March 5 Letters to the Editor, Part 2: Our Readers’ Opinions

What would Reagan say?

This Idaho family is appalled and deeply disappointed by the not insignificant number of Republicans in Congress (aka the “treason caucus”) actively supporting and encouraging Russian dictator Vladimir Putin’s murderous invasion of Ukraine.

Calling for an end to U.S. support to Ukraine not only weakens the NATO alliance we are de facto leader of but in fact rolls out the red carpet for Putin, letting him know that the U.S. will not challenge this and any future attempts to invade by force and enslave other free democratic nations. We are old enough to have robustly cheered the fall of the Berlin Wall and the breakup of our longtime adversary, the Soviet Union, in 1989.

How do you think Ronald Reagan would have reacted to voices of appeasement telling Putin he’s free to take whatever he likes by force while raping, torturing and murdering civilians?

Are we really OK with Putin stealing children from their families to be reprogrammed as Russian-speaking regime loyalists, and forcing once-free men into battle at gunpoint in Russian uniforms in order to push a dictator’s conquest even deeper into the same parts of Europe we helped liberate from Hitler and the Nazis?

Chris Norden

Moscow

Herndon’s deception

Watching white, Christian, nationalist and Idaho state Sen. Scott Herndon from District 1 last week in the Senate State Affairs Committee reminded me of the old saying, “Smooth as silk, sincere as polyester.”

He could barely suppress a smirk when he suggested that it would be OK to not allow student IDs for voting as he proposes in his bill, House Bill 124, because those students, who don’t have a driver’s license, can always vote using an affidavit at the polls. He didn’t happen to mention that he is also co-sponsor of House Bill 137, which would ban the affidavit.

This obvious deception reflects the disdain many Republicans have toward young people voting.

The Idaho Republican Party even prohibits the Young Republicans, as well as the Republican Women’s Federation, from voting in party politics. Herndon and his new bestie, Secretary of State Phil McGrane, felt very comfortable repeatedly stating that only 104 students used their student IDs in the November 2022 election, implying no big deal if those students are denied their constitutional right to vote.

If even one person was denied their right to buy a gun, you can be sure Herndon’s hair would be on fire.

Jean McClain

Clarkston

Show some respect

Thanks to Anne Cassidy for her Feb. 19 letter titled “Shameful display of flag.

There is another display further north and the two displays seem to have at least one thing in common, which was that all flags were pre-tattered. These “artists” desecrated those flags on purpose before displaying them. I have been driving the residential areas of the valley the past few years and have seen our flag frozen in the roof gutter, tattered and faded beyond retirement protocols or displayed in a manner that allows them to be stuck in the bushes or laying on the roof.

It is not hard at all to learn proper flag protocol if you visit the American Legion or Veterans of Foreign Wars websites. It has become apparent to me that there are far too many people that don’t understand how to respectfully display our flag.

Douglas Thornton

Lewiston

No theocracy

Dennis Prager declaring the Bible as U.S. doctrine is designed to hit the bull’s-eye confirmation bias of Lewiston Tribune readers, but it doesn’t make it true.

His whole piece is fallacious. We do not run our country by ancient religious texts.

The assumption that there were no morals in the people who lived on the continent before any Bible version arrived is ridiculous. Same with the idea that billions of Hindus and Buddhists in the world out there are unable to stop themselves from raping and killing each other. Jewish people did not murder each other off before Moses. Since humans thrive in healthy communities, it simply makes evolutionary sense to cooperate and care for each other, no yeshiva stories from Prager needed.

There are some good ideas between the Bible’s covers, but there is no moral superiority. The Bible has plenty of bad ideas for society and has been used to justify slavery, subjugate women and children, discriminate against marginalized populations, condone the murder of millions, etc. Those ideas are clearly dangerous.

The book often uses lovely language but is rife with contradictions and concepts that cannot work in a healthy democracy.

One clear example of the falsity of the claim that the U.S. is a Judeo-Christian nation is the contradiction between the biblical First Commandment and our constitutional First Amendment. In this country, we can worship as many gods as we want. Or we can worship no god. ...

The U.S. cannot be a theocracy.

Janet Marugg

Clarkston

Not voting for us

So, we are six weeks into this year’s legislative session without a town hall meeting and we haven’t seen one bill aimed at helping homeowners with the skyrocketing property taxes.

Nothing to increase the circuit breaker property tax relief, which they should double.

Nothing on eliminating the cap on our homeowners exemption, and nothing to control the rate of property value percentage increase.

Many homeowners I know have had an average 30% increase in the valuation of their home. Why can’t the Legislature cap that? The county and city are limited to a 3% increase of the levy rate. Wouldn’t it be nice if our homes’ assessed valuation increase was capped at maybe 5%?

It is clear our representatives want our vote when election time comes but it seems that they are not willing to vote for us when that time comes.

Kevin Kelly

Lewiston