Letters to the editor for Sunday, May 6, 2018

Trust in public safety officials is paramount

In light of the recent arrest of the Golden State Killer, Joseph DeAngelo, a former law enforcement officer, public safety agencies need to submit DNA samples of new hires and current employees to the national data base.

This, along with the standard background investigations, is necessary to ensure the people who serve the public can be trusted.

Employees who refuse to submit a sample should be let go. (Why would any public service employee refuse to submit a sample, unless they were hiding something)?

Trust in our police and firefighters is of the utmost importance.

Paul Kvam

Virginia City

Mexicans are contributing members of society

In response to “Reconquista of Mexifornia” published on April 29, your article is offensive and misleading. I was born in Santa Clara, Calif., and moved to Fresno with my husband to raise our two children. We owned a home in Fresno, we voted, we speak English, we are educated, and we pay taxes. We are Americans, born in California, and we were educated in the public schools in California.

Our son has been serving in the Navy for the past 13 years. He enlisted during the war and did three tours in Afghanistan. Our daughter graduated with a bachelor’s and is working full-time in Carson.

I attained a bachelor’s and a master’s and work full-time in Carson. My husband also attended college in Fresno and works full-time in Carson. Is my family not American? Should Nevada residents be scared of my family?

My hope is that people who read my response to your article will stop and think. You can choose to be scared, or you can choose to understand diversity. Do not look at my family’s skin color and instantly decide we are gangbangers, uneducated, know nothing of politics, and do not understand English. We may look different, but our hearts and loyalty to our family, God, and country (USA) are true.

May God open your eyes, Mr. Farmer, open your heart and help you write words of understanding, hope, and respect for all citizens. You may be married to a woman who happens to be Mexican and you may have children who are part Mexican, however, that does not excuse your rhetoric or make you an expert on why Mexicans are moving to Nevada. My family moved to Nevada because we wanted to be reunited with our family. There is nothing to fear.

May God bless the United States of America.

Max Cortes

Carson City

Hillary Clinton would have been a deceitful president

Hillary Diane Rodham worked on the House Judiciary Committee at the time of Watergate. Her actions were questionable.

In an interview, Jerry Zeifman, a Democrat and chief counsel of the committee, stated, “(Hillary) was a liar. She was an unethical, dishonest lawyer. She conspired to violate the Constitution, the rules of the House, the rules of the committee and the rules of confidentiality.” Hardly a good endorsement for someone seeking employment in Washington, D.C.

In her recent defense of her email and server incident, she made a number of statements which former FBI Director Comey said were not true.

Comey also stated, “They were extremely careless in their handling of very sensitive, highly classified information.”

Regarding lying, she has stated, “I don’t believe I ever have. I don’t believe I ever will. I’m gonna do the best I can to level with the American people.” Apparently she shares George Constanza of Seinfeld fame belief that “it is not a lie if you believe it.”

The careless handling of classified information and lying but not recognizing it are hardly good qualifications for a person seeking the presidency of the United States of America.

I feel she lost in her attempt to be president as most voters still feel honesty is the best policy.

Why have so many in the media, entertainment, the DNC leadership, the upper levels of the FBI and DOJ worked so hard to put a liar in the White House?

Sanford E. Deyo

Minden

Beauty of Northern Nevada needs protection

As John C. Van Dyke pointed out in his essay, The Desert at Art: “In sublimity — what land can equal the desert with its wide plains, its grim mountains, and its expanding canopy of sky? You shall never see elsewhere as here the dome, the pinnacle, the minaret fretted with golden fire at sunrise and sunsets; you shall never see elsewhere as here the sunset valleys swimming in pink and lilac haze, the great mesas and plateaus fading into blue distance, the gorges, and canyons banked full of purple shadow. Never again shall you see such light and air and color, never such opaline mirage, such rosy dawn, such fiery twilight. And wherever you go, by land or sea, you shall not forget that which you saw not but rather felt — the desolation and the silence of the desert.”

As a lover of the land in its natural, untouched state, I fear for our high desert in rural Northern Nevada. Real Nevada is rural Nevada, a gift from above, one to be cherished and respected.

But now the gate has been opened, the dragon has been set loose and big business has been set free to strip our piece of peace in the world through urban sprawl, scatterization, unending development and all the problems it brings forth by decaying more precious desert lands all in the name of big money.

Once we restructure and build more upon the land, that’s it, there’s no turning back, the gift has been taken.

Ann Burke

Carson City