Letters to the Editor for Feb. 2, 2019

Columnist’s armchair critique of Women’s March outdated

In response to Guy Farmer’s Jan. 27 column, Farmer would have understood the Women’s March if he had actually attended it. Instead, Farmer uses his platform as an Appeal columnist to focus on negative press received by the national chapter of the Women’s March (unaffiliated with the Reno Women’s March) and to criticize the national debate challenging traditional definitions of masculinity. He further attacks Assemblywoman Peters and his fellow columnist for discussing the issue of toxic masculinity, responding defensively as if each woman had called him out personally (they had not). Farmer’s defense to an imagined attack evokes Shakespeare’s iconic line from Hamlet: “The lady doth protest too much, methinks.” Women’s subjugation is well-known and spans a broad spectrum. In the 1970s, women could not apply for a credit card. Farmer’s armchair critique comes from a cocoon, somewhere far away from any personal experience with the subjects he writes about. It’s an exemplar of why women are speaking out. Had he attended, he would have experienced the march’s positivity and been able to speak with people about why they march. If trying to understand the march, attend it and talk with people.

Farmer ends his column with fear-mongering and xenophobia. To suggest that these heinous murders suffered by our sister communities, and specifically the families personally affected by the murders, would not have happened if we had a “wall” is presumptuous at best. Illegal immigration is a longterm issue that our country faces and will continue to face for the rest of our history. However, as President Reagan said, “We must reject the idea that every time a law’s broken, society is guilty rather than the lawbreaker. It is time to restore the American precept that each individual is accountable for his actions.” Murderers come from all countries, economic backgrounds, cultures, religions and families. We cannot equate illegal immigration with murderous evil. These are not American values. To understand our world, we must live in and interact with it.

Angela Bullentini Wolf

Carson City

President’s tweets show ignorance of global ‘waming’

The recent “Arctic freeze” over the Midwest proves that global warming is “fake,” right?

Wrong!

The warming Pacific Ocean has resulted in the jet stream looping high to the north over the West Coast, bringing our springlike temperatures in January. (Our annual spring invasion of those “hordes” of immigrant robins from the south arrived Jan. 30!).

Warming and loss of ice in the Arctic decreased pressure gradients in the “polar vortex” allowing the meandering jet stream to loop far to the south over the Midwest, bringing those current recordbreaking lows.

Average temperatures over all the northern latitudes continue to rise.

Unfortunately, the tweets of our president continue to demonstrate his willful ignorance of climate facts.

For more detail on this current extreme weather impact of global warming, see https://earthsky.org/earth/how-polar-vortex-connected-to-global-warming.

Jon Nowlin

Carson City

Carson City has great fire department

Just want to express that we are blessed to have a great fire department here in Carson City. Tonight my wife and I went out to a casino buffet for dinner and upon returning home I found my carbon monoxide alarm sounding off in the master bedroom. I changed batteries and the alarm was still sounding. I called the gas company to see if they could check my furnace out but it was after hours and impossible to get to a live person. Their voice message said if your having a problem to call 911 which I did. The fire department was dispatched and they checked both the house and furnace in garage room area. Both areas were cleared OK. They asked if I changed batteries and I replied yes just before I called you. The date on the Kidd combo alarm was dated 2011 and was told the alarm is most likely spent its time of use and needs replacing. For the night they left a new in package Kidd smoke detector to use in bedroom until I can replace my combo alarm. I was told to just keep it. It’s not only the big things they do for our city but also the little things like this that makes our community a good place to live in.

Ronald Feldstein

Carson City