Opinion

The school year has started at Alpine ISD, and I want to take a moment to thank our parents and community for entrusting us to serve your children. It is refreshing to have the students back in class and participating in activities. We appreciate the support you have shown the Lady Bucks and Bucks in the past few weeks.

As I watched the Afghanistan debacle unfold it brought back memories of another time. A time when the U.S. government and the American media lied to the American people for years as young soldiers were killed and maimed, both physically and mentally. The Afghanistan desertion is a repeat of the Vietnam disgrace.

We wish to thank all of our family and friends for your thoughts, prayers, and acts of kindness during our time of sorrow due to the loss of our wonderful mother, Frances P. Jimenez. We also want to thank all those who helped to make Mom’s funeral service so uplifting. Among those, Fr. Pablo Matta for leading the Mass and his heartfelt sermon, the Spanish choir for providing the inspiring music, our dear Tia Olga for leading us in the Rosary, all who served as pallbearers, all who sent the beautiful flowers, and last but not least we wish to thank our cousin Cecelia for hosting many of the out of town family members.

History is repeating itself. A key year in the Carter White House was 1979. The POTUS, believing his push for human rights gave him moral authority and worldwide respect, chided the Shah of Iran for abuses. Ayatollah Khomeini exploited that, deposed the Shah, and became the first to turn a modern state into an Islamic state. The Taliban is doing the same thing to Afghanistan. The old Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan in 1979, and it was Carter who formulated the not so covert policy that would feed the mujahideen weapons and money matched by Saudi Arabia for next 10 years.

The Environmental Services Department has been hard at work on the rain gardens project at Kokernot Park. The project consists of constructing rainwater catchment basins at two locations in the park to reduce flooding. The two rain gardens will be landscaped with water-efficient plants without tapping into the city’s aquifer for irrigation. These projects will not only enhance and improve the park’s natural areas, but also serve as training and educational modules for visitors, providing examples of water conservation rain gardens.

In 2019, former Department of Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson said that the first thing he did when he arrived at his office was to check the previous day’s border apprehension totals. Under 1,000 was, Johnson said, “a relatively good day,” and over 1,000 was “a relatively bad number” because that “overwhelms the system.”

It’s Sunday evening. Time is 10:15 p.m. I am working on coordinating a visit tomorrow with my babies. Need to figure out how to pick up my son and his three-year-old sister. She needs to nap at 12:30-ish. We have to be at school with my boy at 2:30 p.m. If I don’t take her with us, she gets her feelings hurt, and throws a fit.

In Australia, New South Wales, the government plans to take 24,000 children, separate them from their parents, put them in a stadium, and forcibly inject them with experimental products known as C-19 vaccines.

It has been common knowledge for years that all major developing countries have possessed the ability to conduct germ warfare. The Wuhan crisis is no exception. Was a virus created in the lab and deliberately leaked into the local wet markets for experimentation on the people of Wuhan? This is totally consistent with China’s poor record on civil rights, and its complete lack of concern for all of the Chinese people. The virus created in Wuhan is by no means a poor reflection on all Asians, especially Asian-Americans. It is simply a reaffirmation of the Communist Chinese government’s unconscionable disdain for human life. They are the ones to blame. Now we, the American people, will soon be required by our government to get the vaccine without being told what are the short/long term side effects. This is inherently a violation of our civil rights since the vaccine has never been approved by the Food and Drug Administration. The one benefactor from the spread of the virus is the environment. Consider how working from home reduces the amount of carbon emissions caused by the automobile. Why aren’t the Biden Administration and various environmental groups encouraging this?

Full house crowds were treated to lots of good cowboy action last weekend at this year’s Big Bend Ranch Rodeo, and crowds welcomed a rain each afternoon to help cool off. The Big Bend Ranch Rodeo is grateful for the support we have received the last 21 years from countless individuals and businesses in Alpine and beyond.