Mythical benefits of Gold Butte designation
To the editor:
In response to the Jan. 6 letter, “Outdoor tourism”:
Designating the Gold Butte area as a wilderness area will not help Mesquite financially, nor will it attract hordes of visitors, as a small, vocal group of environmentalists claim. It would bring more restrictions and problems to the area. Due to the desert tortoise listing, driving is restricted, and should you venture onto the wrong “undesignated” trail you can be subject to fines up to $100,000. Wilderness means no roads.
Gold Butte is not a desert mecca. For someone to state the area has abundant archaeological resources, including rock art, caves, agave roasting pits and camp sites dating back at least 3,000 years is a gross exaggeration. There is very little to see at the Gold Butte town site or Whitney Pockets. No water, no trees, no shade.
There is some water at Juanita Springs (privately owned), and there are a few scattered guzzlers and water tanks maintained by the Bundy ranch. The petroglyphs near Whitney Pockets are definitely not awe-inspiring when you consider the approximately a 250-mile round trip into the Gold Butte area from Las Vegas, or the 100-mile round trip from Mesquite on roads that aren’t the best.
As for wildlife, you will see more at the bar in the CasaBlanca hotel.
In 2011, the Nevada Board of Wildlife Commissioners sent a letter to Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, requesting the Gold Butte area not be considered for any wilderness classification. A copy of the letter was went to all of the Clark County commissioners.
HAL SHRUM
LAS VEGAS
Racial labels
To the editor:
For this nation to solve its racial divide, headlines such as the one in your Jan. 21 edition, “Black icons share national stage,” should never be written. Something like “Two historic Americans share national stage” would have been better.
We have got to put a stop to all the labels on people. What if Ronald Reagan did something on Columbus Day and the headline read “White icons share national stage”? What an uproar would have been heard.
What we have here are great Americans, not African, white or whatever. We will never stop the racial divide by always pointing it out. We better wake up soon, or we’ll just be a footnote in world history before too long.
ROBERT MATUSIEWICZ
LAS VEGAS
52 percent rate hike
To the editor:
The water-use graph on this month’s water district bill is quite symmetrical, peaking in July and showing an attempt to adjust my consumption to the environmental conditions.
The gallons consumed in January 2012 and this month were virtually the same. Yet the bill for January 2012, was $43.14 and the bill for January 2013 was $65.70.
This is an increase of $22.56, or 52 percent. The increase has me really concerned, as this is the lowest-use month of the year.
What is the Nevada Public Utilities Commission position on this increase, and what should we foresee for July and August?
JOHN A. LEITCH
LAS VEGAS
Minority agenda
To the editor:
As I see it, the Democrats have lost touch with the people. Left-wing ideologues have kidnapped the party and have their own agenda, the people be damned.
They passed ObamaCare after a whole year of polls that showed more than 60 percent of the people were against it.
Now the Democrats want to abolish the debt ceiling and give President Barack Obama a blank check to spend, spend, spend – again despite polls that show the American people believe we are already spending ourselves into oblivion.
However, if they give Mr. Obama the ability to bankrupt America, they will be abandoning the people to some demagogue.
Do the Democrats really care about the people anymore?
GLEN B. DUNNING
LAS VEGAS
Taxing the poor
To the editor:
This is a letter to all the buffoons who voted President Barack Obama back into office. I pay $104 a month out of my Social Security check for Medicare. However, because of ObamaCare, next year I’ll be paying $247 a month.
So if you voted for Mr. Obama and are collecting Social Security, when you have to pay almost 2½ times what you’re paying now, who will you blame?
The buffoonery never ends.
RODNEY T. ELKINS
LAS VEGAS
Dumpster diving
To the editor:
In answer to Sarah H. Guarino’s letter of Jan. 22:
Thank the Lord you at least got a Social Security increase of $18 a month. I got an $8 increase. Maybe we can meet somewhere and go Dumpster diving together.
That is the only way I can see us senior citizens surviving.
GERRY BAXTER
HENDERSON
Bells and whistles
To the editor:
I read in the Jan. 14 Review-Journal that the city of Henderson was considering changing the emblem of the city. This would include transportation vehicles, all letterhead, etc.
Do we have the resources for something like this when the city is closing libraries and laying people off? Let’s do a reality check. Do we really need a logo change with the economy the way it is?
JIM BATES
HENDERSON
Gun control
To the editor:
Throughout all of human history, until the birth of the United States, there was never a free country. Then, because the general population of the American colonies was armed with weapons equal to those possessed by the British redcoat enforcers, a noble fight took place: the American Revolution. The first free country was born.
The British were outraged and believed their tyranny over the former colonies was anything but. Therefore, if the British had previously implemented a system of checking and stifling ownership of efficient personal weapons (guns), the American citizenry (called the militia) and the heroic father of the country, George Washington, couldn’t have succeeded in battle.
We would have no freedom today and would be humble British subjects. We wouldn’t be “the land of the free and the home of the brave.” Today and forever, we must keep and bear the most efficient personal arms.
It’s our heritage. Future tyranny is always a real possibility.
PAUL MILLER
PAHRUMP
