Friday, November 12, 2021
Thursday, November 11, 2021
Editor's note: My father passed along a four-page letter written by my grandfather, Charlie Nintzel, in November 1918, recounting his military experience in WWI. In honor of Veterans Day, I share it here with minor edits.
France, Nov. 24, 1918
Dear Pop:
The “army” has called this day Pop's, dad's, father’s or governor’s letter day, whichever you prefer, but I picked out “Pop” because I always called you by these three little letters. They have also given us permission to write anything we please, describe the battles, etc., which is pretty nice of them. I will try and give you the dope from the very start, that is, when we left the Wadsworth camp.
Here it goes. It will be pretty punk.
We left Spartanburg on the 6th of May and boarded a train around 2 o'clock in the afternoon. I will never forget it as it was roasting hot and with full packs, “wow,” the old sweat poured off me and we only hiked about four miles. The old “choo choo” pulled out and took a course towards north and everybody was yelling “Mineola” or “Merritt,” and then it went east passing Columbia, South Carolina, and from there we took a northern course on the Seaboard Air Laine. Everyone was sure we would go to some camp up north and we finally arrived at Philadelphia had “poke” cigarettes and eats from the Red Cross.
You know how anxious a bunch of soldiers are and naturally, a lot of the fellows questioned the trainmen where we were bound for and, of course, they all mentioned Mineola. The train pulled out past Trenton and we surely thought we would go through the tunnel. I forgot the name of the station but we went through to Jersey City. This was about 12 o'clock on the 7th (of May), mother's and George's birthdays. There wasn't any doubt we were going to Camp Mills.
Several members of Arizona’s congressional delegation may have big decisions to make before next year’s election based on the proposed boundaries of the state’s new political map.
The draft congressional map approved last month by the Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission puts several incumbents into unfavorable districts. Some of those district boundaries will change by the time the commission approves its final maps, likely sometime in late December, and those revisions could be to some incumbents’ benefit. Exactly how different the final districts will look is impossible to predict.
Members of Congress don’t have to live in the districts where they run, only in the states they represent. That leaves several Arizona representatives with options if the AIRC doesn’t change the map to their liking.
U.S. Rep. Debbie Lesko, a Peoria Republican, currently represents a heavily GOP district that includes her hometown, along with Surprise, Sun City and surrounding areas. When the AIRC approved its draft map, however, the area she represents was largely split between two districts — and she doesn’t live in either of them.
By just four houses, Lesko now lives in the proposed predominantly Latino, overwhelmingly Democratic 3rd District. Democratic U.S. Rep. Ruben Gallego lives in the district, which is similar to the district he’s represented since he was first elected in 2014.
If Lesko is still in the 3rd District when the commission approves its final map, she’s certain to run elsewhere. Most of Peoria is in the 8th District, a Republican-leaning but competitive district that extends into Glendale and north Phoenix. Large chunks of her current district are also in the 9th District, an overwhelmingly Republican district that takes in must of the West Valley — from Sun City West and Surprise in the north to Goodyear and Litchfield Park to the south — and extends to the state’s western border, taking in La Paz and Mohave counties and part of Yuma County.
Wednesday, November 10, 2021
Preserve Vistoso has raised almost $1.2 million of their $1.8 million goal for The Conservation Fund to purchase the defunct Vistoso Golf Course from Romspen Vistoso LLC, a Canadian non-bank mortgage lender.
“We're taking every opportunity we can to make our case to the community and they have responded generously,” President of Preserve Vistoso Gayle Mateer said.
Preserve Vistoso has until Dec. 15 to raise the $1.8 million. Preserve Vistoso has been working with community members who donated money in earlier an attempt to purchase the property and is kicking into high gear with more strategies to get new donations from the community this time around.
Preserve Vistoso added to its website the ability to donate directly with a card. It also held public Zoom meetings to explain of its mission and will have information booths at community events, including the Steampump Ranch farmer’s market and the Vistoso Community Association shredding event.
As entry restrictions lifted on Monday in a welcomed reopening of the land U.S. border crossings to some tourists from Mexico, the Biden administration is continuing to deny entry to asylum-seekers from Mexico and Central America under a Trump-era emergency public health rule.
Lisandro, a migrant from southern Mexico using a pseudonym to protect his identity, tried to request entry to the country with his wife and two kids Monday morning under U.S. asylum law at a Nogales border crossing. He presented his COVID-19 vaccination card, but a border agent turned the family away.
“He said that, for the time being, there is no asylum. The border is only open to tourists with a passport and a visa,” Lisandro said at a press conference Monday. “I have the vaccine. It’s my right to ask for asylum and I am fleeing from a very dangerous place. How is it possible that they do this to us?”
The press conference was held by the Kino Border Initiative, a faith-based organization that provides shelter, food and other humanitarian services to migrants waiting in Nogales, Sonora, for a chance to get protections from prosecution and violence as outlined by U.S. and international law. The organization is among the various Arizona and national groups that have denounced the invocation of public health powers, known as Title 42, which effectively closed U.S. borders and allows border agents to immediately “expel” anyone they encounter at and between official ports of entry — even if they are seeking asylum under U.S. law.
Tuesday, November 9, 2021
Katie Hobbs avoided a mistake that contributed to her party’s upset loss in Virginia last week, saying that Arizona parents should have a great deal of input into what their children learn in school.
Asked about parental control and the effect the issue had on the Virginia governor’s race, Hobbs, the frontrunner for the Democratic nomination in next year’s gubernatorial race, told reporters during a press conference Tuesday that curriculum is a local issue — and one that school districts and school boards should work with parents to determine.
“We absolutely need parents as partners in our education system. We need to do everything we can to make sure that every student in Arizona, no matter where they live, has access to high-quality public education, and that starts with bringing our teachers and our parents together to work together to make that happen,” Hobbs told reporters.
Parental control over curriculum has been a hot-button issue throughout the year, as parents and conservative activists have swarmed school board meetings across the country, including in Arizona, to denounce “critical race theory.” The term, which refers to a field of academic study about the ways in which race and racism are intertwined with American society, has become a broad, catchall term used by Republicans to describe teaching about certain racially sensitive topics.
The issue came to the forefront in the recently concluded Virginia governor’s race. Democratic nominee Terry McAuliffe said during a Sept. 29 debate that, “I don’t think parents should be telling schools what they should teach,” which many observers believe contributed to his loss to Republican Glenn Youngkin on Tuesday.
