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Letters to the Editor: Corrupt ‘Democratic Machine’ lambasted for ruining Asheville
Saturday, 01 October 2022 15:14
EDITOR’S NOTE: The following was submitted to run as a letter to the editor in the Daily Planet.
•
Hey there, Esther Manhammer & ilk.

Just thought I’d congratulate you all (along with Buncombe County Commissioners) for helping Asheville & Buncombe County to make national news exemplifying the fruit of your failed governance over the decades here!

(“Tucker Carlson: This is what the collapse of civilization looks like”  https://www.youtube.cwatch?v=GH7cnmGHNxw\)

Well, keep up the piss poor “work” of applying your collectivist principles which have been destroying Neo-Amerika since 1913… and YES, we told you so decades ago!

(I already sent a similar message via their pathetic online message form to Brownie & his ilk. The ONE good thing I can say about AVL City Council is that at least you still publish your email addresses on the website that we pay for… along with your salaries.)

Of course, I fully realize you and your ilk have not been on City Council for very long.  However, please try to fathom the fact that the individualist-thinking, freedom-loving people in this area who have been tolerating collectivist principles here for literally decades, view all you collectivists as being cut from the very same cloth as every infamous evil tyrant recorded in human history.

Therefore, when I refer to “you,” please understand the larger picture here.

Funny how your “Democratic Machine” that Brownie and other such villains spoke about over a decade ago has done precisely what we predicted...  served to further corrupt and destroy Neo-Amerika!

It’s gotten so corrupt throughout this entire satanic nation that there is in place a total idiot falsely acting as POTUS after a totally stolen election which anyone with a functioning brain witnessed the very night of the election — and you know all this to be true somewhere deep inside your faulty collectivist minds.

It’s gotten so corrupt that now it’s nearly illegal to question any official narrative about anything… let alone the “plandemic” and “election” results.

While the rest of us already have witnessed your the utter failure of applying your collectivist principles, we can only hope & pray that somehow a miracle will happen and you all will actually wake up for real, recognizing all your “woke” actions of censorship, hypocrisy, and blatant insanity for what they are: EVIL.

Also hopefully, none of you will be victimized by your fellow constituents in AVL-Buncombe who also care NOT about Natural Rights principles… Actually, I question whether or not any of you even have any inkling whatsoever regarding what they even are, because your actions throughout the decades exemplify otherwise.

But after all, since fighting your war against the natural right to self-defense in striving to disarm We the People, you & your ilk among the political class can certainly afford to pay for your personal armed body guards, and since you all are most often *above the law* you can also “illegally” arm yourselves with impunity.

Regardless, I still pray for your well-being and that God will overlook your evil works and protect you from harm.

Enjoy the fruit of corruption and lawlessness, all you collectivists have so perfectly cultivated. However, remember that time is running very short for this satanic kingdom as well as for all the rest in this present world, and it’s never too late to repent of your evil.

Or, just keep on keeping on your path of violating and/or usurping every single God-given Natural Right as every other Collectivist tyrant has done and reap those “rewards” which are certainly soon to come.

Always never your constituent & former vice chair of the Buncombe Libertarian Party,

BERNARD BARUCH CARMAN
Asheville



Leaders ripped for ignoring Monument Protection Act

 On Sunday morning, Sept. 18, 2022, as I stood on the overpass of Interstate 240 West/26 East, in my Dixie Outfitters’ shirt with the depiction of the Honorable General Robert E Lee and the Southern Cross in hand, I would soon find myself surrounded by a group of people. 

"Mr. Edgerton," one would begin:

"We read articles in the Daily Planet newspaper that you write about the South not only from a historical perspective, but also about current affairs. And many seem to resonate about the rule of law and equal protection thereof.”

I then reviewed with them the following:

• The Confederate soldiers’ cenotaph under the rule and protection law of the North Carolina Monument Protection Act that was pulled down at the Durham County Courthouse... The criminal responsible escaped with barely a slap on the hand. 

• At the state-run school, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the cenotaph of Confederate soldier Silent Sam was pulled off his base by crowd of hooligans and professors who stomped and spit on it.The chancellor ordered to put Sam back; removed the base and then retired. Sam had stood under the North Carolina Monument Protection Law. 

• The City of Asheville — where has stood the cenotaph erected (in the memory of his service to the people of the state) to the Honorable Governor Zebulon Baird Vance, the state’s most-decorated citizen who just happened to be a Confederate colonel — had the cenotaph deconstructed, ignoring any input from the Historic Comission and any laws governing the Monument Protection Law(still under litigation).

•.And not to forget the mayor of Enfield, N.C., who ordered the All Veterans cenotaph there to not only be removed, but had it bulldozed and destroyed  — and then going on television to brag about what he did.

We don't know if he is on probation for any of the other crimes he has been convicted of. However, we know that he has no regard for the rule of law, or the Monument Protection Law. 

