Issue link: https://www.epageflip.net/i/490267
GregStevens,Publisher Chip Thompson, Editor EDITORIALBOARD How to have your say: Letters must be signed and provide the writer's home street address and home phone number. Anonymous letters, open letters to others, pen names and petition-style letters will not be allowed. Letters should be typed and no more than two double-spaced pages or 500words. When several letters address the same issue, a cross section will be published. Email: editor@ redbluffdailynews.com Fax: 530-527-9251 Mail to: P.O. Box 220, 545 Diamond Ave., Red Bluff, CA 96080 Facebook: Leave comments at FACEBOOK.COM/ RBDAILYNEWS Twitter: Follow and send tweets to @REDBLUFFNEWS MarchMadnesshitIndianahardthisweek. It had nothing to do with the NCAA's Final Four Championship, which is coming to Indianapolis on Saturday. And despite what you think, it wasn't about gay rights, either. It was really all about was 2016 presidential politics. Thefirestormofmediaat- tention and orchestrated lib- eral outrage started last week after Indiana Gov. Mike Pence signed his state's version of the Religious Freedom Restora- tion Act. The act was broadly writ- ten to protect all citizens of all faiths from being forced by government to do things that violated their religious prin- ciples. It was not written to per- mit Christians or any other religious group to discrimi- nate against gay people or any other minority. And it had nothing to do with the civil rights of gay people. What Gov. Pence signed into law was hardly different from the federal law that Bill Clinton signed in 1993 and the laws that at least 19 other states already have put on their books. That didn't matter to the national media. Neither did the fact that Democrats never made a peep about the Religious Freedom Restoration Act for 20-plus years — and never saw the need to fix the law until Re- publicans got in power. None of the fine print or le- gal nitpicking pertaining to religious freedom versus mi- nority rights matters to the public now. The media war of words is over. As usual, Republicans, Pence and conservatives lost. They were whipped in the pub- lic relations battle and the po- litical battle, just as liberals hoped. Pence caved. After the NCAA, the tourist bureau, An- gie's List, half the major corpo- rations based in Indiana and everyone else who buys or sells something in Indiana begged him to surrender, he did. That tough stand he took in defense of Indiana's law with George Stephanopoulos last Sunday on ABC? History. Pence now says he "mishan- dled" the interview and says the state law needs to be clari- fied or fixed. Until the culture war caught Pence and his state legislature off guard and transformed him overnight into the mean- est Republican in America, he was seen as a possible dark horse candidate for the GOP in 2016. The former Congressman had balanced his first two state budgets, cut unemploy- ment rates and was pals with big moneymen like the Kochs. Some thought the governor could be a worthy compromise for the Republican presiden- tial nomination — or at least a solid VP choice. Not now. He's probably burnt toast. It's the usual story. Repub- licans were again discredited, put on the defensive and em- barrassed by the Democrats and their attack dogs in the national media. Pence, the GOP and conser- vatives were made to look like they don't believe in freedom of choice or tolerance when it's actually the liberals, the gay lobby and the Democrats who don't believe in either. The madness in Indiana looked to the public like a bat- tle over the rights of Chris- tians and gay people, but it was really the political version of one of David Copperfield's slight-of-hand magic tricks. Gay rights was the liberals' distraction for the audience. Their real trick — their larger long-term trick — was inciting their ground troops and cre- ating a polarizing issue that could help Democrats hold onto the White House in 2016. The other day Rush Lim- baugh had a good idea. He said that if he were Gov. Pence, he'd turn the tables on the Democrats. Rush said Pence should pull his state's version of the Reli- gious Freedom Restoration Act and rewrite it word-for word, period-for period, the way Clinton and then-Congress- man Chuck Schumer penned it in 1993. What would the fair and balanced national media then? MichaelReaganisthesonof President Ronald Reagan, a political consultant, and the author of "The New Reagan Revolution" (St. Martin's Press). He is the founder of the email service reagan.com and president of The Reagan Legacy Foundation. Visit his websites at www.reagan.com and www.michaelereagan. com. Send comments to Reagan@caglecartoons.com. Follow @reaganworld on Twitter. Michael Reagan The Democrats win in Indiana Cartoonist's take Born this date in history was Helmut Kohl, Washington Ir- ving, Marlon Brando, Herb Caen, Saralu Gonsalves and yours truly. All, of course, deserving of ac- colade, but only a few left standing to receive it this year. No photos or flowers, please. Just pat your dog in our be- half. If you have no bow wow then more's the pity. ••• Speaking of dogs, William and Uno stopped by to chat. Uno is a rescue dog, you know. A real rescue dog. William noted that his dead mother had just given him birth. He was so young he was hairless. Wil- liam fed him milk with an eye dropper and today Uno is five and William in his late 80s. Both appear healthy and if not wealthy, then certainly wise. This is a success story, the equal of which is unlikely you will read elsewhere. ••• James Wilson, with a by- line of "God Talk," is appar- ently considered by the edito- rial staff to be worthy of inclu- sion in this newspaper. Such a waste of trees. He reports with vigor that he, and other men of the cloth, are a part of "The Califor- nia Governor's Prayer Team," which "deploys teams for reg- ular prayer in 32 of Califor- nia's 58 counties." Rev. Wilson does not indicate which coun- ties are currently suffering without his concentrated bless- ings, and that is good because they would be "sore afraid" to quote scripture, which I am admittedly ill equipped to