Care for Bear!

After receiving his second shot of Pfizer COVID vaccine, Carlos the Bear was relaxing in his den reading the Montecito Association’s most current email blast. He was eating some tasty takeaway from Pane e Vino and saw that a Town Hall Meeting will be held on Wednesday, May 19 at 5:30 pm, regarding his troublesome penchant for poultry and fast food.

Carlos took a deep breath and bowed his head. He knew this activity was becoming an addiction. He needed help but could not ask for it himself. He felt a sense of relief that this was going to happen. He was tired, hopeless and helpless against his raiding antics. An intervention means you are cared about. Doesn’t it? 

So, he brightened up and decided to try and change his ways. He also hoped the meeting would be well attended, because he knew the Fish and Wildlife folks who were presenting the meeting and the Montecito Association would have some good tips on how to help him curb his enthusiasm for easy pickings.

Carlos would like everyone who can to attend.

For more information, contact Sharon Byrne, the executive director of the Montecito Association at: exec
director@montecitoassociation.org.

Michael Edwards

Doesn’t Every Taxpayer Have a Say?

Reading Sandy Stahl’s letter (Montecito Journal, May 6-13) – I’m confused about her questioning signatures from Cold Spring School district parents who may be renting their family residence. Dispute aside, rental money is often taken in by property owners to help them pay property taxes. There are lots of rentals in the Cold Spring School district. It’s been a long time since I was a renter and grade-school parent in your district.

I don’t want and have no reason to address the particulars of this nasty dispute which seems, frankly, very much a first-world personal vendetta, directed at school administrators.

The figures we found online say that approximately 30% of public-school funding is paid from local property tax; the bulk of funding comes from every citizen paying state & federal taxes. Does Ms. Stahl suggest that only property owners have a say in anything regarding a public school district child’s education?

Susan Kelty

Simply Put: ‘We Do Not Live in a Racist Society’

The leftist Democrat tactic of silencing free speech by blocking speakers, the cancel culture in the workplace and social media banning is a detriment to our republic. Some cancellations stem from a fallacy of systemic racism. We do not live in a racist society. 

Racism is defined as an institutionalized system where a race of people would regard themselves as superior, find other races inferior and implement policy to hold a group down based on that assumption. Where in our country is that present today? The Civil Rights and Voting Rights acts of the ‘60s made it illegal to discriminate based on race, gender, or religion.

For 60 years we have been supporting minorities in this country with more than 400 federal programs which they receive at a higher proportion than their population percentages. We have diversity ratios on corporate boards, college admissions and academy award nominations as examples. Would a racist nation do that?

If a guy from 1950s turned on a TV and was told this is a racist country he would die laughing. Yet our president will call election integrity laws in certain states worse than Jim Crow. Does he not know his history? Take a walk on any campus and ask the kids who they admire and overwhelmingly persons of color are mentioned. They are intertwined in our culture.

Thousands cheer on predominantly Black sports teams. We have the highest number of Black millionaires and billionaires in the history of the world. 90% of legal immigration comes from Africa, Asia, Mexico and Central America. Almost 100% of illegal aliens are persons of color. Why would a racist nation allow that? Why would they come to a racist nation? Why would President Trump brag about record-low Black unemployment? Why would there be a need for racial hoaxes like Jussie Smollett’s if there are so many examples of racism?

Biracial relationships are at the highest ratios in history as is approval of them. We have interaction in our free market economy of diverse people every day. If tyrants threatened our freedoms, we would see how no one cares of the hue of the guy in the foxhole next to him as long as he is an American. Democrats promote this narrative and control every institution in our country. The media, education, cinema, TV, journalism, sports and social media all run by Democrats. Urban cities have numerous minority mayors, council members, police chiefs and education boards and have for decades. If this racism were true, how are they culpable? 

Presently the communist BLM movement, politicians and the MSM has gotten the whole country to buy into this false narrative of racism using police enforcement. The FBI states in 2019 there were 10 million arrests in the country leading to 1004 fatalities. Out of those homicides, 12 unarmed blacks were killed by police and 26 unarmed whites. Hardly an epidemic. Our capitalistic CEOs are virtue signaling and contributing money to a contrary communist organization that would like to eradicate capitalism and our western civilization nuclear family unit as well as hasten their change via riots. The worst of all this may be the Marxist critical race theory that is curriculum in K-12 and our military teaching all we are an ugly country with an ugly history.

What makes those normally silent seek to be heard is that if repeated enough this becomes truth and the attack has brought accusations at people for the sin of being born of European ancestry with an unconscious bias. It has taken some struggles yet the promissory note from our founders Dr. King spoke of is here in the eyes of many. Our Democrat party, media and other organizations do not want to point that out.

Mike Hornbuckle