Letters to the editor Feb. 19

Student indoctrination

I should like to comment on Mr. Oppedahl’s letter to the editor on Feb. 13. He was quite upset that Gov. Greg Gianforte was so supportive of having Turning Point USA clubs established in Montana high schools. 

“Public schools go to amazing lengths to educate not indoctrinate,” he wrote. 

Surely you jest, sir. 

We are currently living with a plethora of horrific effects of public school children across this nation being purposefully indoctrinated with everything from exposing small children to sexually inappropriate literature, to you can and should change your sex if you feel like it, to America is a horrible place and you owe it no allegiance. 

Shall I go on? 

This is only a small slice of what has been done to America’s children. 

In another quote from Mr.Oppedahl he states that “educators painstakingly avoid telling their pupils what to think as regards government structure, political theory and religion.” 

You cannot be serious. The news media is replete with stories of teachers across this nation posting LGBTQ flags in their classroom, teaching children how to protest authority, and of late, how to do a school walk out protesting ICE operations. 

Do all teachers participate in this? Clearly not. But education in this country has jumped the rails and stopped making student excellence a priority while turning their classrooms into incubators of disdain for America and all authority — divine and civil. 

One cannot extrapolate from Mr. Oppedahl’s disclosure that he is a “big fan of Jesus” that he is necessarily a follower of Christ. If he were then he would know that there is nothing to fear and much to find hopeful from young adults having a club, open to all, who simply want to explore how to have a relationship with Jesus Christ. What an utter blessing!

— Jill Williams, Kalispell

The Epstein files

The renaming of The Ohio State University Medical Center to the Wexner Medical Center in 2012 was presented as a celebration of philanthropy. Leslie Wexner gave $100 million, the largest donation in university history.

Now, the newly unsealed DOJ files have laid it bare. Jeffrey Epstein’s wealth, derived “virtually in its entirety” from his decades long management of Leslie Wexner’s fortune. Epstein did not simply advise Wexner; he was empowered by him. He used Wexner’s money, Wexner’s private jets and Wexner’s business, Victoria’s Secret, as instruments to recruit and abuse vulnerable young women.

And that same money flowed directly into Ohio State.

We now know that Dr. Mark Landon, a prominent OSU obstetrician-gynecologist, received quarterly payments of $25,000 from an Epstein-controlled company. Payments that internal emails show were billed in advance to Wexner himself. Dr. Landon says he was a consultant on biotech. Perhaps that is true. But the university has not asked the obvious questions: Why was a sitting OSU faculty member on Epstein’s payroll? Why was that payroll funded by Wexner? And why, after all this came to light, did OSU choose to name a lounge after Dr. Landon in the very medical center that bears Wexner’s name?

This is not a case of a donor being blindsided by a rogue advisor. This is a case of a donor whose wealth created and sustained the predator.

The Wexner name does not belong on a medical center. It belongs in an archive, accompanied by a full accounting of how OSU allowed itself to become a repository for tainted money. Dr. Landon should not be honored with a lounge. He should be suspended pending a genuine investigation, not the kind that clears names quietly, but the kind that follows the money.

— Angela Burns, Columbia Falls