We the citizens of this state have come to the conclusion that the North Carolina Protection Law is nothing more than a joke that carries no enforcement by the state attorney general, or the legislative body who wrote and passed it. God bless you!                                                      

H.K. EDGERTON
Asheville

Chairman of the Board of Advisors Emeritus, Southern Legal Resource Center 
Member, Save Southern Heritage Florida 
Honorary Life Member, Zebulon Baird Vance Camp 15 Sons of Confederate Veterans 
Honorary Associate Member, Abner Baker Chapter 14 United Daughters of the Confederacy 
Confederate Legion Judah P Benjamin Camp 2610 Sons of Confederate Veterans 
Honorary Life Member, North Carolina, Tennessee and Georgia Orders of the Confederate Rose 
President, Southern Heritage 411





Sale of Ramada Inn in E. Asheville for ‘supportive housing’ raises questions

Well, the inevitable has happened: The Ramada Inn on 148 River Ford Parkway in East Asheville had officially been sold to Shangri La and Step up for high-access permanent supportive housing for 100 people. 

Interestingly, if you access the register of deeds and view the deed under Shangri La, it claims the top lot, with all of the buildings and acreage, sold for 13,000 to a NC LLC, which seems to have been created by the company. 

The lower lot, a parking lot, was sold for what looks like $8,000,000 to an out-of-state LLC. 

Why would they sell a parking lot for so much? 

Is there a reason this was sold to an out-of -state LLC and not an NC limited liability company? 

Something seems very weird about this transaction, as most of them have throughout this process. 

I have to wonder what this means for the future of, not just the property, but also the community it will be within? 

With recent conflicting feelings on the recent Fox News article claiming a rise in crime in Asheville over the past five years, to the rebuttals-style article by Asheville Watchdog, I had to wonder to myself why, in general, is crime up? 

Regardless of the number, it’s risen. The facts show that, in fact, we have had a rise in crime. It’s clear from many forums and interviews that D.A. (district attorney) Todd Williams leans heavily on the idea that his implementation of diversion programs for those people headed to jail are very effective and resulting in success. 

Is that actually true? 

A look at the diversion program website leads to nowhere as far as statistics or quantifiable data regarding said successes and failures. 

My question is ... if these diversion programs actually work, where is the proof? 

If there is data somewhere, does that data include what happens to the individual who graduates from the diversion program? 

Certainly, in order to do their due diligence to the community, they would follow up for a year, or some extended period of time, after these people graduate to determine that they are in fact gaining an opportunity to rehabilitate rather then reoffend, right? 


If there is no data pricing the long-term effect of these diversion programs as successful, does that mean they base success off of completion alone? 

And, if that’s the case, is that really good enough to prove success? 

I think not. 

I want proof that the people getting out of the consequences of their actions as far as the crimes they commit aren’t just being put back out on the streets — as chronic re-offenders —  because that sure is how it seems, now isn’t it?


BAILEY STOCKWELL
East Asheville






It’s time to begin electing president by popular vote

According to the August, 2022 Pew Research Center poll, support for electing the president by national popular vote is increasing among all voters regardless of party, ideology, or age.

This poll demonstrated that 63 percent of Americans support moving to a popular vote for president, including 42 percent of Republicans. 

This is because most voters believe that the principle of one person, one vote is essential to the future vitality of American democracy.

A constitutional amendment is not required to have a national popular vote for president. We can repair our broken election system with the National Popular Vote.

The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact will go into effect when states totally 270 Electoral College votes adopt a law to join the Compact and assign all of their Electoral College votes to the presidential candidate with the most popular votes nationally.  This way the national popular vote winner will win the presidency every time. 

The bill has already been passed in states representing 195 electoral votes. Only 75 more votes are needed to fix the way America elects our president and to help protect democracy.

Learn more about the National Popular Vote by going to the website: www.nationalpopularvote.com. 

You can support it by writing to your N.C. General Assembly representatives and sharing it with your friends.

KAREN WARD
Member
League of Women Voters, Asheville/Buncombe County
Asheville




Asheville’s mayor should have sat this one out!

East Asheville Forum — reported on by the Asheville Daily Planet — gave the public the candidates' views and, right away, I noticed the moderator Rick Freeman announced that Asheville Mayor Esther Manheimer gave notice she was running late, so he decided to put her remarks in the end — which I felt was unfair to all the other candidates who showed up on time.

Some candidates didn’t show up at all. 

The mayor arriving late apologized for her tardiness, stating she had been participating in the Big Brothers Big Sisters event, then went onto to talk about how she is married to a coach at Enka  High School. 

She said, “I think Asheville should be a place where our children can grow up — I feel like achieving that job for you is what I do-I feel like achieving that job is what I should do — and do do — for you.” 

