Opinion

MAGISTRATE COURT Britton Jay Tasa, 29, Carbondale, CO, renewal registration during assigned month, fine $54.00, court costs $50.00, surcharges $28.50. Kelly Saunders, 54, Vermillion, SD, speeding on a state highway, fine $39.00, court costs $50.00, surcharges $28.50.

Over the past two years, America has seen some of the most concerning attacks on freedom in our history. Governments seized previously unimagined power over our day-to-day lives. Churches were forced to close, forsaking freedom of religion. Big tech and government alike attempted to police speech, something that is supposed to be free for all. And though the Supreme Court seems poised to advance the right to life for all people, renewed attacks on that right are only just beginning.

Yesterday, June 14, was Flag Day. Both President Wilson, in 1916, and President Coolidge, in 1927, issued proclamations asking that June 14 be observed as Flag Day all across the country. However, it wasn’t until August 3, 1949, that Congress approved the national observance, and President Harry Truman signed it into law.

In his May 11 response to my (Nancy Wirsing) April 27 Letter to the Editor in the Gregory Times Advocate, Mr. Eric Putnam accepts my contention that he is not a supporter of religious tolerance. Indeed, he greatly enhances his justification of his intolerance of religious and ethical beliefs different from his own, and he affirms that he is supremely confident that his religious morals are “right” for Americans in general. He does not address my main point that given our plural society, the mixing of religion and politics (legislating the morals of one religious group as general law) has a far-reaching negative effect on democracy. So, here I am moving on to address Mr. Putnam’s response to Jim Liggett’s Canadian Perspective printed in the May 18 Gregory Times Advocate.

On June 14th each year, we celebrate the American flag as an enduring symbol of freedom, equality, justice, and hope. Our flag is more than a symbol of our country’s core values — it also represents the toil and sacrifice of so many who have worked to lift America to the top of the world stage.

Hugh Glass, American frontiersman and fur trapper, is best known for his survival after having been left for dead when a grizzly bear he had been mauled him along the Grand River in northern South Dakota. He survived the attack and traveled alone for more than two hundred miles to safety. Much of it was done by crawling on his elbows and one knee.

MAGISTRATE COURT Virginia Jolene VanMetre, 63, Burke, SD, speeding on state highway, fine $39.00, court costs $50.00, surcharges $28.50. Destiny Lynn Blackcalf, 20, Saint Francis, SD, seat belt violation, fine $25.00.

What happened to America? That’s the question that’s been on my mind. Before the pandemic struck, America was experiencing a resurgence in global economic and political strength that hadn’t been seen since World War II.

The work of the cowboy on the yearly roundups west of the Missouri River was hard and dangerous. A day in the saddle could be long, hard, and sometimes fatal. Immense distance from medical care and slow transportation just added to the hazards they faced on the open range. In the summertime, the work was often hot, dusty, and bonebreaking; in the wintertime, it was cold, lonely, and demanding.

Dear Editor & Readers, I have read and meditated on Jim Liggett’s Canadian Perspective in the May 18 Gregory Times-Advocate, and thought it meet, right, and salutary to offer my American Perspective, so here it goes: My friends and I are not willing to be human guinea pigs and lab rats, for Big Pharma’s experimental “COVID vaccines”, which is wise considering the side effects of these vaccines, up to and including death. Besides, the masks and jabs became politicized when the Deathocratic Left used them as virtue signaling to bash politically those persons opposed to their malign agendas - persons like your humble scribe, who refuse to be buffaloed by an accursed little Chi-Com flu bug and it’s variant strains.