If you are low skilled and have even less ambition Sen. Gazelka and the Republican Party have your back.

Bills authored by Rep. Ward and Senator Wiger would have protected our dogs from body grip traps but the Republican chairs refused to give them a hearing.

After blocking these reasonable bills and shutting 2 million hunters and non-hunting dog owners out of the process the republican chairs fast tracked the MN Trappers Association’s (MTA) dog killer bill through their committees The videos on http://www.youtube.com/user/SafeDogMN clearly show that the MTA bill is a dog killer. The main reason why many trappers use body grip traps on land is because they only have to check them every three days.

Little ambition is needed.

One Republican legislator is even quoted as saying that we should just accept our dogs dying in traps

This disturbing view seems to permeate the Republican Party and the trappers association. The opinion seems to be ‘We only kill a few dogs every year so what’s the big deal?’

When the Wisconsin DNR began recording dogs killed in body grip traps they recorded 17 dogs killed in a single year and that didn’t include the dogs trappers tossed into the brush. The trapper that tracks down the dog’s owner and confesses to killing their dog is rare. I’ve only heard of the one who killed a woman’s dog last Thanksgiving Day and then went to her house and cussed her out for stealing his trap. She didn’t know how to remove the trap from her dead dog and had left a note for the trapper.

Sen. Gazelka and most republicans voted repeatedly to continue the slaughter of our dogs as the dog killer bill was rammed through the process.

John Reynolds

Merrifield

How is it that a Dispatch letter is titled “President Obama’s Big Lie,” when the letter didn’t prove any lie?

By definition a lie is “an assertion of something known by the speaker to be untrue with an intent to deceive” (Webster).

President Obama is only quoted as saying back in 2006 that, “Americans deserve better” – regarding something not identified. The president hasn’t lived up to writer’s expectations of being a leader in turning the economy around and lowering the debt, and for the writer this constitutes leadership failure. This is allegedly Obama’s biggest “whopper.” But Obama’s 2006 opinion vs. the writer’s 2012 opinion does not a lie make. The allegation is a non sequitur that is pure political propaganda. Dispatch readers deserve better.

Having said this, the letter provides an excellent example of the low level of reason, attitude, and civility of current discourse that goes on in both public dialogue and in government. The letter itself is a lie in so far as the allegation gave only a deceitful appearance of a lie. In every month of President Bush’s last year in office, monthly job losses increased. Obama’s first year was a reverse mirror image of Bush’s last, and in the last 26 months all months have shown growth. If this reality is to be grist for making up lies rather than making some constructive suggestions, Obama supporters could justifiably use the same data and methods to construct opposition lies. Is this a constructive way to solve our problems?

If the amount of effort that goes into seeing how much others can be demeaned were put into constructive solutions we would be a lot farther ahead. Why should we expect more of those we elect? Honesty and charity start at home. We get what we deserve.

Dick Peterson

Nisswa