Opinion

Public rhetoric should prompt removal

As someone whose politics are centered on bodily autonomy, I sympathize with folks who are against forced vaccinations. I bristle at anything that encroaches on a person’s individual freedoms — restrictions on abortions, prohibition, gun laws, etc. — any mandate, especially any mandate from the government, especially from the American government, which has a long history of using “medicine” to harm black, indigenous, and poor people. We all have ample reason to be cynical and skeptical of the American healthcare system, and no one should be ridiculed for questioning what is in a vaccine. This stuff is going right into your body. It is normal and prudent to question what goes in your body.

Extremists also garner my sympathy. As someone labeled an extremist myself, there are specific events I can point to as things that radicalized me. That’s a common thread with extremists — something happened to us that commits us to an ideology. For me, one of my radicalizing events was watching court proceedings in Haywood County. Sitting in a court room and watching the “justice” system chew up and spit out poor white Appalachians has forever altered my consciousness, and my entire worldview is filtered through that experience. I understand where extremism originates, and I fully understand that people generally view me as a lunatic when I articulate my abolitionist beliefs.

I am also reluctant to belittle folks who are labeled “conspiracy theorists.” Again, if we look at all the awful things the American government has engaged in since its inception, no one can be blamed for thinking that the government has ulterior motives. Sometimes, given the screwed up state of the world, conspiracy theories are the only things that make sense. So, I can totally see why folks might believe that something like a vaccine for COVID is a government conspiracy to microchip everyone. It definitely would not fall among the worst or most outrageous things that the U.S. government has ever done. Since COVID began to interfere with normal life back at the first of the Jesse-Lee Dunlap Guest Columnist year, I’ve heard Janet Presson speak on a number of occasions at public meetings. She’s been called an extremist and a conspiracy theorist due to her anti-vaccine and anti-mask stances, and I have gotten a little bit of insight as to why Janet has landed in this extremist camp — having a child be permanently vaccine-injured would definitely push a parent to extremism. But there is something to be weighed against our ideologies when we enter the public sphere no matter how autonomous, extreme and skeptical we are of the government, of society as a whole, and that is personal responsibility.

Personal responsibility requires that we make certain that in exercising our personal freedoms we do not harm others. If I am consuming alcohol, my responsibility is to not injure someone else in my altered state. I am personally liable if I wreck a car into someone when I am drunk. If I am carrying a gun in public, it is my responsibility to make certain that my head is on a swivel and that my gun is secure enough that someone can’t disarm me and use my gun for nefarious purposes. I am personally liable if I allow my gun to be snatched from my holster and used to shoot someone because I am preoccupied. When we consider illness in this context of autonomy and responsibility, we are responsible for not getting others sick if we are unwell and contagious. If we do get others sick, we should be held liable for doing so.

However, Janet Presson is unwilling to engage in the trade off of personal ideologies and personal responsibilities. She and others have spent their life energy during public comments lately to rail against COVID precautions and mock simple measures that would keep our community safer. And it is one thing for Joe Public to get up during public comments and say whatever is on his mind, but it is quite another for a nurse, a nurse who sits on the Haywood Healthcare Foundation board, to stand up publicly and deny science. With the power that rests in the hands of Haywood Healthcare Foundation board members, it is important that we have people on the board who rely on data to make decisions. It is obvious that Janet Presson cannot serve in this capacity and needs to be removed from the Haywood Healthcare Foundation board immediately. The well-being of our community depends on it. (Jesse Lee Dunlap lives in Waynesville, is a harm reduction advocate and works for Down Home NC in Haywood County. queer4jesus@protonmail.com)

Thanks to all the election volunteers

To the Editor:

With the most contentious presidential election in modern American history coming to a close, there is enough finger-pointing going on to satisfy even the most cynical. Sadly, that means that a great deal of good work is going unnoticed. Now is the time to thank the many election volunteers, paid and unpaid, who gave so much of their time and energy to help make the voting process work as it should in Swain County.

