Issue link: https://www.epageflip.net/i/585228
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 To paraphrase former Speaker Sam Ray- burn, Republicans have proven they can knock down a barn. In the aftermath of John Boehner's resignation and Kevin McCarthy's withdrawal, now they have to find among their number a carpenter who can rebuild the House. Until then, our Congress is being held hostage by Banana Republicans with a bad case of electoral dysfunction. The theater critics of Washington have long asked why Barack Obama won't lead our government, ignor- ing that the GOP's raison d'etre has become obstruc- tion, if not outright decon- struction. As Mike Huckabee recently put it, "The race for speaker of the House is not about Kevin McCarthy, it's about burning the corrupt Washington political ma- chine to the ground." Expecting Obama to quiet this unruly minivan is a silly notion. Right now Republi- cans are not capable of lead- ing this country. The ques- tion isn't whether Obama can lead them but whether they're capable even of gov- erning themselves. After McCarthy quit the scene, the House descended into "total confusion," ac- cording to New York Re- publican Peter King, who reported that some con- gressmen wept inside the cloakroom. "We have to end this. We look absolutely crazy," he said. Former George W. Bush speechwriter Matt Latimer agreed the congressional Re- publicans looked bad, writ- ing, "Are they moonlight- ing as Justin Bieber's chap- erones? Did they all serve on the OJ Simpson jury?" How bad? The Globe and Mail, a Toronto newspaper, editorialized that Canada might need to take drastic measures to keep out Amer- ican political refugees: "It's time to build a wall — the higher the better." The Tea Party members of Congress are demanding that their next leader fol- low their lead. Says Louisi- ana Republican John Flem- ing, the Tea Party wing wants a speaker who isn't "dictating the agenda" and who gives "power to the in- dividual members." In other words, they want a speaker who only speaks when spo- ken to. They might as well de- mand no bedtimes and all the candy they want. Califor- nia Democrat Mark Takano got it right when he posted a fake Craigslist job posting for a new speaker: "Babysit- ting experience strongly pre- ferred." Top all this off with Don- ald Trump leading the pri- mary field, and this is ex- actly how the Republi- cans did not want to head into the 2016 elections. Their post-Romney autopsy warned about alienating Hispanics and women and otherwise appearing like a ship of fools that couldn't steer away from the rocks. That autopsy, once a hopeful document, now looks like an actual autopsy. When Republicans took over the Senate, Boehner thought he had his chance to show Americans that Repub- licans could handle at least one branch of the govern- ment responsibly. "Just be- cause we might not be able to get everything we want doesn't mean we shouldn't try to get what we can," he said. He tried, and for his attempt to govern a legis- lative body over which he nominally presided he was branded a traitor by Tea Party activists. The problems for the GOP won't end when the Free- dom Caucus says grace over a speaker because the Tea Party's idea of running the House is more similar to lu- natics taking over the asy- lum than to any conven- tional notion of governing. Shutting down the govern- ment? Yep. Endless parliamen- tary maneuvers to stop reg- ular business? Uh huh. Stomping their feet and holding their breath till they get their way? Can't wait. We're already seeing a lit- tle of what's in store once they figure out who is third in line to the presidency. Utah Republican Jason Chaf- fetz finished up his inves- tigation into Planned Par- enthood's funding, saying, "Was there any wrongdo- ing? I didn't find any." So the House voted to create a special committee to investi- gate, you guessed it, Planned Parenthood. That's right, birth control is the new Benghazi. Pap smears are on a permanent war foot- ing now. Of course, Republicans could also work with Dem- ocrats to find a consensus Speaker and find compro- mises to govern responsibly. Congressional Republicans could even choose to govern, but this year the Cubs have a better chance at winning the World Series than Congress has of acting like grownups. Remember, this is Washing- ton where hope springs in- fernal. Jason Stanford is a regular contributor to the Austin American-Statesman, a Democratic consultant and a Truman National Security Project partner. You can email him at stanford@ oppresearch.com and follow him on Twitter @ JasStanford. Jason Stanford Banana Republicans take charge Cartoonist's take It's been 10 days since the massacre of students and a teacher in Roseburg, Oregon, by a deranged, hater-of-Chris- tians, whose im- mediate family (father included) should have been paying attention to his accumula- tion of guns. It's a pattern we've seen since the Columbine atroc- ity—parents apparently clueless to offspring that have dimin- ished/demented capacity who should have been turned in to authorities. Still, we've no co- herent, practical, constitutional plans from Emperor Obama, Democrats in Congress or left- ist pundits, columnists and car- toonists. Some examples: Last Friday's "Opinion" page featured a Salt Lake Tribune cartoon with car- icatures of the progressives' bo- geymen—angry white men la- beled Guns Inc, GOP, NRA, a flannel-shirt-and-confeder- ate-flag adorned southern sim- pleton and an "assault-gun" bearing, bearded hunter/sur- vivalist. The cartoonist's ver- sion of Republican candidate Ben Carson's advice to "rush the shooter" was twisted into a mob-inciting call for the bo- geymen to attack, of course, a