do. Anyhow, Rev. Wilson avows that, through the efforts of his prayer teams, the Califor- nia drought has been corrected and in the past two months, rain and snow has averaged 150% of normal. He states, with undoubtedly a hallelujah or two, that "dry streams and riv- ers are flowing with water bub- bling from the ground in three counties following an earth- quake" and while the drought is far from over, this is a clear case of God's mercy in response to heartfelt prayer from a crit- ical mass." Not leaving well enough alone, he concludes that "Concentrated prayer must be sustained for lasting impact to occur" that "targeted prayer has accounted for large drops in crime rates, hospital cancer admissions, and plummeting rates of sui- cide and youth deaths." That said, such claptrap should be restricted to card table distribution on the side of the Post Office where it will not sully the minds of the thinking public. Tsk, tsk. ••• Just discovered 4 bricks from the original Cone & Kim- ball building recovered from the disastrous fire of 1984. If there are readers old enough to remember the grand old dame, and would like to have one, they are available at our 760 Main office. You may have a brick at no charge but call ahead to 527-5514 to reserve one. ••• The February 2 issue of The New Yorker contains an article by Adam Gopnik regarding his learning to drive and getting his license at the advanced age of 50. He did not specify his age at the time of his ordeal, but as he began writing for the magazine in 1986, one can do the math. This excellent writer concludes with the stinging ob- servation: "Social life involves being sorted out by a few oth- ers who have, by the rest of us, been given the power to sort. Our illusion is that it ends on graduation, from one school or another, when one teacher passes us, and then passes us on. But it never really does. We go on being driven and sorted, until at last we're sorted out, and driven home." ••• Speaking of driving licenses, I got mine at age 14. You see, this was during the early years of WW II, men were off to war and father desperately needed drivers at the meat plant. I re- member little of the licens- ing but I assume strings were pulled and I was restricted to only driving company pickups. This I did, and considered my- self hot stuff. I made meat deliveries about town and picked up small live- stock from mom and pop ranchers about the county. The bed of the pickup was sur- rounded by high green wooden panels and had a swinging tail gate of the same height. It was safe enough for hauling the animals, but I almost be- came a cropper early on when I was crossing the railroad tracks near the feed mill on Madison and failed to notice a freight train bearing down rap- idly from the south. I gunned the engine and had almost cleared the track when the "cow catcher" on the front of the engine hit my swinging tail gate…and the crashing noise served as a wakeup call for my subsequent driving. ••• If all goes well, the editor may elect in the near future to publish an excerpt from my 2011 book "The Knocking Pen." This is, as usual, for such filler, published at his discretion. If it comes to fruition, it may serve for newcomers the dual role of explaining what went on at that dilapidated 40,000-square- foot structure sitting forlornly at the convergence of Fort- ier and Minch Road, and that success and prosperity can be fleeting. ••• "Never go to a doctor whose office plants have died." Erma Bombeck ••• Holy Moly! The cost of the S.F. Chronicle has risen to $1.50 per issue. I've been read- ing this rag at noon since Hec- tor was a pup. What's to be done? Maybe get it online? It might be cheaper. Is the DN next to rise up price wise? Only the shadow knows. ••• Two friends, Bill and Ray, who had not seen each other in many years met for a drink. In the interim Ray had under- gone a sex change operation and was filing in Bill in on the details. "Is there anything you miss now that you're a woman," asked Bill. "I just wish," replied Ray, "that I could remember how to parallel park." Robert Minch is a lifelong resident of Red Bluff, former columnist for the Corning Daily Observer and Meat Industry magazine and author of the "The Knocking Pen." He can be reached at rminchandmurray@hotmail. com. I say In good company on my birthday Until the culture war caught Pence and his state legislature off guard and transformed him overnight into the meanest Republican in America, he was seen as a possible dark horse candidate for the GOP in 2016. Sounding off A look at what readers are saying in comments on our website and on social media. Brilliant! So the "shop local" mantra is all lip service. I'll be shopping online. Ann Taylor-Minch: On a voter-approved quarter cent sales tax increase in Red Bluff. So could we just buy individual items. I'll go to Food Maxx and buy 100items and have 100different transactions, as long as it's under four dollars you don't have to pay that tax. Todd Pitner: On a voter-approved quarter cent sales tax increase taking effect in Red Bluff. Robert Minch StateandNational Assemblyman James Galla- gher, 150 Amber Grove Drive, Ste. 154, Chico 95973, 530 895- 4217, http://ad03.asmrc.org/ Senator Jim Nielsen, 2634 Forest Ave., Ste. 110, Chico 95928, 530 879-7424, senator. nielsen@senate.ca.gov Governor Jerry Brown, State Capital Building, Sacramento 95814, 916 445-2841, fax 916 558- 3160, governor@governor.ca.gov U.S. Representative Doug La- Malfa, 507 Cannon House Of- fice Building, Washington D.C. 20515, 202 225-3076 U.S. Senator Dianne Fein- stein, One Post St., Ste. 2450, San Francisco 94104, 415 393- 0707, fax 415 393-0710 U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer, 1700 Montgomery St., San Fran- cisco 94111, 510 286-8537, fax 202 224-0454 Local Tehama County Supervisors, 527-4655 District 1, Steve Chamblin, Ext. 3015 District 2, Candy Carlson, Ext. 3014 District 3, Dennis Garton, Ext. 3017 District 4, Bob Williams, Ext. 3018 District 5, Burt Bundy, Ext. 3016 YOUR OFFICIALS OPINION » redbluffdailynews.com Friday, April 3, 2015 » MORE AT FACEBOOK.COM/RBDAILYNEWS AND TWITTER.COM/REDBLUFFNEWS A6