Some things improving
I went to fill up today at Costco and was amazed to find the gas price reduced to the price I paid June 6. Way to go! Something good is happening to bring prices down. I wish some people would stop complaining and see that certain things are improving. As the old song goes: “Accentuate the positive; eliminate the negative …”
Baby boomers have been through inflation and gas wars in the late 1970s as well as a recession in 2008. We survived!
Paula Palotay
Marana
Amazon is new Sears
All this controversy over Amazon Prime is a bunch of poop. What is the big deal? Amazon just updated Sears, Roebuck & Co.’s business model to the 21st century. I hope the new one works as long as the old one.
James Galvin
Sahuarita
Republican whataboutism
You published two letters June 21 that engaged in Republican whataboutism. They complain about the threat to Kavanaugh. Even Fox, who covered today’s hearings, engaged in this nonsense. If you listened today you would have heard our own Republican Speaker of the House describing how he and his family were intimidated and threatened by Trump supporters. You would have heard from Georgia Republicans also threatened. You would have heard of Georgia government employees driven from their homes and jobs by Trump supporters.
I’ll make you a deal. Once Trump and his supporters who threatened bodily harm to patriotic American citizens are in jail then we can talk about threats to our highly partisan Supreme Court justices.
Steven Brown
Midtown
Saving democracy
In 1959, our sophomore high school English class read George Orwell’s, “1984.” While I thought a government based on “double think” could exist in communist countries, it would never happen in the United States. The Trump administration proves how wrong I was. The former president and his minions have strewn lie after lie about the 2020 election, always knowing they were lies. In so doing they have destroyed the lives of common citizens and tried to end democracy for their own personal power. We must all thank people like Arizona Rep. Rusty Bowers, all the secretaries of state in the 50 states, the governors of the 50 states, the rational members of Congress, then-Vice President Mike Pence and the thousands of poll workers who did their jobs and adhered to the Constitution and the rule of law. My wife and I thank you all.
Donald Ries
Southeast side
Supreme Court and Biden
Our country is founded on the principle of three pillars of government, the administrative, legislative and judicial branches. The Congress writes the laws, the president administers the laws and the Supreme Court decides if the laws written by Congress are faithful to the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. This system, the best in the world, has served us well for 250 years. How dare President Joe Biden denigrate the Supreme Court for their recent decision. Whether you agree or disagree with that decision, their job is to faithfully do their job to the best of their ability. Because he did not agree with the decision of this branch, he basically called for radical changes to the Supreme Court and allowed unlawful pressure on the justices. He should be censured or even impeached for attempting to overthrow our government. As the leader of our country, if the president cannot absolutely support our form of government, he should go!
Loyal M Johnson Jr.
Oro Valley
‘Z’ for …
We have a mystery, why do vehicles of the Soviet army carry the “Z” logo; if I was to speculate, perhaps Vladimir Putin wasn’t always the maniacal leader he is today. Maybe Putin was a fan of the Disney series “Zorro”, as there is a strong coincidence between the premiere. (Oct 10, 1957) and Mr. Putin’s birthday (Oct 7, 1952) which would put him at his most impressionable age. At that age, he could see himself riding a gallant black horse, riding to the rescue and removing evildoers with the flash of his sword — leaving the “Z” as a token of his disapproval. If he had continued with these high ideals, he would be a hero of the Soviet Union, fighting for justice and the weak. He probably decided that there are no rewards for heroes so he decided to embrace Buzz Lightyear’s nemesis instead, “Zurg,” and now uses the “Z” to terrorize his enemies. All this is pure conjecture on my part — the coincidence speaks for itself.
Richard Rebl
East side
Historical truth of immigration
The idea that the United States faces an invasion of brown people from the South is almost exactly the opposite of historical truth. Santa Fe was founded in 1610, before most of the English colonies on the Atlantic coast. The brown people were already here when they were invaded by white men from the Northeast. One fourth of the present continental U.S. was under Spanish rule before the adoption of our Constitution. The techniques of cattle herding used in the American West were developed by Spanish vaqueros in California by the time William Henry Dana sailed there from Boston around Cape Horn in 1834. All of us here now are descended from immigrants, most of them refugees.
David P. Vernon
East side
Blame deaths on Biden
On June 27 in San Antonio, an abandoned tractor-trailer was found containing the bodies of 46 undocumented entrants having died from heat exhaustion and dehydration. Four more later died at the hospital. Twenty-two of the dead were from Mexico, seven from Honduras, two from Guatemala and the rest undetermined as of today. It is one of the deadliest, if not the deadliest, tragedies of its kind. These undocumented entrants were part of the 1,000 a day “gotaways” that escape Border Patrol detection because they are occupied processing unaccompanied children and family units crossing the border. Thus far for this fiscal year, the Border Patrol has encountered over 1,444,000 people illegally crossing the border. White House spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre said of the incident: “The fact of the matter is, the border is closed, which is in part why you see people trying to make this dangerous journey using smuggling networks.” That was an ignorant remark. I blame this tragedy on Biden for not securing the border.
