on High Drive. I used to drive on it, but hesitate to now, due to the 20 mph. It is almost impossible to drive that slowly for 2 miles. Now, instead of taking High Drive, I have been driving down side streets. Is that really what Spokane lawmakers intended to happen when they decided, without citizen input, to change the speed limit?
Tricia Sporn
Spokane
Simple but effective
As a physician, a mother and resident of Spokane, I am strongly in favor of City Council adjusting the level of fluoride. It is of utmost importance that we help strengthen our community in these times. As an obstetrician and gynecologist, it is imperative to me to advocate for my patients, including our community of women to help give them the support they deserve. This includes fluoridation of the water to help with dental health.
This impacts the health of all. If our dental health is impaired, it trickles down into our general physical well-being. In pregnancy, poor dental health is known to have a detriment and can contribute to complications that could have otherwise been prevented.
As a mother, it is difficult to see my children need medication (fluoride) in addition to their regular multivitamin when this could have simply been provided through their drinking water.
In light of COVID-19 and the difficulties to access health care in our community, let’s ease the burden on our society and improve our health care with this simple measure. Thank you.
Elizabeth Newell, MD, FACOG
Spokane