Nothing District could do in earlier case
To the editor:
The Review-Journal disclosed Wednesday that John Stalmach was previously accused of showing pornographic images to a freshman high school student. Mr. Stalmach is the teacher recently arrested and accused of having sex with a different student.
The report goes on to say a police investigation produced no evidence of a crime, but in May 2010, Mr. Stalmach was issued a 20-day suspension and forced to transfer to a different school.
Because no criminal charges were filed, the district could only suspend him; he was given the maximum penalty.
What in the world is wrong here? If any teacher is caught showing pornographic images is it not common sense that this person should never again be allowed to teach our schoolchildren? Why was this suspension the maximum penalty? And to transfer the problem to another school - ridiculous. He should have been fired, end of story.
Whatever prevented his firing from happening needs to be changed immediately.
AL SHIRLEY
BOULDER CITY
AWOL
To the editor:
According to the White House calendar, there is no public record of the president attending his daily intelligence briefing in the week leading up to the attacks on the U.S. embassy in Cairo and the murder of the U.S. Libyan Ambassador Chris Stevens and three of his staff.
The last time the prior to the slayings that the White House calendar publicly confirms Mr. Obama attended his daily intelligence briefing was Sept. 5.
Then, when the protesters were rioting in the streets outside our embassies and attacking the embassy in Yemen, our president was "pressing the flesh" at a campaign stop in Las Vegas.
Yet the liberal media are stomping all over GOP challenger Mitt Romney for speaking his mind about the tragic episodes in the Middle East, giving Mr. Obama a pass, when all the while our president was "in absentia" as commander in chief.
Who was left in charge to make command decisions and take control of the escalating situations? Joe Biden? Hillary Clinton? God help the United States of America.
GEORGE PUCINE
LAS VEGAS
Laughingstock
To the editor:
The news is full of how Muslims overran our embassies and killed American citizens. Who do we blame? Of course the Muslims who did it, but there is one other person to blame - the community organizer who occupies our White House.
President Obama went all around the Muslim world telling whoever would listen "I am one of you"; "America is not a Christian nation"; "America is arrogant." Because Mr. Obama is totally unqualified to be in the White House, we have become the laughingstock of the Muslim world. They know he does not know what to do when Muslims kill Americans. They know he will go on vacation and play golf. It shows he cannot act as a true American.
Has he made any effort to stop the moneys we are sending to these countries? Has he or his staff formulated a plan to deal with things like this? No. He is off campaigning.
The blame for the deaths of these people should be placed at his feet. I hope America wakes up before it is too late. We cannot afford another four years of an unqualified leader.
EDWARD McGLYNN
NORTH LAS VEGAS
Jimmy Carter, Part II
To the editor:
Another incompetent administration with a domestic economy on the edge of collapse and a foreign policy that looks like it came from a fourth-grade class. Apparently, no one on the Obama team has ever heard of Jimmy Carter. Jan. 20 can't come soon enough.
DAVID CHRISTENSON
BOULDER CITY
Of all the days ...
To the editor:
I felt compelled to respond to your negative Sept. 11 editorial about firefighters.
I fully understand the frustration that some have expressed over our presumed inflated salaries and benefits. Would you believe that a firefighter in the city gets paid a little over $16 an hour and is not eligible for overtime until he/she works 56 hours of straight pay?
What I do know is that figures lie and liars figure. I have been a part of EMS and the fire service for 20 years now and have worked for the Las Vegas Fire Department in the "underbelly" areas of Las Vegas for most of my career, by choice. You see, there are a lot of us who believe we can do the greatest good in the worst areas. What is that worth?
By the way, my first job in the fire service paid $28,000 a year, and I could not have been happier.
I am just surprised that you could not even given us a break on Sept. 11. I went back to New York after the attacks and stood in the pit, devastated as an American.
Not even a break from writing a scathing article about firefighters on a day when the fire service incurred the largest loss of life in its history?
ERIC LITTMANN
LAS VEGAS
Scientists and warming
To the editor:
Warren Sanders of Medford, Mass., assigns a grade of "F" to Vin Suprynowicz's column on climate change, and I would like to assign a grade of "F" to Mr. Sanders' response.
To his claim that Richard Lindzen is "the only remaining scientist of any repute who maintains a contrarian position on the issue (of human-caused climate change)," I would answer that he can easily find both the names and the qualifications of many hundreds of scientists from around the world who agree with and support Mr. Lindzen, if he will only read the list of those who have signed the Manhattan Declaration on Climate Change. He can find thousands more at petitionproject.org.
I would then ask Mr. Sanders why he devotes roughly half of his column to an explanation of how "global warming" evolved into "climate change," while totally disregarding what I see as the most significant question raised by Mr. Suprynowicz: "What is the effect on our society if people lose faith in science because they see scientists fudging the data for political reasons or to obtain continued funding for their 'research'?"
OWEN NELSON
LAS VEGAS