Inside the polls, there were dozens of people assigned to tasks such as verifying voters’ names and registrations; explaining authorization forms voters must sign; wiping voting booths clean after each use in this time of Covid; providing curbside service, if needed; and redirecting “lost” voters to their proper polling places. The inside workers are recruited from each party, trained by county election staff, and required to keep their own political preferences private.

Outside the polls, the rules are very different. Dozens of partisan volunteers spent their time welcoming voters to the polls, and offering opinions, voting recommendations, candidates’ campaign literature and sample ballots to anyone who was interested. At the Whittier-Cherokee precinct under the leadership of Lisa Montelongo and Mary “Missy” Crowe during early voting and on Election Day, seven young Cherokee people handed

LETTERS

out information, provided free T-shirts and literature, and made sure Cherokee people voted. Special thanks is given to Gadusi Crowe, Amy Lincoln, P’takatu Lincoln, Simon Montelongo, Quedi Sampson, Mikayla Shell and Rose Shell for all of their efforts. Some of these young people also helped with voter registration prior to early voting.

There were other volunteers, both in and outside the polls, who were required to sit silently as they monitored their locations for problems or voting irregularities.

Clearly, the volunteers, along with paid election staff, got the job done well. When all of the votes were counted during the official canvass on November 13, the numbers showed that 4,675 people voted during early voting, 1,658 voted in person on Election Day and 760 voted by mail-in or absentee ballots. Fourteen of 58 provisional ballots were accepted; those rejected were cast by out-ofcounty voters. The final total showed that 7,107 out of 10,088 registered Swain County voters cast their ballots. That’s a turnout rate of 70.34 percent — the highest in recent memory.

The process did not end there. There was a recount on November 20 to reexamine votes cast in the race for chief justice of the N.C. Supreme Court. Under the watch of the Board of Elections and observers from both parties, the final totals were substantially the same as those reported in the prior canvass. There was a more detailed “hand-eye” recount on December 8 because the margin between the two candidates was razor thin, statewide.

No matter which candidates you were backing and who won or lost, we owe a debt of gratitude to the dozens of Swain County volunteers whose efforts and enthusiasm make the voting system work, year after year, election after election. Thanks, volunteers! It could not have been done without you. Mary A. Herr Cherokee

I was watched over by angels

To the Editor:

I wanted to let everyone know what an amazing medical community we are fortunate enough to live in, especially during this Blessed Christmas season of hope.

At 10 p.m. on May 13, 2020, I was ready to go to bed, but my husband, Dick, convinced me to stay up a little longer. He was the first angel that came to my aid. (My doctor said if I had gone to bed, I probably would have died in my sleep.)

After watching television for a few minutes, my husband told me later that when he spoke to me and I didn’t answer, he immediately knew something was wrong and called 911.

My second angels, the EMT personnel, arrived within 10 minutes after the call, because they were already in our area. They asked what hospital I wanted to go to, I could no longer speak, but nodded my head to go to Haywood Regional Medical Center.

The angels were there in the Emergency Room at Haywood where I was immediately taken for a Cat Scan of the brain. I found out later that they found a massive blood clot in the speech and memory center of my brain. The clot was too large to be treated with TPA, the clot busting drug, but due to Mission Hospital’s community partnership with Haywood, I was immediately transported to Mission Hospital’s Stroke Center where the greatest surgical team in the world was waiting for me, with Dr. Jonas Goldstein at the helm.

They rushed me into OR at 2 a.m. where they performed a neuro-thrombectomy. That is a surgical procedure where, guided by X-ray technology, they insert a catheter into the aorta and guide it into the area of the brain where the clot is located. The catheter they use for this has small surgical instruments attached to the end of it that are used to remove the clot.

After this procedure, I was in ICU for three days. The first couple of days I was not making much sense verbally and did not realize how grave my situation had been. By the third day I was speaking normally again and was aware of what I had been through. When the neurologist, Dr. Alexander Schneider, came into my room he called me “The Miracle Patient.” I thanked him for going to medical school and he replied with the greatest humility, “No, I’m just a small part of a great team. God is the one to F