Letters to the editor

Downtown solution

After reading Tom Henderson's editorial on March 29, I'm offering to write an editorial for Tom once a month so he won't waste space writing a babbling mess and he can have a day off to recharge his brain cell. I'm not sure what his point was ranting about parking, driving, drinking and DUIs. The only thing that made sense to me was the colossal waste of $33,000 to have someone tell us there is no parking problem. I'm sure this individual is laughing his ass off as he tells his friends that somebody paid him an insane amount of money to tell them nothing is wrong!

Getting back on track, I can only deduce two things from his editorial: Tom is sitting somewhere downtown late every Friday and Saturday night in his faded green 1963 Volvo with three hubcaps and cracked windshield secretly gathering notes on people, or he's one of those stumbling out of the bar, burning rubber all the way down Main Street, yelling obscenities and hanging his bright white cheeks out the window.

Does no one have a solution to downtown? Let's try this. There is no parking problem (obviously). All owners and employees who work downtown should be parking in the off-street parking lots and let customers use the Main Street parking. A highway goes right through downtown, which shouldn't be a rutted piece of crap, and the city needs to provide huge incentives for businesses to locate there. End of story!

Mark Lorenz

Clarkston

Why the racket?

Would someone enlighten me about why people place in their vehicles a racket that can be heard for blocks? I guess it's the bass from some godawful sound system. Earplugs don't help. It's the vibration that is so obnoxious. Why risk damaging your hearing? It does remind me of my grandson jumping up on the couch and screaming "Look at me, look at me!" Or is it just a reflection of our narcissistic society?

Howard Jordan

Lewiston

Truth about Saddam

I for one am tired of hearing the cliche "Saddam had no WMDs." Anyone with any sense at all would know that Saddam had plenty of time before the coalition forces struck him to hide any evidence of WMDs. He had them before and the world knew he did. So what makes anyone think that he still didn't have them or was trying to develop a nuclear weapon?

If you thought Saddam Hussein was merely a threat, you have no idea! If you really want the truth about him, then read the book "Saddam's Secrets" by Gen. Georges Sada. Gen. Sada was one of Saddam's top generals and foremost military advisers. A truth-teller in a government that made the truth dangerous. A devout Christian in a Muslim country. And a man who would stand up for what was right - even at the risk of his own life. He was a top ace in the Iraqi air force. In the book, he exposes Saddam's plans to destroy Israel, hide WMDs and control the Arab world. Because of Gen. Sada, all of the captured pilots' lives were spared in the Gulf War in 1991.

The world is a better place because we are rid of Saddam Hussein.

Eldon Bomley

Nezperce

Charge Potlatch to use air, water

Many people have expressed their opinions against Potlatch charging user fees for access to Potlatch lands. I can't complain about it because I do not allow just anybody on my property, especially those that want to hunt "my game" or tear up "my land" with their four-wheelers and pickup trucks. Most of us will never collect a fee to permit others to use our land for their own purpose. Most of us prefer to reserve our private land for our private use. What about "property" common to us all, such as our air and water?

Many of us are concerned with pollution entering our air and water. The largest polluter of our air and water is the Potlatch mill in Lewiston. The Potlatch mill is the second largest polluter in the entire state of Idaho, second only to the sugar processing plants south and east of here. Potlatch is permitted to do this. Potlatch applies for and receives permits from the Department of Environmental Quality to operate a "polluting facility" in Lewiston. This means that the Potlatch mill is permitted to discharge pollution into our air and water.

Potlatch is going to charge a fee to permit people to use their land. Why not charge Potlatch a fee to use our air and water? I recommend a $10 fee per every gram of pollution that the mill discharges.

Mark D. Reaney Jr.

Lewiston

Put up a wall

In the past decade there have been an overwhelming number of Mexicans crossing the border. Once across, they are living in the U.S. illegally. Because of this, the U.S. government is putting in a wall 700 miles long. I think this wall will stop most of the immigrants coming over illegally.

First, unlike the Berlin Wall, this wall will stop illegal immigrants from taking U.S. citizens' jobs. The jobs that they are taking are the hard physical jobs that others don't want. To get these jobs, they ask for low pay for it is all they need. Others can't live off that amount of pay and have no chance getting that job against an immigrant.

In 2000, CNN claimed that there were a million of the 7.1 million illegal immigrants who had criminal records in the U.S, even though, the other 6 million immigrants live good lives and are trying to support their family. However, they still broke the law after they cheated to get into the U.S. because they couldn't get a job in Mexico. Now in 2007 CNN claims there are 12 million, and 1.9 million of them have a criminal record.

In conclusion, I don't want the immigrants to leave the U.S. I want the immigrants to become U.S. citizens and live in the U.S. legally. This wall will not allow very many illegal immigrants in. Instead it will only allow those who come legally.

Colby Hansen

Clarkston

I'm back

Hey, you guys, I just wanted to reassure you that I was still around and very fit, thank you. I will have to admit that it has been a while since you last read my comments about whatever I had to say at the time. I know there are many of you that actually enjoyed what I wrote, no matter what the topic. Many of you have told me so, and I am thankful that you felt the way you did.

Oh, and there were those others that never had a good word to say because it was in very bad taste what I wrote on. In all your ways, I was wrong because you were right. Yes, and you folks even told me so.

Regardless, I am back and I will continue to write on topics that come to my mind when they do not matter what the topic may be about. It's free speech that says I can write what I want no matter what others might think. My ideas come from my own mind and what I want to say at the moment. ...

Frank Salvado

Clarkston

Embarrassment In Iraq

My brother and I are veterans, my sons are both veterans, and my grandson is now serving in the armed forces. We all believe in protecting our country against attack, but we don't believe in marching into an unarmed country, like Iraq (which had nothing to do with 9/11) and killing people who don't agree that we should be there.

How do we glorify this into "fighting for our freedom"? Every excuse that Bush used to start this war was false. His brilliant cake walk to Baghdad and his "Mission Accomplished" were an embarrassment before the whole world. By whining for help in Iraq, Bush has proved to the world how weak and vulnerable we are. After firing Rumsfeld, Bush is now busy firing anyone else who disagrees.

He didn't learn one thing from the recent elections. If we need to help handling the tiny, unarmed country of Iraq, we should be saving all our manpower and resources for a real war that could threaten our freedom. By stealing money from schools, highways, social security, the VA and farmers, Bush has run up a deficit that our children and grandchildren will be paying.

Robert G. Schultze

Riggins