LETTERS: Now it’s time to protect Gold Butte, too
In future decades and centuries, our two recently created national monuments ’ Tule Springs Fossil Beds and Basin and Range ’ will join Red Rock Canyon, Valley of Fire and Lake Mead as cherished elements within Southern Nevada's natural landscape. Such outdoor recreation opportunities attract a growing population of visitors who shun the bright lights of Las Vegas in favor of natural features.
These folks, who often pick up their rental cars at McCarran International Airport and scurry off to the national parks of Arizona, California and Utah, are finding increasingly compelling incentives to linger for a few days in the natural wonderlands of Southern Nevada, helping to diversify our tourism base. But there is one additional natural treasure ’ Gold Butte ’ that is also deserving of high-profile protective status. Stationed between the Overton Arm of Lake Mead and the Nevada-Arizona state line, Gold Butte is a fantastic medley of jagged-ridge geology, petroglyph-panel archaeology, fossil-footprint paleontology and glorious Mojave Desert scenery.
The times are changing, and our population is expanding. Graze-your-cattle-wherever-you-like libertarianism may have worked OK in the sparsely populated 19th and early 20th centuries, but it is not a viable strategy for Southern Nevada in the 21st century. Now is the time to protect Gold Butte. It will preserve this spectacular region for the enjoyment of all of us in the near term, and for future generations in perpetuity. And it will significantly contribute to Southern Nevada's growing reputation as a mecca for outdoor recreation.
Steve Rowland
Henderson
Home invasions
I could not disagree more with Phyllis Collins' letter ("Abuse of power," July 14 Review-Journal). Ms. Collins' letter referenced an editorial ("Right to keep and bear arms," July 11 Review-Journal) that she said represented an abuse of power by the press, as it encouraged the public to get guns.
Having survived a home invasion of my own — thanks solely to the deterrent of my large handgun aimed at the four young men who entered the rear of my home while others were smashing through my front door — I learned two lessons. The first lesson was to respond to knocking, instead of ignoring it as I did on this day. The second was to be prepared, which I was. And although I can appreciate opponents of the Second Amendment, my counterpoint is, "What ya gonna do when they come for you?"
Marc Russell
Henderson
Planned Parenthood
Examples of the left's tolerance of diversity and free speech would be amusing if they weren't such a threat to our overall freedom. For example, Lori Ernsperger's letter noted that she supports "open dialogue on all issues, regardless of how difficult and divisive" (R-J errs on Malkin," July 26 Review-Journal).
But then, Ms. Ernsperger goes on to chastise the R-J for giving Michelle Malkin a platform to express her opinion, preferring censorship over "open dialogue." That appears to be the left's totalitarian position toward opinions or beliefs they disagree with — shut the opposition off by denying them the basic constitutional rights we all have under our system of governance.
We have little to fear from the Lori Ernspergers of this nation; she has no power to enforce her beliefs over us. But there are many in power in federal, state and local governments who believe as she does.
Jerry Fink
Las Vegas
Housing market myth
The editorial on the home-ownership market was about as far off as anything can be, and I can prove it ("Housing help," Aug. 12 Review-Journal). I have done the math, and there is more than enough land to achieve each person's acre, so that the market is not self-correcting — not even vaguely self-correcting.
Of course, many will say no one can force everyone to be equal, but as with so many other things, this is wrong. Equality is the superset, and outside the hyper-competitive scope of athletics, all appearances of inequality are actually various forms of pseudo-stratification.
John E.M. D'Aura
Henderson
Sports math
Is it the new math? A sign of the apocalypse? Or perhaps a subtle argument for Common Core? As a daily, cover-to-cover reader of the Review-Journal (and a Detroit Tigers fan), I am cognizant of the fact that Miguel Cabrera has led the American League in batting for the last two months — even as his batting average has fallen from .350 all the way to (in the Aug. 14 edition) .327.
But there's just one problem: Mr. Cabrera was injured and didn't have an at-bat for six weeks, until returning earlier this month, yet his average fell 23 points in that time. According to my trusty calculator (and my junior high long division) 97 hits in 277 at bats is a .350 average — whether in late June or mid-August. As Casey Stengel once said, "You could look it up."
Bob Ashman
Las Vegas
