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Live and let lie: Send Onion to sanctuary

To the editor:

Regarding the Review-Journal editorial, “Put down Onion” (July 8), I’ve owned dogs my entire life, and there are three things dog owners should know, and most certainly should instruct small children about: don’t go near the animals when they are eating; don’t try to take their toys away; and perhaps most importantly, don’t ever startle a sleeping dog.

When my youngest grandson was small, I owned a female Chow Chow. She adored the boy, and I baby-sat very often. The dog followed my grandson everywhere and would sit by the playpen slowly licking his little toes. He could pull on the dog’s ears, hold on to her tail, do whatever he wanted to her; she never growled or showed a tiny bit of aggression.

One day, while I was in the kitchen and the dog was sound asleep, my grandson toddled over while my attention was diverted and grabbed the dog’s hair, suddenly waking her. She instinctively snapped and caught his cheek, thank God missing any real damage. As soon as she realized it was him, she was whining and running around as concerned as I was, as I washed his face, dried his tears and calmed the situation down. We were all very lucky no real harm was done.

In Onion’s case, it was the same issue.

The grandmother gave permission for the Lexus Project to send the dog to the sanctuary. Onion did not harm the child out of viciousness; it was a tragic accident, and he should not be killed because of it. He can live out his days away from any people except those who understand the needs and behavior of four-legged creatures.

With humans, there is manslaughter and degrees of murder. Our species doesn’t get the death penalty every time they cause someone to die. Why should this creature die, after already spending more than a year in solitary having no idea what he has done? I say, let Onion go to Colorado now.

The only thing in the editorial I agree with is that it should not have taken the Supreme Court to make this decision.

RANA GOODMAN

HENDERSON

Education assessment

To the editor:

Kudos to Brent Bandhauer for his accurate assessment of what’s wrong with education in Clark County (“Schools aren’t failing, but culture is,” Wednesday Review-Journal letters). There is nothing more money thrown at teacher contracts and infrastructure is going to do if parents aren’t part of the education process.

We own a video production company in town, and for years we’ve had trouble finding staffers who could speak and write English correctly or who didn’t have an entitlement attitude. It was only recently that we found a young man — Hispanic, by the way — who is a tremendously diligent worker and is able to communicate properly in all forms, and who has excellent computer skills and a good attitude.

He graduated from Del Sol High School, and I asked him what allowed him to develop his skills better than so many others. He told me that from a very young age, he wasn’t allowed to play until his homework was done. His relatives learned English when they came into the country, becoming citizens and assimilating into American culture. This is in contrast to parents who don’t speak English at home and never really assimilate.

This is just common sense, and all the other reforms are just ways for people to steer funds to their own special interests and ignore a problem that is hard to deal with. If we want reform, why not develop as part of the school system curriculum sessions for parents to learn how to raise their children into productive, well-educated adults? Think about it. Where does training like this exist, and isn’t it needed?

RICHARD DEPASO

LAS VEGAS

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