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Corrections Needed
Bloomington Herald-Times, January 26, 1998
To the Editor:
Reading failed County Commissioner candidate Mark Stoops' letter, I noticed a few things that need to be corrected.
First, to say it was Republicans that gave Sheriff Williamson a "character trashing" ignores reality. Some of the strongest criticism is coming from The Herald-Times and Channel 6. The H-T is not exactly a Republican controlled outlet, nor is Channel 6.
Sheriff Williamson is not the victim of an ideological witch-hunt. He, if the allegations against him are true, is the victim of his own unethical practices and those of his office. To suggest otherwise is foolish.
I was also fascinated by Stoops' allegation that the county party's desire to rid themselves of Jerry Bales is because he "doesn't vote the way he's told, doesn't do the goose step." Putting the inflammatory Nazi comparison Stoops uses aside, that Bales is a team player is exactly the reason many Republicans want to be rid of him. The "team" Bales marches in lockstep with is the Democratic Party, particularly the more radical facets of that party. Bales is not being targeted because he is "independent". He's being targeted because he's a radical left-wing extremist. Bales voted against a ban on partial-birth abortion, a procedure so horrifying even liberals such as U.S. House Democratic leaders David Bonior and Richard Gephardt voted for the ban at the federal level.
Bales' friendships with Democrats such as Mark Kruzan and Vi Simpson are not, and have never been, the issue. If the Republicans truly excommunicated people who had friends in the other party, I would be the first to go. The issue is that Bales votes with the more left-leaning Democrats in the Legislature. Bales' friendships aren't the issue: his left-wing ideology is. That is why Republicans want to elect a true conservative to the legislature: Jeff Ellington.
Scott Tibbs
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