Letters to the editor: Rep. Simpson, Idaho legislators, metal detectors
Rep. Simpson
Congressman Simpson, the mob chanted, “Hang Mike Pence. Hang Mike Pence.” Members said they intended to assassinate Nancy Pelosi, flew the Confederate battle flag, wore “Camp Auschwitz” sweatshirts and displayed Nazi iconography. Our president, his family members and some of the most irresponsible of his enablers had incited them, whipped them into a frenzy, with easily disprovable — and disproven — charges of a stolen election and sent them to the Capitol to actually steal the election. Five people died, and American democracy was shaken to its core. And you voted against impeachment.
We suspect you know the president’s actions were impeachable and were merely toadying to Mr. Trump and the hard-right, prioritizing what you thought was good for Mike Simpson over what you knew was good for the United States of America. Your motivations and actions seem both cynical and cowardly.
Have you no spine? Have you no honor? Have you no sense of decency? You have failed your office and your country.
Todd Graeff, Boise
Crowd limits
Rep. Brent Crane, I am writing to register my protest against your efforts to roll back crowd size restrictions at the height of a pandemic that is now killing more Americans every day than the total of those killed in the 9/11 terror attacks. Some 1,500 Idahoans have lost their lives to this virus. Advocating for mass gatherings is irresponsible and callous. It demonstrates a level of depraved indifference to human life that to me seems beyond the pale. What right do you have to deliberately and recklessly endanger the health and lives of anyone?
Many thousands of your constituents commute to my my current hometown of Boise on a daily basis. I also have family and friends who live and work in Caldwell and Nampa. I have a stake in this. But quite frankly, everyone everywhere does. For no man is an island, unto himself.
Michael McAuliffe, Boise
Wear a mask, legislators
To the visiting legislators:
Ada County and Boise city have mandatory mask orders.
As lawmakers, please set an example and follow the laws. When you step out of the Statehouse, you are required to wear a mask. It is pro-business to wear a mask. Businesses cannot thrive if their employees are sick.
Mary Glen, Boise
County commissioners
Congratulations to Rod Beck and Ryan Davidson, our newest Ada County commissioners, for setting a new low in destroying public trust. As your opening salvo, and in the midst of a pandemic, you have apparently bypassed Idaho’s open meetings laws to appoint Raul Labrador to represent Ada County on the Central District Health board.
Labrador is a science-denier (masks don’t work) who lives in an alternate reality (“nobody dies because they don’t have access to health care”). As a registered nurse at one of Idaho’s largest hospitals, I am deeply offended by your politicization of CDH and shudder to think what lies ahead for the all the men, women, children, elderly, differently abled, minority and financially insecure people who count on this board to make sound decisions that uphold public health safety.
Gayle Stauffer, Boise
Metal detectors
When did Americans become so selfish and self-righteous? Even Congressman Fulcher defends his arrogance by offering that “we would not be participating with the new screening procedure until we knew House rules were followed.” Is this the behavior our leadership should be modeling, especially when it is still unclear who among them might have enabled or even supported this attack? How hard would it have been to respectfully conform and quietly clarify later? I see this attitude everywhere nowadays. “No one’s going to tell me what to do,” even for something as simple as wearing a mask or walking through a metal detector. Will this behavior become the norm at airports or stoplights? And what message is it sending our children? Will the rule of law or respect simply become who is the biggest bully or carries the biggest gun? No one is above the law, or we have no law at all. We no longer need look around the world to see where this will lead. It was on full display in our Capitol. Democracy only works when we all agree to follow the rules we impose on ourselves. This is a slippery slope, folks, and it must stop!
Tony Edmondson, Weiser