LETTERS: Hefty pay raise for teachers? Try a pittance

To the editor:

Your April 28 editorial, "Gov. Guinn and the teachers," includes the wording "in order to keep this apparent promise of a hefty across-the-board raise for all the state's public school teachers." Do you know something specific about a raise for teachers? Do you know what exact percentage is being offered? I am a teacher and I haven't been told that I would be even getting a raise.

Do you define "hefty" as 2 percent? A 2 percent raise for me amounts to $845.24 per year. That increase in no way keeps up with the additional amounts that I have had to pay each month. I now pay $1,590.72 more per year due to the loss of long-term disability insurance and increased health insurance premiums, things that used to be considered part of our benefit package.

Or do you define "hefty" as 4 percent? That increase would give me an additional $1,690.48 per year. That leaves me with $100 more per year when you deduct my increased premiums. That $100 equals just more than $8 a month or 1/1000th of a penny per hour that I am contracted to work. Is that "hefty"? In the seven years that I have been employed in this district, the teachers have never been given a 4 percent raise.

Again, I must ask, how do you define "hefty?" Webster's defines hefty as "heavily built or strong." I must have been absent from English the day that "hefty" was taught as being synonymous with 1/1000th of a penny. I would wager my "hefty" raise that the word "pittance" would have been more accurate.

BONNIE BAUMGRAS

LAS VEGAS

Pot use

To the editor:

I'm impressed. The Review-Journal is one of very few papers to provide coverage to the continuing case of Steve Kubby ("Pot activist held for three days in Canada," April 28 Vin Suprynowicz column) medical cannabis user from California, now living in Canada.

While continuing the policy of absolute prohibition of cannabis, the U.S. federal government ignores the accumulated evidence of science, medicine and history.

Meanwhile Steve Kubby provides living evidence of the medical efficacy of cannabis. While there is no history of fatalities from cannabis consumption, the death of best-selling author Peter McWilliams while in federal judicial custody provides stark testimony to the fatal nature of prohibition. Mr. McWilliams died because he was denied the use of cannabis.

So shabby is the play of smoke and mirrors in this fraud that we call prohibition. It is unthinkable for the United States to continue its pursuit of Mr. Kubby or any patient using cannabis, or for Canada to deny his medical claims and needs.

ALLAN ERICKSON

EUGENE, ORE.

Air traffic

To the editor:

I am steamed. The April 2 article, "Prince roils air traffic employees," not only roiled air traffic control employees, it roiled me.

So, Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Abedulah made a request that "no" woman in our air traffic control system handle his flight. The nerve of this guy. It becomes clearer and clearer why the Middle East is always in a state of turmoil. With prehistoric thinking like this, they will never emerge from the Stone Age. Is it any wonder they despise a Democratic state such as Israel? It shatters their male superiority syndrome. How in the world did they work with President Clinton's Secretary of State, Madeline Albright? It is obvious now, they didn't.

Let's turn this around. The next time President Bush flies into Saudi Arabia, for the sake of fairness, he should ask that only women handle his flight. I'm certain they would be more than delighted to honor that request. When are we going to learn that what is good for the goose is also good for the gander? The response to the prince's request should have been, "Go home."

LOUIS FREDERICK

NORTH LAS VEGAS

Tax plan

To the editor:

I read with interest the tax proposal put forth by the Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada. What I found interesting was the politically correct approach of increasing taxes on alcohol and tobacco, both of which are aimed specifically at the lower- to middle-income working class -- the people who are least able to afford an increase in taxes.

Something that does boggle the mind is the proposal to impose what is basically an income tax on businesses that earn $50,000 or more a year. These people are being penalized for working for themselves and they already pay a lot more in taxes than others who are employed and making an annual salary of $50,000.

Also, why should people be penalized 6.8 percent for making investments? This taxation scheme just does not make sense nor is it fair.

I did, however, like the way PLAN proposed the money raised should be divided -- half to education, one-quarter to mental health, and one-quarter to politicians, just to make everybody happy. Tell me something does not smell.

I think that it is about time that the government and social engineering groups get a reality check. This tyranny through taxation has got to stop.

DARRELL WELCH

NORTH LAS VEGAS

Sting operation

To the editor:

I see the FBI is at it again. I refer to the article in the April 17 Review-Journal, "Man planned sex with girl, FBI alleges."

It seems an FBI agent, of undisclosed sex and age, logged onto a computer chat line and claimed to be a 14-year old girl. Since to my knowledge there are no 14-year old FBI agents, it is probably safe to say that was a lie.

An adult male responded and made a date with the nonexistent juvenile. When he went to meet her, he was instead arrested by the FBI and charged with "intent to engage in a sexual act with a juvenile." I always thought people were only arrested for overt illegal actions, not merely for thinking about what they might like to do, as objectionable as that might be.

This was apparently one of the FBI's sting operations, where agents pose as criminals to induce some citizen to do something illegal and then arrest him/her for doing it. If this is not entrapment, then apparently I don't know what entrapment is.

I could never support this "sting" business in court. I believe it is unconstitutional. Please call me for jury duty on this one, though I expect, like a recent identical sting in California where the charges were thrown out, it will never get to court. It shouldn't.

BOB SCHULTZ

LAS VEGAS

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