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Very soon on Dec. 9, there will be a special election in Sac County.
This election is to fill the seat at the Iowa house for District 7 which covers Sac, Calhoun, Pocahontas and parts of Webster County.
I am proud and confident to endorse and support my friend and our own Sac County Democrat Rachel Burns of Odebolt.
Rachel is a mom and regular working Iowan. She is a self employed language speech pathologist, volunteer firefighter, EMT and educator for EMS classes. She’s also a Medical Examiner investigator for two counties.
Rachel’s education and experience is impressive. She is a dedicated hard worker and will take that work ethic with her to the Iowa House. She is a critical thinker. She knows the issues and will find the solutions to help her fellow Iowans. She stands up for what she believes in and won’t be bought, bullied or coerced.
Some of Rachel’s main priorities are healthcare for all, protecting Medicare and Medicaid and remembering that reproductive care is a right. Keeping telehealth permanently available and ensuring access to mental health and substance abuse care. She’ll work to address the growing cancer crisis in Iowa, along with the water issue. This candidate cares about education which includes public money for public schools, free meals for all kids and rebuilding the AEA. Iowa needs higher wages and lower costs, not eminent domain for private gain.
To get more details about Rachel’s stance on issues, go to info@burnsforiowa.com or visit her Facebook page, Rachel Burns for Iowa.
Right now the decisions being made nationally by the majority that control all three branches of government are hurting many people. That pain has been trickling down to the state level which is also controlled by a right leaning majority of lawmakers.
The candidates that we the people elect to serve in government positions are there to represent us. We put our trust in them to work together to find common ground. They take an oath to the Constitution, not to a president or a governor and they promise to uphold the law. Rachel is one person but her win can be the first step in adding the balance we need at our Iowa State House.
I have full faith in the Democrat candidate, Rachel Burns, that she would uphold her oath of office as she consistently demonstrates honesty and integrity. She will listen to her constituents and work to her best ability to put their needs first. As a firefighter, EMT, speech pathologist and a mom, putting others first is what she does.
Please vote Dec. 9 for progress by a proven leader. Vote for Rachel Burns.
Micki Quail, Sac City
In response to Iowa Republican Party President Jeff Kaufmann’s Nov. 14 editorial, “Political violence isn’t symmetrical, it’s escalating on the left and political leaders must call it out.” Was his true intention to cool political violence, or just to distract us from the political violence being propelled by the right?
His narrow vision of “escalating political violence” ignores a wide swath of political violence that has occurred in recent years, and what he includes is mis-attributed. Three of his four examples have not been proven to be perpetrated by people connected to the left — only the baseball game attack in 2017 has proven to be connected in any way to a left-leaning individual, and Democrat leaders vehemently condemned each of these attacks.
When Kaufmann asserts that one side is more responsible for escalating political violence, he is being disingenuous. He ignores his first suggestion to “call it out, directly and by name.”
We must acknowledge the horrendous attacks from the right: the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, the hammer attack on Nancy Pelosi’s husband, the murder of Minnesota Congresswoman Melissa Hortman and her husband Mark, the shooting of Minnesota State Senator John Hoffman and his wife Yvette, the shooting of Gabby Giffords, and the attempted kidnapping of Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, to name a few.
If he intends to “lead with example, not excuse,” he could start by naming and opposing all acts of political violence rather than trying to erase violence committed by right-leaning individuals.
Political violence is wrong no matter who commits it — it’s unfortunate the President of the Iowa Republican Party tries to hide some of that violence with his political rhetoric. If we are to de-escalate political violence, we must not let our egos or political perspectives get in our way.
Cheri Shatto, Fostoria
On Nov. 14, the Times Pilot had an editorial called Political Voices. I wish I could have pointed this out immediately so people could look at their papers.
Rita Hart, the Democratic Chair tells everyone to cool their jets. But Kaufmann, the Republican Chair, starts blaming Democrats even in the opening headline. He uses the word left nine times and Democrats four times, always blaming them. He only uses the word right one times and does say their violence shouldn’t be excused. Rita uses the word right one time when she says left versus right.
Webster’s Dictionary says incite means “to stir up or spur on.” Read both perspectives and see who’s doing the inciting. Republicans control the house, senate and presidency, so if people are so unhappy and mad, who’s at fault?
If Kaufmann really wants to stop political violence he should cool his jets. The name Kaufmann comes from the German meaning merchant and what he’s selling isn’t peace and togetherness. Weren’t Germans immigrants?
Dave Haynes, Duncombe
Randy Feenstra often refers to his height and his “work-horse” mentality. Well, Randy’s parents were responsible for his height, and I have a question about that mentality. I’ve heard critics call him a show-horse, but I think of him as a no-show horse.