I feel ithat if the mayor really earnestly believed that, she would have taken the forum time seriously and showed up on time — same as other candidates — to actually hear the questions and the cheering from the public on topics they reacted heavily to. 

I feel children are not just the children involved in Big Brothers or Big Sisters, but children locally — and not just Enka High-coached children, but the children are from all over, encompassing so much more from the children that are in foster care, the children that are homeless, the children in every district school — public to private — to the children being homeschooled. 

If the mayor really wants to have Asheville a place in which children can grow up, she definitely skipped explaining just how the children can succeed in that. 

Later, Freeman asked, “What steps would you take to support police now — and how do you plan (to) help them attract and retain better quality candidates?” 

Esther Manheimer replied by saying “it” (the APD) is actually down more than 40 percent right now. Our police department is actually in a “crisis” right now. 

Calling the Asheville Police Department an “it” was, to me, another all-time low by the mayor. Not one time did she cite a single officer’s name — so it appears (she) has (had) no dialogue with police to share their facts nor her own facts, yet stated, “We need cross-community dialogue.” 

Also, the mayor replied, “We see a community. We want to be safe. We also don’t want to confine people of color in institutions. That’s not radical — that’s not defunding police.” 

Clearly here she has zero “cross-community dialogue” when she fails to answer the question on what steps would you take to support police now. 

She replied with nothing on stating steps to support police at all, but flipped the question to (her) comfort by stating we want to be safe, then — out of nowhere in that question poised to her — brought up not confining people of color in institutions. 

She then went on to ignore entirely also the second part of her question on what how do you plan to help them attract and retain better candidates. 

When you have a mayor that can’t even answer a two-part question, the public should notice, especially over a topic she started out saying the police her “it” are in a “crisis!” 

The reality is police continue to be in a crisis due to individuals just like the mayor who openly cannot even — on political stages — say they personally support the police and why the police are low in staff, or what they plan to do to help them attract and retain better candidates. 

Here are some of the reasons of the police being in a crisis the mayor didn’t bother to tell you from the news:

According to Tori Richards interview in the Washington Examiner, Sept. 14, 2022 article, reasons for Asheville’s record homicides and crimes are according to the previous sheriff:

1) “Anti-police sentiment brought in by newly elected Democratic Party leaders.”

2) Negative environment reason given by the former Democrat Sheriff Van Duncan “So, when officers have to work under… those conditions, when they’re out there really serving the community well, and we see high dismissal rate with the district attorney, low cash bail or no bail for these folks who are just being turned back loose into the community, it becomes very frustrating for the officers.”

3) The homeless population —  “As our district attorney said, it’s not against the law to be homeless, but it is against the law to commit those crimes and really kind of put a damper on business and make it hard on your town.”

4) “The district attorney frequently dismisses cases against homeless suspects, providing no deterrent to future criminal activity.”

5) “Citizens are also grappling with an increased homeless population and have seen a Mexican drug cartel move into the area, contributing to the crime problem.” The homeless population was reported to have grown 21 percent from the previous year. 

6) APD staffing shortages was reported in numerous 2021 articles — In December 2021, Nick Buffo Spectrum news reported in his headline  “Asheville police face critical staffing shortage.” It wasn’t a few officers leaving but 80 officers retired or resigned. 

7) Asheville police issued statements on call in’s they could no longer respond to due to staff shortages. Here is the quote:

“Theft under $1,000 where there is no suspect information (this does not include stolen vehicles or guns)

“Theft from a vehicle where there is no suspect information“Minimal damage and/or graffiti to property where there is no suspect information

“Non-life-threatening harassing phone calls (does not include incidents that are related to domestic violence and/or stalking)

“Fraud, scams, or identity theft

“Simple assaults that are reported after they have occurred

“Reports that do not require immediate police actions and/or enforcement (information only reports)

“Funeral escorts

"Lost/found property

“Trespassing where the property owner does not want to press charges.”

8) According to WLOS, Asheville police officers are still understaffed and over-burdened with record crimes are working overtime. 

“Sworn APD overtime pay by year:

2020: $681,625.85

2021: $813,842.38 

2022: $390,707.94

Police Chief (David) Zack told News 13, it’s the “cost of business” to  ensure there are officers on the streets. He cited staffing shortages as the main driving force behind the significant increase in overtime.

“It’s a lot of money and costing a lot of taxpayer money,” said Chief  Zack. “We’re still only filling about 50 percent of our overtime request. We’re still short on the street every single day.”

The police department staff was reported is down about 40 percent of officers available on the street compiling those still in training or unavailable for other reasons.

9) Response time is longer because of heightened crime and less staff to address the reports. 

APD Capt. Brandon Moore says: “The staffing shortage is causing response times to go up — and they’ve had to change which crimes officers will respond to.”

KRISTEN BURNS-WARREN
Cecil community of Haywood County




 



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