Notice: Undefined index: HTTP_REFERER in /home/stparch/public_html/headmid_temp_main.php on line 4394
Newspaper Archive of
Shelton Mason County Journal
Shelton, Washington
July 2, 2020     Shelton Mason County Journal
PAGE 6     (6 of 40 available)        PREVIOUS     NEXT      Jumbo Image    Save To Scrapbook    Set Notifiers    PDF    JPG
 
PAGE 6     (6 of 40 available)        PREVIOUS     NEXT      Jumbo Image    Save To Scrapbook    Set Notifiers    PDF    JPG
July 2, 2020
 
Newspaper Archive of Shelton Mason County Journal produced by SmallTownPapers, Inc.
Website © 2025. All content copyrighted. Copyright Information
Terms Of Use | Privacy Policy | Request Content Removal | About / FAQ | Get Acrobat Reader




Page A—6 Shelton-Mason County Journal Thursday, July 2, 2020 GUEST Like Poland, the United States needs change 11 July 4, 1975, America proud— 0 1y celebrated its Bicentennial as the world’s greatest nation while Poland was a suppressed Soviet satellite state. Poles had no right to free speech, were hungry and impover- ished. If you wanted a job, you played ball with Communist Party bosses. If you disagreed with their ideology, you likely were imprisoned. Poland was a rather bleak land which had not recovered from the Ger- man blitzkrieg in 1939. Meanwhile, in Washington, the Business Week program started at Central Washing- ton University as a way for high school students to experi- ence our nation’s dynamic market- based economic system. It was an idea germinated at the Association of Washington Business by Yelm grocer Hal Wolfe and Dr. Jim Brooks, CWU president. It migrated to Poland 20 years ago. When Business Week started, Lech Walesa, founder of the Solidarity Movement, was jailed by Communist Party leaders for violating the right to organize shipyard workers in Gdansk. Karol Jozef Wojtyla was archbishop of Krakow and Ronald Reagan was Cali- fornia’s governor. Walesa formed the Soviet bloc’s first independent trade union, won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1983, and served as Poland’s president from 1990—95. Walesa led peaceful protests - not riots. . By DON BRUNELL In 1978, Wojtyla was elected Pope John Paul II. In 1979, he startled the Communists by returning to his na- tive land. His 10 days in Poland drew millions peacefully. The embers of freedom lit by Walesa suddenly be- came a bonfire. Then President Ronald Reagan sealed the deal in 1987 appearing at the Brandenburg Gate divid- ing East and West Berlin and challenged Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev: “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!” Twenty-nine months later after intense East German protests, the famed gate opened and the wall started tumbling down. This July 4, we need to remember thatpeaceful protests are important to bring about change, but rioting, burning and looting are impediments to progress. People peacefully calling for reforms in policing, equality and changes to improve opportunities for everyone are needed. However, riot- ers taunting and threatening those attempting to maintain public safety, looting businesses, and ransack- ing and burning stores and offices, destroy people’s ability to carry out meaningful change. Complicating systemic changes is the COVID-l9 pandemic. It continues to hit small businesses hard, particu- larly those owned by minorities. For example, in mid-June, the Wall Street comes the employer and economic engine. As we celebrate our independence on July 4, we ought to remember that en- terprising people ul- timately create a bet— ter life for all of us. Too often, Ameri- cans forget we are fortunate to live in a governmental system which allows us to peacefully change. Occasionally, it needs a good tuning up and that time is now. It is time to build upon our strengths rather than rip America apart. We need to push our political leaders to work together now and not await the outcome of the No- vember elections. Journal reported the number of active black business own- ers fell by 41%. WSJ published data from economist Robert Fairlie, Uni- versity of California, Santa Cruz, who wrote the number of working business owners plummeted from 15 million in February to 11.7 mil- lion in April. That 3.3 million is a stunning 22% drop. Minority busi- ness owners were hit hardest. About 441,000 Black, 658,000 Latino, 1.1 million immigrant and 1.3 million women businesses disappeared. For women, one of four businesses closed. But what seems lost is the private sector, allowed to in- vent, can solve prob- lems in new ways. I Don C. Brunell is a business analyst, writer and columnist. He retired as presi- Poland experienced dent of the Associa- the iron rule of gov- tion of Washington ernment which con- Business, the state’s trolled every aspect oldest and largest business organiza- tion, and now lives in Vancouver. He can be contacted at theBrunells@msn. com. of its people’s lives. It stagnated. While America is not the Poland of 1975, it is drifting rapidly to a nation where the government be- LE'ITERS cont. from page A-5 Sheriff Salisbury on slippery slope? Editor, the Journal For the second time in re- cent years Casey Salisbury, . Mason County sheriff, is pub— licly refusing to enforce a