Rubio plan still amnesty for lawbreakers

No matter how he tries to frame it, it’s still amnesty. In the Jan. 27 Viewpoints section, U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., set out his plan on immigration. Except it’s not a plan on immigration. It’s really just a path to citizenship for illegals.

He says the system is broken; that we need a new legal immigration system. We have a legal immigration system. It’s not broken. It’s just not enforced.

Sen. Rubio says we need to address three areas. In the first two, he talks about better law enforcement. In the third, he addresses undocumented immigrants (illegals). So, here it comes. After all his talk about enforcing the law, then he says that illegals are here to stay with or without documents. So it’s OK for them to break the law, stay here and apply for permanent status/citizenship while they wait. Can you say “amnesty for lawbreakers”?

His proposal is not a fair process. This is a slap in the face to all those who have applied and waited legally and to all those who try to play by the rules.

Sen. Rubio is playing politics. Our country welcomes immigrants, not lawbreakers. If Sen. Rubio plans to run for national office in 2016, he won’t get my vote.

RICHARD McARTHUR

LAS VEGAS

The writer is a former Republican assemblyman in the Nevada Legislature.

Don’t harm our women

To the editor:

We have a congressman paving the way for women to perform combat duty. What? How about congressmen doing combat duty? Bet wars won’t last long then – or even start.

Women are the best half of the human race. We men fight to protect them. How many men want to see their wives, mothers, sisters, nieces, lovers and best friends go off to war? To come back limbless, blind, deaf, shell-shocked? To stand on street corners with their male combat comrades with “please help” signs? To be denied help from various veterans facilities? To sleep on the streets? To go Dumpster diving?

What does said congressman use to think with? He is set for life. Overgenerous retirement, unlimited medical benefits. Pockets and bank accounts full of campaign contributions.

You can see on a daily basis, on street corners and in the media, how returning combat veterans are treated. No jobs, no respect and sometimes no arms or legs.

Leave our women out of it.

ROY O. WILLIAMS

LAS VEGAS

Prove it

To the editor:

In his Thursday letter, Joe Schaerer claims that Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., can’t handle the truth about gun control. He compares the number of innocents slain in mass murders with the “hundreds of thousands of would-be robbers, rapists and murderers annually thwarted from harming innocents by law-abiding citizens bearing the kind of firearms and magazines the anti-gun folks want to make illegal.”

I ask Mr. Schaerer for the source of his facts. Where did he find these hundreds of thousands of cases? If he can’t cite such a source, perhaps he could at least cite a number equal to the losses suffered by the three mass murderers cited in his article?

If you can’t do at least this, Mr. Schaerer, we will have to question your ability to handle the truth.

RICHARD L. STRICKLAND

NORTH LAS VEGAS

Look it up

To the editor:

I know that many letter writers exist for no other reason than to amuse me. But in all fairness, please don’t be so ridiculously obvious in your ignorance.

Recent letters reveal that writers can’t take a breath after hearing their partisan, creatively edited sound bites before contributing to the know-nothing cacophony that passes for contemporary political discussion. Before rightists proclaim “Gotcha!” over Hillary Clinton’s exasperation in her Senate hearings, so creatively re-edited on Fox News, try watching the whole exchange.

And would my liberal friends please read a book before lecturing us on their deliberately misinformed interpretation of the Second Amendment? (One recent letter writer based his whole argument on the imaginary presence of the word “guns” in the amendment. Try again. “arms” means something much broader.) Stop rewriting history and legal interpretation merely to fit your arguments.

BILL HALDEMAN

LAS VEGAS