Republicans put in place voting laws
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
To the Editor: I would like to reply to Mr. Dale Dahlke’s letter of Dec. 9. I agree with Mr. Dahlke’s letter in two places. The first is when he says the previous week’s editorial was correct in saying, “A free and fair election is key to democracy.”
In America, we live with the concept of a representative democracy at the national, state and local levels of government. We elect officials to represent us.
This form of government carries with it grave responsibility. Citizens should know the history of America. They should have a basic understanding of the U.S. Constitution and equally important the Bill of Rights. These are living documents reflecting the concerns and wisdom of the founding fathers.
Citizens have a duty to comprehend how the division of power and balance of power function in theory and in reality. This defines the power of the federal government, the state governments and local governments. Also, this designates the powers of each level of the legislative, executive and judicial branches.
Following Dahlke’s quoting the earlier editorial his narrative goes off the rails. He spends six sentences spewing, “The numbers don’t add up. Something smells really bad.”
Of course, true to form like Trump and his elite lawyers, no proof is offered. This is a reason they have lost all those court cases. Evidence must be presented in a court of law, not on the courthouse steps or outside a landscaping company.
U.S. Attorney General William Barr, who has spent his time in office acting like Trump’s personal lawyer not the attorney general for the United States, said, “We have not seen fraud on a scale that could have affected a different outcome in the election.”
Christopher Krebs from the Homeland Security Department and U.S. cybersecurity chief, said, “The Nov. 3 election was the most secure in U.S. history.” For this, Trump fired Krebs. William Barr has resigned.
Dahlke also claimed, “It is a coincidence that all of this happened in liberal Democratic state?” The voting laws in Wisconsin were put in place by the Republican Party when it controlled all three branches of government. Are they closet liberals?
Current Rep. Tom Tiffany was among those who crafted these laws. This is the same Tom Tiffany who signed onto a brief along with 105 other Republican congresspersons to support the Texas lawsuit challenging Trump’s defeat. He was the only member of the Wisconsin delegation to do so. Does this mean his re-election was illegitimate?
In closing, the second part of Mr. Dahlke’s letter I agree with was his saying, “I think, not.” He just forgot the comma.
Gary Fergot Town of Wien
To the Editor: There is anxiety surrounding the COVID vaccine due to the speed with which the vaccine was developed, further fueled by conspiracy theories. The new mRNA vaccine technology has been in development for over 15 years. The final part of the technology that made the vaccine functional was developed due to rushed funding, global cooperation, and thousands of volunteers willing to participate in the clinical trial studies. Our current vaccines, measles, etc. are made with modified, purified or pieces of deadened virus and take a long time to manufacture.
DNA and RNA contain our genetic code but each have different codes and different functions. One type of RNA is mRNA (messenger RNA) whose job is to cross out of the center or nucleus of our cells into the cell body and make proteins. The mRNA only lives a few minutes.
Coronavirus cells are covered with “spike protein,” which triggers viral illnesses such as COVID-19. The objective has been to develop mRNA that makes a “spike protein” that looks like a virus “spike protein” in order to trick and trigger the human body immune system to develop antibodies against the virus.
In 2005, mRNA was able to be manufactured to represent a “spike protein” using COVID genetic coding without using actual pieces of the virus, but the mRNA only lasted a few minutes and did not trigger an immune response in the body. Scientists this year developed a way for the mRNA to travel through the cell membrane and to last long enough to trigger an immune response before it degrades.
The mRNA does not re-enter the nucleus of the cell, therefore, there is no change in a person’s genetic code. These types of vaccines can be made quickly, but because the mRNA still has a limited life, it needs to be kept in very cold storage. The mRNA fake “spike protein” causes an immune response that will be remembered by the cell; therefor, the immune system will kick-in and kill the COVID virus if it attacks the body.
The immune response triggered by the vaccine can cause symptoms of injection site pain, redness or swelling; fever; fatigue; headache; muscle pain; joint pain; mild nausea, sense of not feeling well; swollen lymph nodes, or severe allergic reaction that occurs in one out of 1 million people. The vaccine has not been tested on pregnant women or children.
These COVID vaccine myths are false: There are no microchips in the vaccine. There has not been any evidence of female sterility. There will not be more deaths related to taking the vaccine then the COVID disease itself.
There have been two deaths in Brazil during testing but there is no certainty if the deaths were related to the vaccine. If you get the vaccine, plan ahead; you may feel ill for a day or two after your vaccine injection and may need to be off work.
This letter is in response to questions I have been asked about the COVID-19 vaccine.
Janice Soczka Edgar
Republicans are shameful at best
To the Editor: Free and unencumbered elections provide one of the most basic pillars of a free society and democracy itself.
I hoped President Trump would accept defeat graciously after losing the popular vote by more than 7 million votes and the Electoral College by 74, but he hasn’t. Instead, he continues to flail about, making wild, unfounded and often bizarre assertions the election was rigged and he actually won.
This is very dangerous because it undermines people’s confidence in our system of voting and casts a shadow of illegitimacy over the incoming Biden administration at a time when trust in gov- ernment is critical.
I understand that Trump’s narcissistic proclamations are often unfounded and irrational. I do not understand why Senator Johnson, Congressman Tiffany, and over a hundred elected Republican members of Congress would lend support to these unfounded attacks on the fundamentals of our democracy.
The only explanation for Republican inaction in the face of obvious lies is the fear of reprisal by Trump. Shortly after the election, Sen. Johnson admitted privately that Biden had won the election but saying so publicly would be “political suicide.”
When Republican members of Pennsylvania’s state legislature petitioned their congressional delegation to nullify Biden’s 81,000 vote victory there, the Republican majority leader was asked if she would also sign the petition. Her reply was, “If I would say to you, ‘I don’t want to do it,’ I’d get my house bombed tonight.”
Congressman Tiffany has never shown any backbone, vowing early to follow Trump’s lead on all matters. He justified his support for the suit initiated by the Texas Attorney General by saying, “Every legal vote must be counted, credible complaints of fraud and irregularities must be investigated, and legitimate legal challenges must be heard.”
The problem with that reasoning is that Tiffany knows all the legal votes have been counted, there are no credible complaints of fraud or irregularities and Trump’s attorneys have had their cases rejected more than 50 times by judges across the nation.
The Wisconsin Elections Commission had already certified the results of Wisconsin’s election. And, incidentally, the Wisconsin election was held under some of the strictest guidelines in the nation that Tiffany voted for when he was a state senator.
The refusal of our representatives to defend one of the most basic tenants of the democracy they profess to serve while emboldening the baseless rants of a tyrannical bully is shameful at best and demonstrably unpatriotic at worst.
Bryce Luchterhand Unity
Don’t delay hunting season
To the Editor: The Wisconsin DNR announced a wolf hunting season would not be held until November of 2021. This is a disservice to those living with the impacts of the unmanaged wolf population in our state. Delaying holding a wolf hunt one more year will only bring one more year of needless wolf depredations and conflicts.
Wisconsin’s current wolf management plan can be reinstated tomorrow. The population goal of 350 or less is still supported by the vast majority of wildlife organizations, agricultural and farming organizations, and many of Wisconsin counties.
Delaying a harvest season one more year will mean additional wolves on the landscape spread across a greater area of the state which need to be managed down to the population goal of 350 or less.
WeneedtodemandtheWisconsinDNR hold a wolf harvest season this 20-21 winter using the existing management plan and goal of 350 or less.
Matt Lallemont Chippewa Fall
