LETTERS: Redskins just a start; Angels should be next

To the editor:

Political correctness lives! I refer to the current furor over the name of the NFL’s Washington team. May we extend this uproar to its illogical conclusion?

First of all, the Los Angeles Angels will have to change their name. The name “Angels” is contrary to the philosophical beliefs of agnostics and atheists. We will not even bring up the Chicago Blackhawks of the NHL, and we can’t forget the Kansas City Chiefs either, can we? The New Orleans Saints? Uh-uh. There are too many of us who have broken a commandment or two, are therefore unqualified for sainthood, and find the name “Saints” elitist.

The same for the Oakland Athletics: The majority of American males who did not make high school varsity teams can look at the name “Athletics” as demeaning to those who weren’t. The list goes on. The Washington Nationals? Anathema to those who advocate states’ rights. The New York and San Francisco Giants? How about the New York and San Francisco Little People?

If something I can’t do anything about annoys me, I just ignore it. It keeps the blood pressure down.

ROBERT MANN

PAHRUMP

Wilcox died a hero

To the editor:

We were so pleased to find Monday’s excellent coverage acknowledging Joseph Wilcox’s heroic efforts to intervene in the Wal-Mart segment of this month’s senseless shooting rampage. This coverage follows Glenn Cook’s thoughtful and thorough June 22 column on his death.

Sheriff Doug Gillespie, the Metropolitan Police Department, individual police officers and the general public gave Mr. Wilcox the hero’s sendoff he deserved. Mr. Wilcox acted quickly with the information he had at the time, and he couldn’t have known of the CiCi’s Pizza shooting that preceded his intervention in this rampage-in-progress, or that a second shooter was involved. Had Mr. Wilcox not attempted to intervene, the outcome of this horrible incident could have been very different and included the loss of many more lives.

The city can be proud of its response to this tragic event. Thank you! And thank you to the Review-Journal for your timely and thorough coverage. May Joseph Wilcox rest in peace. We’re proud of you. You died a hero. Most of us wouldn’t have had the courage to do what you did. You saw your duty and died trying to do it.

KENNETH F. HINES and MARY LINDSAY

LAS VEGAS

Feel-good policy

To the editor:

Gov. Brian Sandoval vetoed a bill in 2013, supported by ex-New York Mayor Bloomberg’s Mayors Against Illegal Guns, to criminalize private firearms transactions in Nevada. Now Mr. Bloomberg’s henchmen are back with bundles of cash to perpetrate their favorite civil wrong on law-abiding Nevadans: de facto universal gun registration (“Nevada petition filed to require background checks for gun purchases,” Saturday Review-Journal).

Mr. Bloomberg’s Nevada posse is citing phony polling numbers and has no proof that universal background checks would actually prevent crime. That’s because there isn’t any. This is a politically correct, feel-good campaign, period.

LYNN MUZZY

MINDEN

U.S. should butt out

To the editor:

Sens. John McCain, Lindsey Graham and Kelly Ayotte have publicly blamed President Barack Obama for the problems in Iraq, insisting that the action of removing all U.S. troops from Iraq is the cause of today’s hostilities in that nation (Sunday Steve Chapman commentary, “What’s long enough? Forever?”).

Our soldiers fought and died to give the people of Iraq the chance to form a peaceful government that encompassed Shi’ia, Sunni, Kurd and Christian citizens. The Maliki government has persecuted the Sunni minority (and the Kurds, too), and basically brought this conflict on by Maliki’s own partisan actions. In short, they blew their chance.

Of course, the senators have conveniently forgotten which president signed a treaty with Iraq that stipulated that all U.S. military must leave Iraq by the end of 2011. That president was George W. Bush. How was President Obama expected to react to a treaty signed by our president and the president of a sovereign nation? I submit that he complied with the agreement that President Bush signed.

If the senators are now aware that it was President Bush who signed the treaty, perhaps they expected President Obama to follow an older historic precedent — namely that of not honoring a treaty between sovereign nations. Heck, the U.S. signed many treaties with sovereign nations right here in North America (I’m referring to Native American tribes, which are sovereign nations) and then failed to honor its commitments many times. Is that what Sens. McCain, Graham and Ayotte wanted President Obama to do?

The U.S. needs to stay away — far, far away — from any conflict in the Middle East, indeed, any conflict involving Muslim vs. Muslim, be it Shi’ia, Sunni, Baath, Alawite or any other sect, with the only exception being that we defend Israel should it come under major attack. Hopefully, that’s what President Obama will do.

Until these people resolve a thousand years of feuding, there can be no “democratic,” all-encompassing government in any of the Middle Eastern countries. Let them work it out for themselves without our help.

DAVID ADAMS

LAS VEGAS