woman holding a "Common sense gun laws" placard. The opposite is the actual case, with the usual gun-hating left, in- cluding Obama and all of news media, ginning up a nearly hys- terical level of vituperation and guilt directed towards gun owners. On the same page were a piece by Michael Reagan titled, "Time for sensible background checks," as well as a column by Robert Minch, "Mass shootings accentuate the violence of the gun." Reagan's reasoning seems to avoid or ignore the discon- nect between existing laws— prohibiting criminals and in- sane people from buying guns and killing people—and the fu- tility of expanding such laws to private sales. Criminals already know they can't legally buy or even possess guns and so they use "straw buyers" to acquire them. Requiring mental health professionals and family mem- bers to inform authorities of a dangerous person would help. Minch, for his part, lobbed more of his characteristic cheap shots my way. I'll not respond in kind with denigration for his apparent anti-gun and anti- God musings. However, I think it is a disingenuous mischarac- terization to call me a "gun lob- byist" employing "unfounded nonsense" in saying that "law- abiding citizens might be de- nied their 'God given right' to self defense in any public space" through gun control measures. Well, Mr. Minch's sentiments are simpatico with our Gov- ernor Brown and Sacramento Democrats, who just passed and signed into law SB707, which "will prohibit people with con- cealed weapons permits from carrying firearms on school and college campuses."Perhaps he could explain to readers how that law will impact anyone who is deranged, unstable and hate-filled—but not already a felon or formerly institutional- ized; they could still legally pur- chase guns. Perhaps he can ex- plain how guns kill without criminals' hands holding them. Will such a person, deluded as the Roseburg killer was, still believe in a mission to kill peo- ple—on a campus where guns aren't allowed and the guard is unarmed? Will they stop at a sign saying "Gun free zone" and remind themselves that it's against the law to kill people? By what interpretation of our Founders "Declaration of Inde- pendence"—that people are "en- dowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life…"— by what reading of those words can those "Rights" not include the God-given right to self de- fense? You can reject God with no denigration from this writer. But don't reject the right to self- defense. Could you, Mr. Minch, sim- ply state how you have come to believe in your right of self- defense? Does it extend be- yond the confines of your home and property? The courts have deemed our 2nd Amendment "right to bear arms" to be a per- sonal, private right. Shall we agree that it is unalienable? Do you, therefore, support or op- pose SB707, support or oppose anyone's right to obtain a con- cealed-carry permit, and sup- port or oppose a law-abiding citizen's right to be secure from assault and attack wherever they should travel? Just ques- tions, not attacks, Mr. Minch. "The NY Times Discovers Self-Defense," by John Hinder- aker, points out that "The New York Times has editorialized hysterically in favor of more gun control measures for years. Operating in an antiseptically- sealed liberal milieu, the Times editorialists seem not to under- stand why their position keeps losing at the polls." Some of their reporters might have been trying to clue them in with "Common Response After Kill- ings in Oregon: 'I Want to Have a Gun'" I'm not bothered in the least that gun purchases "shoot up" (pun intended) with each "ac- tive shooter" incident. Con- cealed carry permits have like- wise risen exponentially as courts and local authorities ac- knowledge the obvious: legal gun-carrying citizens propor- tionally commit a tiny fraction of crime, and "shall issue" poli- cies merely reflect that. Here are some facts that bear on the issue: Those scary, eeee- vil, assault weapons were ef- fectively unavailable for pur- chase for 10 years. "Between 1994 and 2004, Americans were flatly bared from purchasing or transferring 660 arbitrarily selected semi-automatic fire- arms and from obtaining any magazine that could hold more than ten rounds. This prohibi- tion had no discernible impact whatsoever. "In fact, rifles are the least popular killing tools in the United States. Per the FBI, this is how Americans killed each other in 2014" (in summary): Handguns and Unknown fire- arms=64 percent; Shotguns and Rifles=4 percent; Knives and Cutting Instruments, Hands, feet, fists, pushing, and Other weapons=32 percent (Charles C.W. Cooke, quoting the Na- tional Institute of Justice). Less than 1 in 20 deaths from long guns; almost 1 out of 3 deaths involve no guns at all. Don Polson has called Red Bluff home since 1988. He can be reached by e-mail at donplsn@ yahoo.com. The way I see it Are rights, facts relevant? Says Louisiana Republican John Fleming, the Tea Party wing wants a speaker who isn't "dictating the agenda" and who gives "power to the individual members." In other words, they want a speaker who only speaks when spoken to. Don Polson StateandNational Assemblyman James Galla- gher, 2060 Talbert Drive, Ste. 110, Chico 95928, 530 895-4217, http://ad03.asmrc.org/ Senator Jim Nielsen, 2634 For- est 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 Feinstein, One Post St., Ste. 2450, San Fran- cisco 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 Red Bluff City Manager, Rich- ard Crabtree, 527-2605, Ext. 3061 Corning City Manager, John Brewer, 824-7033 YOUR OFFICIALS OPINION » redbluffdailynews.com Tuesday, October 13, 2015 » MORE AT FACEBOOK.COM/RBDAILYNEWS AND TWITTER.COM/REDBLUFFNEWS A6