Guns and safety
If state Sen. Wendy Rogers (R-Flagstaff) believes concealed weapons are a good way to keep college students safer, why doesn’t the senator propose a bill allowing guns in the Senate chambers?
Leslie Kanberg
Downtown
U.S. Senate filibuster
Because Sen. Kyrsten Sinema did not support blowing up the Senate filibuster to pass legislation federalizing U.S. election management, she received harsh, and even threatening, criticism from members of her own (Democrat) party.
Since those who predict political future now suggest the Democratic Party is in serious danger of losing the Senate and the House in the 2022 midterm elections, Sinema’s decision demonstrates admirable wisdom. Destroying the Senate filibuster now (2022) would surely boomerang against her party when Congress reconvenes in January 2023, following the midterm elections, if, as forecast, the Democrat Party loses the Senate.
P.S. I am a registered independent.
Alan Kohl Northwest side
Place blame where it belongs
There’s been a plethora of articles and letters blaming Biden for the troubling state of COVID in America. Really? Biden has, from Day 1, begged Americans to get vaccinated — the key to ending this miserable pandemic. Most of the blame belongs on those who refuse vaccination and won’t follow experts’ recommendations for masking and social distancing. They are the ones spreading the mutating virus and creating a huge strain on our hospitals and medical staff.
Also deserving blame are spreaders of misinformation, lies and false theories about the virus, suggesting quack “cures” or unproven alternative remedies. This includes the former president and some of his supporters in Washington. These same people discredit and denigrate medical experts, further fueling vaccine hesitancy. Some letters ignorantly spout the fact of more COVID deaths under Biden than under Trump, as if that somehow proves Biden is responsible. I believe more deaths are the result of obstinate refusal of some to consider the public good, with no concern about spreading a deadly virus. Who really is to blame?
Deb Klumpp Oro Valley
Sinema is no McCain
I was pleased to read of the Arizona Democratic Party’s censure of Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, her loss of Emily’s List endorsement, and the momentum of the Primary Sinema Project (to which I donated). Gov. Doug Ducey and GOP pundits may approve of her self-proclaimed independent stance. But let’s be clear, the senator is not a maverick; she’s self-absorbed. And she is no John McCain.
Sheldon Clark Vail
Transgender athletes
If there is a legitimate reason to separate many sports into men’s events and women’s events, then that reason clearly extends to prohibiting biological males from participating in women’s events, however they may conceive of themselves with respect to gender.
A biological male who participates in women’s sporting events is transparently seeking an unfair advantage and I believe deserves the scorn of all who value real sports achievement. I will never accept as valid any result of a competition in which one or more males compete as women.
And I urge all female athletes, whom I honor and revere, to boycott any event accepting biological males into a women’s event.
Wes Jernigan, cultural anthropologist
Midtown
She do
esn’t care
I am tired with all the letters and columns complaining about our faux Democratic Sen. Kyrsten Sinema.
She doesn’t care that she is censured or that her constituents don’t support her. She is also not afraid of not being re-elected. She knows that the Arizona Republicans will continue their headlong rush to the far right and will nominate someone so distasteful to Dems and independents that she will look like, and be, the best choice.
She may not act the way we want, but she beats the alternative.
Mimi Pollow
East side
We can cut
education funds
Everyone in Arizona — parents, teachers, children, grandparents — knows our schools are woefully underfunded. We already have nearly the lowest per-pupil funding in the United States. But it’s going to get much worse if the Arizona state Legislature doesn’t act now to pass an exemption to the 1980 spending limit.
That’s right, a 40-year-old limit will force schools statewide to cut spending by $1.2 billion. As if COVID hasn’t harmed our children’s educations enough, without this legislative action, teachers will be laid off, programs will be cut, and some schools may even have to close.
The spending limit does not reduce our taxes. It just means the money collected can’t be used by the schools. Ridiculous? Contact your state representatives to: 1. Approve a one-time exemption before March 1, 2022, and 2. Adopt a ballot measure so we the voters can repeal this limit. Find your representative on azleg.gov.
Eloise Gore
Foothills
