Guest Editorials

Ron Montoya Rants On MUSD Sports - Again

GUEST EDITORIAL - Good morning to you all, can Marty Bitter's explain the systemic inequalities at Madera South High School. Unfortunately, the culture of silence continues to exist within Madera Unified School District. Why didn't Marty Bitters give the MSHS Varsity soccer coach a $100.000.00 raise after winning the state championship?

In speaking with several coaches of color, staff on campus about the elephant in the room staff are reluctant to ask questions and if you do questions miraculously your career will dealt with. Furthermore, Coaches/Administrators at MSHS continue to enable student athletes to participate in sports who don't meet the GPA requirements, student athletes are not given consequences for tardies, and fractures the relationship with parents who are trying hold their kids accountable.

EDITORIAL: Are State Lockdowns Even Legel?

EDITORIAL - President Donald Trump elicited predictable howls of criticism – from both the left and right -- with a recent claim asserting presidential supremacy over the states and their governors during the COVID-19 crisis. Suddenly, far-left Governors like the radical Andrew Cuomo of New York began positioning themselves as born-again Constitutionalists and advocates of the 10th Amendment.

For the Democrats whose entire political party and political philosophy is based on an all-powerful central government in Washington, D.C. to quickly pirouette into stalwart defenders of states’ rights is astonishing. It is reflective of the Trump Derangement Syndrome in which anything Donald Trump is for, the afflicted must be against, and vice versa.

EDITORIAL:Trump’s Attacks on Credibility of the Press are Dangerously Effective

EDITORIAL - Of the many ways in which the Trump administration has attacked the press, its most effective and dangerous ploy has been to try to destroy the media’s credibility, undermining truth and consensus even as a pandemic threatens to kill tens of thousands of Americans, the Committee to Protect Journalists finds in a report released today.

The report, “The Trump Administration and the Media,” examines stepped-up prosecutions of news sources, interference in the financial independence of some media owners, and the harassment of journalists, particularly at U.S. borders. It shows how the White House’s approach has emboldened authoritarian leaders to silence the press in their own countries.

EDITORIAL: Are We Being Misled Concerning COVID-19 Deaths?

EDITORIAL - A recent newspaper headline in a rural county in Central California blared the following: “Local virus casualty was a beloved cowboy.” Any reader would immediately draw the conclusion that COVID-19 killed 60-year old Ken Machado of San Benito County. Yet, when one reads the actual news story, this interesting nugget appears:

Diane Machado was careful to emphasize that county health officers who have spoken with the family said that while Ken Machado tested positive for COVID-19 after his death, that does not mean the virus itself took his life. Ken Machado had a number of existing conditions, including Lyme Disease – which he contracted about 20 years ago – and heart disease. His sister and other family members think these underlying conditions were exacerbated by the COVID-19 illness.

EDITORIAL: Hoarding Toilet Paper is Not the New Normal

EDITORIAL - During my last visit to the grocery store, after directing me to the hermetically sealed conveyor belt, the clerk grinning proudly said, “Welcome to the new normal.” No, thank you. These ad hoc restrictions on our liberties are not normal—at least in the United States of America.

In the name of public health, prisoners have been released from jail, physicians are being restricted in what drugs they can use to treat their COVID-19 patients, and cancer patients are having their treatments delayed as “elective.”