I called his office in October during the shutdown, and I asked the staffer about Randy’s next constituent townhall, given the abundance of free time he had. The staffer referred me to Randy’s congressional website. I duly went and despite looking at the detail several times, I saw nothing about future townhalls, so I called again. After refusing to help me navigate the website the staffer told me since I was unable to find the information, he would email me an announcement. Adding injury to insult, the staffer never emailed me.
Why? Probably because there is no information about Randy’s town halls; Randy doesn’t do them.
Randy also doesn’t use his time in the office to show leadership. In a district riven by the eminent domain question, Randy held back and eventually and anemically said he was opposed, but really the issue is between landowners and companies. And Randy NOW is finally talking about lower health care costs, ignoring the facts that the shutdown occurred when Republicans would not negotiate about ACA health premiums, and that he voted for the Big Ugly Bill which RAISED medical costs.
I’m not betting on him to do the work.
Sue Ravenscroft, Ames
It was a lifetime ago that cousin Tom Murray and I grew up in Storm Lake during those halcyon years of the late 1950s and 60s. Tom’s dad, Coach John Murray, was a teacher and coach with St. Mary’s High, 1954 through 1967, and positively influenced a generation of students and families during his long and significant tenure.
It must have been fertile ground for creation of aspiring writers as brother Art and cousin Tom have published books released during this fall, Art’s nonfiction, “Dear Marty, We Crapped in Our Nest” (Ice Cube Press) and Tom’s fiction, “The Empty Set” (Full Court Press). I enjoyed reading both, and I’d like to take a look at “The Empty Set.”
“The Empty Set” is the second in Murray’s Iowa Trilogy, bridging generations of heartbreak and triumph in small town Iowa by exploring the crossings of time, belonging, legacy, death and what comes next.
The first novel, “Fathers, Sons, and Holy Ghosts of Baseball,” described a story of a high school baseball season in 1974 with inimitable characters young and old.
Murray’s second novel, “The Empty Set,” takes place in 2018, and is the first-person narrative of teen Michael Moriarity. Michael tells his story of living in three worlds, an Asian American with Laos and Irish heritage and Irish surname, a connection with his Hmong culture with friend Pa Dao’s intervention, and Black friend, Harden’s gravity pull toward him and Harden’s basketball friends.
Michael, his older brother, John, and father Pat (Puff) Moriarity, continue the tradition of listening to a nightly baseball game as the Moriaritys are solid Minnesota Twins fans with a particular devotion to star Joe Mauer. Puff says of him, “a protector from the earth when hope is lost.” Mauer is a star in any sport but especially baseball. Mauer models when to hold on and when to let go of a Hall of Fame career during Moriarity’s personal narrative.
The Russian writer Leo Tolstoy said, “All great literature is one of two stories, a man goes on a journey, or a stranger comes to town.” And that is apt in this storytelling.
The Moriarity family leave the “quiet sameness” of fictional Cottage Park, Iowa, to start over in the turbulence of the Northside of Minneapolis — ground zero for some of our nation’s most severe societal and educational achievement gaps.
Michael’s guides for navigating Northside are classmate and fellow hooper Jerome Vaughn (Harden) and his teammate friends, and Pa Dao Xiong, a rising young Laos-Hmong shaman who has been summoned by Michael’s deceased mother, Mai Vang, to explain Hmong cultural practices to Michael.
Life on the Northside at times balances on a razor’s edge between conflict and connection, and death and salvation. That balance is the question for Michael, will he know when to hold on and when to let go?
The characters of “The Empty Set” answer that question in this ambitious and compelling novel that the reader will find enriching. This novel, along with Art’s “Dear Marty” can be purchased at Sugar Bowl in Storm Lake and the Book Vine in Cherokee.
Bill Cullen, Dubuque
An updated version of the Nov. 28 editorial cartoon would include “Piggy’s” sisters and fellow journalists, “Ugly” and “Stupid.”
Mike Wellman, Des Moines
President Trump has prepared a few holiday well-wishes to bless folks who may be struggling to make ends meet and who are upset about the lack of true patriotism in America.
Our chief executive is treating the trillions of dollars in the national treasury as his own exclusive, personal piggy bank. He wants us to know he is going to use some of those income tax and tariff dollars to encourage millions of voters with $2,000 gifts right before the 2026 election!
He is also presenting our proud and patriotic people with the prospect of some exciting new wars in the Western hemisphere, including new conflicts in Venezuela, and perhaps next Colombia and Mexico, great opportunities to spill the blood of patriotic young Americans!
He is also using his personal treasury to build massive new detention facilities to house scared, hard-working, non-criminal immigrants. Hopefully he might soon be able to use this new affordable housing to intern big city mayors, Congressional seditionists, liberal preachers, lawyers, university faculty, and disgruntled health care practitioners and patients, and thereby rid the country of no-good Democrats.
Kimball Shinkoskey, Woods Cross, Utah
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