Boris Slovek
Green Valley
Apathy hurts democracy
Apathy or nonchalance about voting this year will really hurt our democracy. Throwing up your hands at the latest crazy or dangerous proposals coming from the Arizona Legislature will do no good. We must change the majorities and high offices to exclude radical, conspiracy-driven and undemocratic actions and laws. It’s time to limber up your voting skills. Decide that your vote will matter and that in our current environment voting is extra important. Check your registration status, decide whom to vote for and most importantly what political caucus they will join. Decide how, when and where to vote. Your voice and your vote, and those of your friends, family and neighbors are more important than ever.
Donald Ijams
Midtown
Understanding Biden support
Inflation and gas prices have increased worldwide — President Joe Biden did that by himself?
Shipping delays after two years of COVID-19 — businesses failed to anticipate a demand for goods after restrictions were lifted. Still in lockdown, China, which business depends on, couldn’t produce.
The Afghan failure was 20 years in the making. I think Biden had the guts to stop the hemorrhaging.
We need foreign workers, but Trump shut down immigration, asylum and immigration judges. A backlog for visa renewals keeps documented workers out, too.
If you insist on placing blame, try looking at Republican senators, who only want tax cuts for the wealthy and extremist judges.
Nevertheless, Biden and Dems got some Republicans to vote for an infrastructure bill and gun safety. Bipartisanship!
Biden has been president for less than two years. I think fixing the four-year Trump mess, COVID and its aftermath, and the longstanding immigration debacle take time and either cooperation from Republicans or election of more Dems to replace obstructionist Republicans.
Lisa Wolfe
North side
Conover, the rest of the story?
Re: the July 6 article “Ex-deputy blasts Conover in email.”
In this article, Laura Conover did not dispute one word of Tamara Mulembo’s scathing indictment of Conover’s management and leadership style. Mulembo’s complaints are consistent with the fact that the entire leadership team Conover assembled when she was elected has quit. Perhaps that tells it all. Conover’s claim that the non- disparagement agreement with Mulembo was not unusual and was commonplace is also problematic. I have a copy of that agreement and it allows Mulembo to stay at home for over two months with a salary of over $10,000 a month before she is required to resign, and her only real obligation is she agrees not to say anything bad about Conover. The agreement was not commonplace; it was extraordinary. Conover’s comments, the article and the agreement with Mulembo should be troubling to the people of Pima County.
David Berkman
Northwest side
Transgender plight
It has been shown by professionals that children who identify as the opposite sex do so at an early age, usually at around 5 years old. To force these kids to go for years in the wrong body causes them untold stress, up to and including suicide. I can speak from experience that waiting so long causes their relations problems, too, by trying to switch gears and use the appropriate pronoun after so many years. This also causes the young adult to experience even more stress on a stressed-out psyche. Please listen to the professionals and act accordingly, whether you like the news or not. I would add that so many youngsters coming forward now does not mean that they are playing follow-the-leader. It is because there was beginning to be an openness for the first time, which allowed them to come forward. They were there all along, in a lot of pain.
Robert Garr
South Tucson
Gun violence
The shooter at the Highland Park 4th of July parade passed background checks and purchased four guns legally. Does that make him “a good guy with a gun?”
Neil Norton
Oro Valley
The 8-foot rule
Gov. Doug Ducey signed HR 2319 which prohibits a person from making an (outside) video recording of “law enforcement activity” within 8 feet from said activity. This vague and likely unconstitutional law raises practical measurement questions:
What is law enforcement activity? Writing a traffic ticket and/or kneeling on a person’s neck for several minutes?
Who measures the distance and with what (a tape measure)? Freeze everyone while the authorized measurer measures.
What precisely is the fixed 8-foot point-to-point distance? The videographer’s body to the nearest officer’s body? From lens to body? From lens to center of the activity?
Given a fixed point-to-point distance, can 7 feet 9 inches. be precisely, therefore legally, distinguished from 8 feet 3 inches?
If the activity is moving, is the required distance an average of the multiple distances during the course of the activity?
One sure measure of this law is that the collective IQs of the Republican Legislature and governor is less than eight.
Sam Sherrill
SaddleBrooke
Winning votes
Re: the July 12 letter “Democrats and socialism.”
I think the writer suggesting the Democrats change of ideals is the way to win an election needs to reflect on more current ways to win an election:
Lie, ignoring fact
Call fraud even before the election if polls are against you
Definitely call fraud if you lose the election
Demand recounts
Change voting rules that have worked for decades
Challenge loss in court
Definitely do not concede
Isn’t this more believable?
Duane Harpet
Northwest side
What have you done lately?
In the depths of the Great Depression, a reporter asked John Maynard Keynes, the British economist advising President Franklin D. Roosevelt on his New Deal plans, if there was anything in history as terrible as what America (and the world) was experiencing. Keynes said yes. It was called the Dark Ages and it lasted 500 years.
And I think that’s what President Joe Biden saved us from when he ushered through Congress in record time the nearly $2 trillion American Rescue Plan to help an economy in total disarray and a population in panic recover from the COVID-19 pandemic.
Ann Shoben
Northeast side
