LETTERS: Little League gets it right on ruling
To the editor:
Once again, the pursuit of fame and fortune has won out over morality. The Little League debacle is not about the ethnicity of the Chicago players. It’s about breaking the rules.
The parents of the Chicago Jackie Robinson West team are placing blame for stripping their children of the national title on the wrong group of people. It isn’t Little League International’s officials who are at fault, but rather the Jackie Robinson coaches.
Little League has done nothing wrong by following the rules that all the players agree to when they join. If you don’t agree with or don’t want to play by these rules, then don’t join this league — start your own.
The Las Vegas Mountain Ridge team shouldn’t shy away from accepting the banner. The team should embrace it. Has anyone considered the fact that Mountain Ridge might have actually won the U.S. title if the Chicago team had not stacked the roster?
Will Mountain Ridge now receive an invitation to the White House? Is this team going to get the accolades and the hometown parade it deserves? If not, why not?
The old adage, “Winners never cheat and cheaters never win,” couldn’t be more appropriate, and it is sad that these young children from Chicago are paying the price for the adults’ wrongdoings. One can only hope that this lesson forced on them is one they will remember for the rest of their lives.
KATHLEEN M. STONE
PAHRUMP
Little League and race
To the editor:
Ed Graney wrote an interesting commentary on the U.S. Little League championship between Las Vegas’ Mountain Ridge team and Chicago’s Jackie Robinson team (“Shenanigans of adults can’t erase what’s good about Little League,” Feb. 12 Review-Journal). I got the impression that the commentary was shaded in favor of the Chicago team, seeking to put some imaginary racial guilt on Nevadans.
Mr. Graney dwelled on the fact that the Chicago team was comprised of African-American players from a city that suffered violence and budget cuts. Was he inferring that Mountain Ridge’s players were just some rich, pampered, Irish-American kids who didn’t deserve to win? Why did Mr. Graney need to make any racial inferences in the first place?
As far as Jackie Robinson West being ruled guilty of cheating, that rests on the shoulders of the adults involved. It had nothing to do with the kids. As to whether the title should be stripped from the Chicago team or not, that was a difficult decision to make. Should the AFC title have been stripped from the New England Patriots after winning with their doctored footballs? Probably yes, but huge amounts of money most likely dictated that outcome.
Fortunately, baseball remains one of the few institutions in which you can check your worries and bigotry at the door. You root for your team, not a color. I was a lifelong Chicago Cubs fan, and I was saddened by the recent passing of a friend of mine, the great Ernie Banks. I never thought of him as an African-American. He was just a friend.
RON MOERS
HENDERSON
Stadium politics
To the editor:
I don’t think there is any doubt that Las Vegas Mayor Carolyn Goodman is committing political suicide with her persistence in pushing for public funding for a stadium that none of the voters want, especially now that Major League Soccer has turned down Las Vegas. Oscar and Carolyn Goodman have a good chance of being dethroned this year.
JERRY GORDON
HENDERSON
Tapped-out taxpayers
To the editor:
Gov. Brian Sandoval, my pocket is closed for this legislative session. I am on a fixed income, and there is no room in my budget for more taxes for you. You gave Tesla $1 billion, so use that fund for your misguided wants.
As for sunset taxes, we the people expected them to sunset, as we were led to believe. They must expire, and if you want them back, then go through the whole process to get them back — like a supermajority vote of the whole legislature.
For your overinflated school wants, no new taxes are needed. Stop feeding all the kids for free, stop the English as a Second Language programs and remove the children of undocumented parents. These children are not learning English at home. If the parents are not doing their part, we do not need to spend the extra dollars on the programs. My child has to share textbooks so that ESL and food programs can continue. That is unfair.
As for the excess cost of welfare and food stamps, do something right and pass legislation to make eligibility start at 18 years of age, and require participants to have a high school diploma or a GED.
I think these solutions to the state’s funding problems will make most people happy, because there will be a tax decrease and legal residents will have better roads, better water and better lives, without having to choose either hamburger or higher taxes. Like I said, my pocket is closed until the people who pay taxes benefit and the ones who break laws to come here are removed from benefits.
STANLEY K. SCHONE
LAS VEGAS
