Letters to the editor for Wednesday, July 25, 2018

‘Facing Your Privilege’ commentary incongruous with reality

In “Facing Your Privilege For the Greater Good” author Kathy Walters reports on her trip to a luxury resort in South Africa where she could “come face to face with privilege — [her] white, upper-class and American advantage.”

Her timing was unintentionally ironic. South Africa’s ruling ANC is in the process of confiscating farms and other property from while South Africans and turning them over to blacks.

Zimbabwe’s ruling junta did this a few years ago, throwing its once-thriving economy into a tailspin because of agricultural mismanagement, an equally disastrous result for Zimbabwe’s blacks and whites.

Walters’ feminist progenitors, who refused to be kept down because they happened to be women, would be aghast at her wallowing in race-based identity politics.

Fringe lunatics like Walters need to learn that how we live our lives governs the content of our character, not skin color or gender.

Lynn Muzzy

Minden

Summer’s parade in the sky

Dawn slowly creeps over the horizon to the East alluring our curiosity of the day to come.

Rich shades of violaceous flushing rouges with hints of purplish silhouettes mark a day clouded with sweltering heat and possible thunderstorms to follow.

The desert turns into a windblown stir of heat meeting cool, a landscape of flash flooding and lightning thunderous skies, as one chemical reaction offsets another and so on ...

And then, alas, the calm after the storm takes center stage to the West as the components of a gorgeous sunset form.

Nature has a way of putting on a dramatic show all its own as we witness the meltdown of a day in crimson colors of sun firing into bands of amethyst blushing pinks and deep violet hues.

Once again, nature restores us back to a sense of peace, a sense of surrender as nightfall carries us into sleep.

Ann Burke

Carson City

Safety of country comes first

I am grateful that Sens. Masto and Heller participated in the unanimous vote to protect our ambassadors and any military individuals from being turned over to Putin.

Yay! Two thumbs up!

Next item that needs to be addressed is the need for a stenographer at any and every meeting Trump has with future leaders, in particular Putin, and Kim Jung Un.

No president, not now nor in the future, should have the authority to make secret deals in private!

The fact that Congress along with the American people have no idea what was discussed is deplorable.

To invite Putin to our country after we know he interfered and still is interfering with our election is at this point unacceptable.

Add to that the timing of invitation around our midterm elections is also clearly suspect. Any congressional member who would support that would be suspect to me. Duplicity!

Country before party including before an authoritative president.

I am a patriot, and the safety of my country comes first.

Robin Hunter

Mound House

Changing the Constitution

According to your Appeal on July 14, we now have another opportunity to change the Nevada Constitution. It has to do with renewable energy and the ballot in November.

In order for Nevada to adopt its Constitution when becoming a state in 1864, that Constitution had to first conform to the U.S. Constitution that predated it by several years.

It would appear that instead of just making or amending laws in Nevada, are we setting a precedent for changing all Constitutions?

Will someone eventually try to change the U.S. Constitution as well?

Do they intend to replace it with our new fourth “administrative” branch of our government? If so, would that eliminate the need for voting or a Constitution of any kind, anywhere?

Would that create a dictatorship? Wasn’t that the reason for constitutions to begin with?

With all the controversy over the last presidential election, are we now heading for a one-party system? What will it be called?

If we had already given up our guns wouldn’t this already have happened?

The ones who think they are still free make the best slaves.

The times, they certainly are “a changing.”

Pete Bachstadt

Carson City

Lyon a county of contradictions

Lyon County is a county of contradictions. It has some of Nevada’s oldest and newest buildings, smallest and largest ranches, rich agricultural and dry desert land.

Now access to USA Parkway makes the areas of Silver Springs and Stagecoach seen as a way to fill the county coffers. But sacrificing land without any gain in infrastructure or positive influences for the current or future residents is irresponsible.

In 2005 Lyon County was USA’s fastest-growing county. It was a feeding frenzy for developers. When the bubble burst, so did the county’s budget.

Developers have been doing business here for years. No record shows they helped grow Lyon County’s economy. Vidler Water Company’s deal with Lyon County will bring more and larger developments along Highway 50.

Our commissioners will be making a huge impact on the economic future of Lyon County, and of every person living here.

Margot Easley

Dayton