June 22, 2022, R-C Letters to the Editor

Great work, Haley

Editor:

Recently, I have enjoyed the writing and photos of new R-C intern Haley Estabrook. I especially appreciated her front-page piece on the Pony Express Re-ride in the June 18 issue. She is making progress as an up-and-coming Journalist, and I think she should be encouraged in her endeavors.

Well done, Haley.

Gary B. Swift

Gardnerville

School board candidates tale of the tape

Editor:

This year’s school board race is coming down to two very different groups of candidates. 

In the red corner, candidates Roberta Butterfield, Robbe Lehmann, and Heather Jackson are running on one slate. 

In the blue corner are Candidates David Burns, Susan Jansen, and Catherine Dickerson are running on another slate. 

So, let’s see how these two slates of contenders match-up. Here’s the tale of the tape:

Combined years of living in Douglas County:

Butterfield-Lehmann-Jackson: 76

Burns-Dickerson-Jansen: 18

Combined numbers of kids who have attended Douglas County schools:

Butterfield-Lehmann-Jackson: 10

Burns-Dickerson-Jansen: 0

Position on CRT being taught in classrooms:

Butterfield-Lehmann-Jackson: Against.

Burns-Dickerson-Jansen: Against. 

How to handle CRT:

Butterfield-Lehmann-Jackson: Support teachers in what they’re doing. Use policies and procedures that are already in place to address any complaints of CRT in classrooms. Libraries should stock age-appropriate books that discuss all points of view. 

Burns-Dickerson-Jansen: Implement strict censorship that stifles debate and discussion in the classroom. Remove books from school libraries that don’t agree with their point of view.

Student Mental Health

Butterfield-Lehmann-Jackson: Recognize the need for social and emotional learning to provide all students with the tools and resources they need to handle today’s challenges. 

The Burns-Jansen-Dickerson: In an era when student mental health problems are at historically high rates, remove all tools and support systems for student mental health because “all these needs should be provided at home,” they say. 

Conclusion

Butterfield-Lehmann-Jackson are hands-down the best three candidates in the school board elections. As opposed to Burns-Jansen-Dickerson, who are one-topic candidates, Butterfield-Lehmann-Jackson have real ideas for the real problems facing schools and teachers. 

I am voting for Butterfield-Lehmann-Jackson and I highly encourage you to do the same.

Lisa McGuffin

Minden

Read the room, Sheriff

Editor:

This is an open letter to Sheriff Coverley regarding his latest letter to the editor, which was as abrasive as the one he wrote to the past library director wishing her “good luck” if the library ever needed his department’s assistance in the future, because he was irritated by the library’s potential statement of racial inclusion. 

Sir, read the room.

You are concerned about “Red Flag” laws while school students are being gunned down by assault rifles obtained by young white men. You call defunding the police radical and extreme. Yet I do not see your letters condemning excessive police violence that has resulted in actual murder convictions. Did not see you speak out against violence and gun abuses in your own community when a fully armed militia gathered in our local park with their legal to open carry assault rifles, fully meant to intimidate anyone who openly showed support for the radical idea of exposing police abuses through Black Lives Matter. What did you say to those radical supporters with signs reading ‘God, Guns and Douglas County’? I think it was, “Thank you.” How ironic.

(And it is telling of our whole county that a grand jury found those same self styled militia types, gun carrying, camouflage wearing persons to be simply rude as they roamed our streets assaulting law abiding, tax paying citizens.)

 Would you, sir, classify a person carrying an assault rifle to your church or our local schools as simply rude? Where is your ability to recognize all people need to feel, and actually be safe, not only the ones you believe support your politics, religion, or race.

I have seen a lot of radical ideas in my lifetime get laws removed, others added, and some commonly accepted social norms reversed. For example, laws now mandate for persons with disabilities to have access to public buildings. People of different races in our Republic can now legally intermarry. Woman can vote, and are entitled to equal pay. The Mormons Church is reversing its policies of classifying persons in same sex marriages as apostates. All these actions were once considered radical.

So stop calling everyone who does not think like you a leftist radical. Instead think of them as a person you could learn from. And for God’s sake, don’t let your fear of red flag laws allow one more of our school children to be gunned down in a classroom, or in a mall, or in a church, or at a birthday party or any where. 

Read the room. Be a public servant for all in your community, even the radical free thinkers. And stop fear mongering about gun laws. Step up and find other tools. 

Marie Johnson

Gardnerville

Lombardo claims Douglas

Editor:

Democrats are spending tens of millions of dollars nationally to meddle in Republican Party primaries this year.

In Nevada, a Democrat-financed PAC (A Stronger Nevada) reserved $2.1 million in television advertising to attack Clark County Sheriff Joe Lombardo in the GOP’s governor’s race, the Nevada Independent reported. Democrats wanted to derail Lombardo, the strongest Republican in the field.

The ads (“Slick Joe”) were misleading and factually untrue — an attempt to portray Lombardo as “soft on crime.” The hope was to discredit Lombardo in the eyes of Republican voters to benefit weaker Republican candidates in the primary.

Other Republican candidates in Nevada, including U.S. Senate candidate Adam Laxalt, were on the receiving end of similar Democrat-financed deceptive ads.

The inventor of this strategy was Nevada’s own “Dirty Harry” Reid in 2010.  Reid boasted he “successfully manipulated” the GOP primary to get the opponent he “was most likely to beat.” It worked in 2010 as Reid defeated far-right Republican Sharron Angle.

Still, it’s up to Republican voters to stop themselves from being played for suckers.

On June 14, enough Nevada Republican voters saw through the deceptions and decisively voted to nominate Joe Lombardo for governor—including his winning in Douglas County.

Jim Hartman

Genoa