Letters to the Editor
Women should consider vote carefully
Editor: To Democratic women: Rabidly pro-life, opponent of sex education in the schools, stem cell research, equal rights for gays and environmental protection. Killer of animals with high-powered rifles from planes.
Hillary? No. Barack, with whom Hillary agreed on most substantive national issues? No.
Why then would growing numbers of Democratic women (per the media) defect to an ultra-right-wing vice-presidential candidate who espouses everything Hillary is against, and vice-versa? Is it a foot-stomping snit, girls? Hold your breath instead, and consider the damage this Limbaugh clone in lipstick would gleefully wreak upon you, your family, the country and the future of us all, smiling all the while.
Also keep in mind that McCain has at least one foot on a banana peel, having had major health problems. Sarah is pretty and has an inordinate share of testosterone (thus “gutsy”). But she, having been governor of a state with the population of San Francisco for two years, is sorely ill-equipped to lead the greatest country in the world.
Please, women, think very carefully about your choice. Although we’ve lost a great deal in the last eight years, we would lose a great deal more with the sweetheart of the evangelicals in the White House. The five children of the perky “hockey mom” would also lose, if anyone cares.
Sharon Hines
Sonoma
Supports Measure P
Editor: I am actively supporting Measure P because we need fast, short ambulance trips to the emergency room and enough ambulance service on call and quickly available to us. Our family has benefited from the emergency room for both a life and death situation and a life and limb situation. We all know the importance of the emergency room, but its loss also impacts the service levels of the transport.
In a critical case, we have had the experience of a long wait for an ambulance to make a transfer from SVH to a tertiary care hospital because one of the two ambulances on duty was already out of the Valley. The other ambulance had to remain in the Valley for coverage.
Without our local emergency room, which, by law, must be part of a hospital, not only will access to the emergency room be slowed, but ambulance services will have to be significantly augmented. Long delays will affect patient outcomes.
Jim Halow
Sonoma
Missing the music
Editor: It was disappointing that there was no high school marching band in the Vintage Festival parade. This is the effect of “No Child Left Behind” (NCLB) policies on our schools. There are fewer students taking instrumental music in elementary and middle schools because NCLB requires all students with lower test scores to take extra remedial math and reading classes instead of elective classes such as music. Without students learning to play instruments in the elementary and middle school music program, there are many fewer students with the skills needed for marching band. The high school band this year is much smaller and there are no drummers. Without drums they cannot perform as a marching band.
As a long time parent volunteer, I have seen how NCLB requirements have reduced the middle and high school music programs. It has resulted in squandering the talents of our excellent middle school and high school band teachers, both of whom were recent recipients of the “Teacher of the Year” award. They now spend some instructional periods teaching music appreciation and elementary school music, while band rooms, instruments, and programs, that they have spent years building, go unused. In addition to requiring improved test scores, federal and state educational requirements need to provide more support for the music and arts programs that keep local culture alive!
Matt Metzler
Sonoma