law of the state of Washington, and instructing his subordi- nates to do the same. When I voted for Casey Salisbury, several times now, it was with the expectation that he would enforce the laws of the state and county. Instead, he has twice refused to enforce the laws of our state. The sheriff has publicly expressed his opinion in op- position to the law, and has replaced the law as it is with his judgment. This is not ac— ceptable. The sheriff, and his sub- ordinates, have made public statements to the effect that they will not enforce the new law in connection with wear- ing masks in public —- a law that is solely designed to save lives and stop the spread of COVID-19. Mason County has a sher- iff who will not enforce the law if he does not agree with it. This is not OK. This is the sheriff violating his oath of office. Sheriff Salisbury believes his opinions are more rel- evant, and more important, and carry more weight than the highest health official in the state. What do you think? Katherine Price Shelton A few thoughts on CHOP, cops Editor, the Journal Some random comments on the current mess: 1. No one responded to my question of last week, which was, do the lives of Black police officers matter? Can someone please answer this without blaming the cops? 2. Last Friday morning, a local TV news station greeted me with a live shot of 3 Se- attle CHOP member dressed in black and lying in the street. He was lying in front of a big city-owned front-end loader there to remove the CHOP barricades. The driver stood by helplessly. My solu- . tion? Empty one of the Porta- Potties there on top of the law-breaking CHOP kid. The smell would probably be the same. 3. The woefully ignorant “defund/eliminate the police” crowd now says that cities should take to task police unions, Which help retain “bad apples” on the force. I agree with this. I think the good cops would be glad to be rid of the bad ones. However, the same charge made here against police unions must also be made against teachers unions and for the same reasons. 4. What about all these young ignoramuses tearing down monuments every- where? Well, first, they don’t even know who or what the statues represent, and two, like their probable hero, for- mer President Obama, they don’t like America very much, if at all. The subject of American history has, I believe, been sliding deeper into the sewer over the last 20-plus years. Heck, only 18% of universi- ties require an American his- tory course to graduate. Now, students in grades K through 12 and especially these in the universities are being taught the “America sucks” version by teachers sympathetic to, or wholly ignorant of, social- ism. I don’t know how to fix this. Maybe police and/or the National Guard can stop the destruction we’re see- ing on TV, but in the future? Academia from local school boards to college administra- tions has neither the inter- est nor moxie to tackle the history problem, and neither parents nor concerned citi— zens have the clout. 5. I think it’s safe to say now that we have in our midst what I call the Lois Le- rner strain of the coronavirus. It targets only Republicans. According to the communica- tions branch of the Demo- cratic Party, the mainstream media, those tens of thou- sands of protesters marching arm-in-arm and cheek-to-jowl don’t need to social distance at all, but you freaky reli- gious Republicans in your cars listening to sermons in church parking lots, you’re all under arrest! Wow. A left-wing, thinking Virus. Thanks, MSM. 6. A TV pundit last week said Joe Biden reminded him for several reasons of a holo- gram. Breathless headlines today tell us that real or not, Biden leads Trump in nation— wide polls by 10-12 points. At this same time in the 2016 campaign, Hillary also led Trump by 10-12 points in na- tionwide polls. Oops, I may have said this in a previous letter, but it’s sure fun to repeat. Robert E. Graham Union Fourth of July more special for reader Editor, the Journal This Fourth of July is go- ing to be a bit of a milestone for me, since I was born in July of 1950 and will be turn- ing 70 near the end of the month. A little background: I was born and raised in Hudson County, New Jersey, just , across the Hudson River from the Big Apple. My father was a bricklayer and my mother stayed home and raised six children. We never had much mon- ey, nor our own home, or even a car. Yet in our own humble way, We seemed richer than Bill Gates is today simply by having each other. My dad always said that the world does not owe us a living. My mom. stressed that we should treat all as we’d like to be treated ourselves. Adhering to these two tenets has worked pretty well for me, and I suspect would for most folks. Every Fourth of July now, I celebrate both this good though imperfect country of ours, along with my match- ing good but imperfect family I feel so fortunate to be have born into. And for those who cannot celebrate either: I’m sincerely sorry. But I wouldn’t blame America for all your troubles. Bill Barker Shelton Whata coincidence Editor, the Journal Interesting how the “love fest” turned into a “public nuisance” once the protesters in Seattle’s CHOP learned where the mayor lived. Val Reineman Shelton