Is compromise all it’s cracked up to be?

To the editor:

The greatest problem with American politics is that it has embraced "the art of compromise." Politicians and a national media currently have elevated compromise to the status of a lofty virtue. Is compromise really the panacea for all political controversies, as we are led to believe?

The American people voiced an order to our politicians in the past election to stop deficit spending and balance our nation's budget. The resistance to this mandate was as strong in Congress as was the insistence to adhere to the will of the people. The politicians resorted to their usual refuge from responsibility, the "great compromise." As a result, massive deficit spending will continue, with just minute illusionary "cuts" achieved and no balanced budget. Just the opposite of what the people demanded.

Too often, all that is required for the great "art of compromise" are people with malleable principles. But a compromise on a balanced budget can never produce a balanced budget, no matter how many verses of "Kumbaya" ring out in the hallowed halls of Congress. It balances, or it does not.

Historically, would any prefer the solutions of the "Great Compromiser," Henry Clay, over the principled position of Abraham Lincoln? Mr. Clay's Missouri Compromise provided for the extension and preservation of slavery; Mr. Lincoln would not compromise on slavery and abolished this reprehensible practice. Would a compromise on the total-surrender demand for the Nazis have been OK?

President Reagan is another often touted by politicians and the media as a master of the compromise. They fail to recall that his disingenuous compromise on the withholding of state taxes while governor of California set the stage for such irresponsible spending as to have brought this great state to fiscal ruin. A truly devastating compromise.

Usually the detrimental results from a politically convenient compromise are far outweighed by the benefits of maintaining an unassailable principled position.

JOHN TOBIN

LAS VEGAS

Teacher woes

To the editor:

A new school year approaches and teachers across Clark County are busy working for free. No overtime or bonuses or promotions on the line -- just doing it for their students. They are setting up classrooms, planning lessons and attending meetings.

The Clark County School District's new high school teacher of the year for 2010-11 is not one of those teachers, though. She is going to be teaching math in North Carolina this year. Another promising first-year math teacher and coach from the same school left the profession this summer for higher paying private-sector employment.

A good math teacher living in Arizona applied to the district last August and was finally just offered a job Monday. Unfortunately for the children of Clark County, he was offered a job in California four months ago. They are paying him $18,000 more than he would be making here, and they hired his wife, who teaches special education.

Is it any surprise that Clark County students struggle when there have been schools with as many as five long-term substitutes in their math departments? A substitute math teacher does not have to have any teaching skills or any math skills to be a long-term substitute math teacher. A more accurate classification would substitute adult supervision. There are some very good substitute teachers; my point is just that you would not want a brain surgeon working on you if she wasn't a brain surgeon or a surgeon at all.

It is a good thing Gov. Brian Sandoval is making sure we get rid of the bad teachers. I am sure his alternative routes to licensure will have people lining up to teach math at a starting salary of $34,688.

You get what you pay for. Nevada's children suffer and we all suffer from the burden of the uneducated.

Jeremy M. Christensen

Las Vegas

Political evolution

To the editor:

So Harry Reid ridicules the evolution of Mitt Romney's views (Monday Review-Journal). Don't all politicians' views evolve?

Sen. Reid's position on "bonus babies" and the financial burden of illegal immigrants evolved into the Dream Act. Sen. Reid and Barack Obama were both staunchly against raising the debt ceiling when George W. Bush was in the White House. We all know how their position has evolved on that subject.

Let's not forget Sen. Reid's evolving position on Byron Georgiou. And how about his support for the maglev train switching to DesertXpress -- although that change seemed to be motivated by campaign funds rather than moving people quickly from Los Angeles to Las Vegas and back.

Sen. Reid's evolution seems to have surpassed even Mr. Romney's.

John Venniro

Las Vegas

Time to go

To the editor:

President Obama is on a bus tour to bolster his dismal showing in the most recent opinion polls. He has an approval rating below 40 percent. He is possibly at the nadir of his presidency. And what is his message? He said our problems stem from the fact that "our politics are broken." The problem is that President Obama's politics are what is broken.

This is an abject excuse from a president who is trying to lead us down an extreme socialist path that we as a people are rejecting lock, stock and barrel. His whining, pitiful and forlorn pitch is to confiscate more wealth through higher and higher taxes and to mandate more and more control over every aspect of our lives. He is governing against the will and desires of the people of this great country.

A word of advice, Mr. President: Your best course of action at this stage would be to resign your office, take that multimillion-dollar armored bus and ride into the sunset.

Burton J. Simpson

Las Vegas