Letters to the editor | Dec. 4 edition

Published 11:30 am Tuesday, December 2, 2025

Santa letters

We’re so excited that Santa and Mrs. Claus will soon be visiting Vashon at WinterFest!

We also know he’s eager to see kids and their parents in person at Santa’s Cottage, in the Village Green, from 12-3 p.m. on Saturday and Sunday, Dec. 13 and 14. Parents, we hope you remember to bring your cameras or charge up your phones for those keepsake photos!

Santa has also let us know that he is eager to receive letters from kids, which should be dropped off this month at a special mailbox at Vashon Bookshop instead of put in the regular mailbox at the post office.

Santa’s love for Vashon goes way back — and thank you, Bruce Haulman and Mike Sudduth, for detailing the history of Santa’s Cottage in the Vashon Heritage Museum’s “It’s Your History” column in The Beachcomber.

But we need to make a slight correction about something that is different this year. The column said that Santa’s elves will handwrite replies to Santa letters, postmark them “North Pole,” and mail them back to Vashon kids.

That has happened in the past, but this year we’ve been told that due to an overload at the North Pole, all letters may not get answers this year. But that doesn’t mean that Santa doesn’t read all of them!

Here’s hoping everyone has a joyous holiday!

Bettie Edwards

A letter to Trump

Mr. President, have you heard of the Statue of Liberty, located on Liberty Island in New York Harbor? There’s a poem by Emma Lazarus inscribed on the base which ends:

“Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

Perhaps the poetry is too subtle for you, Mr. President.

What’s clear is that your private army, ICE, is not only violating the Constitution, but everything this country stands for. Or perhaps you’re simply blind and have no clue that you are committing treason.

Those people who still have some respect for this country, have become ashamed of what is going on around them. You’ve brought others to a whole new level of callousness regarding the lives of our fellow man.

Please do us all a favor and resign yesterday. Your golf courses are calling for you.

Shelley Simon