Letters to the editor - Monday (1-30-2012)

Defense Act should raise more concern

I would like to thank the editors of this paper for printing the Jan. 27 article titled, “Defense Act is indefensible.” On the day this bill passed, we lost our freedom. Sadly, very few of my fellow citizens seemed to care or even notice.

The Defense Authorization Act contains provisions that allow for indefinite imprisonment without charge, trial or even a hearing. Those of you who say that this only applies to terrorists must realize that there was a conscious decision to not exclude Americans from the provisions of this bill. Even though it clearly violates the U.S. Constitution, it was enacted by members of Congress who have taken an oath to uphold the Constitution.

No, I am not soft on terrorists. They should be arrested, given a speedy trial, and if found guilty, should be executed or imprisoned. If they are found innocent, they should be released. That is the way our system of justice works, according to the Constitution. Anyone who argues otherwise is subverting the principles of law that separate our nation from those of a dictatorship. Ben Franklin stated that freedom should never be exchanged for temporary safety.

When will an article such as this provoke an arrest and indefinite detention without charge, trial or hearing? Would it be OK to tie the person in a chair, put a bag over their head and then flood it with water to simulate drowning? I have a very simple definition of torture. If a member of your family was in the military and captured by the enemy, would you consider it torture if the procedure was performed on your loved one? Some have argued that torture saves lives. Two thousand years ago an innocent was tortured to death. What would he say?

Please pray for our nation.

— Joe D. Teeter

Gold Hill

Look beyond slogans

I’ve found that most political “talking points,” those easy to remember bumper-sticker slogans used by both Democrats and Republicans, aren’t very accurate. I had a conversation last weekend with an old friend who was supporting President Obama’s economic policies by saying that “Bush almost ran this country off a cliff.” I wasn’t a fan of President Bush by any stretch of the imagination, but I couldn’t resist taking the bait. “How,” I asked, “is the economy Bush’s fault?”

He started by saying that it was the Bush tax cuts and all the lost revenue that resulted. When I explained that revenue was actually $10 trillion higher under Bush than under Clinton, he seemed surprised. So then he said that Clinton created millions of jobs, while Bush created none. I explained that the BLS (Bureau of Labor Statistics) keeps an annual history of unemployment figures, and the average unemployment rate for Clinton’s eight years and Bush’s eight years was identical — 5.2 percent; so obviously the “jobs created” numbers are somewhat ambiguous and misleading. Besides, I said, according to the BLS, there were millions of jobs created under Bush, in spite of the fact that the 9/11 attacks destroyed the leading financial sector of the country; not to mention the dot-com bubble that was wreaking havoc with the markets when Bush took office.

Not ready to give up, he then blamed the cost of “Bush’s two wars.” I asked him if he really believed that, considering that both wars together have cost a total of around $1 trillion since they started, while total government expenditure was close to $30 trillion for that same time period. War costs have only been 1/30th of total government spending, not exactly an economic game-changer.

Bush isn’t blameless, of course, but you’ve got to go beyond reading bumper-stickers to find the truth.

— Steve Pender

Rockwell

Too lenient on rape

Regarding two separate news stories in the Jan. 24 Post:

A 29-year-old man is charged with raping a 15-year-old child and walks out of the jail after posting a $5,000 bond.

A man is charged with stealing metal from air conditioners and is in jail under a $100,000 bond.

As always, crimes against property are perceived as worse than crimes against people — even a 15-year-old child raped by a 29-year-old man. The sickening part of this injustice is that it has been true far too long. We seem to value our stuff more than our selves; specifically, in this case, our children.

This will never change until, we — all of us, whether we have children or not — demand change in the laws. Most significantly, we must change the way we think about rape, the way we define rape, and put into place laws that reflect zero tolerance.

Stealing metal from air conditioners is considered more heinous under our current law than the raping of our girls by sexual predators. This is the face of the age-old tyranny of sacrificing our girl children and the tacit approval the society.

Tell the “justice system”: Get it straight. No more “statutory” rapes. No more “Romeo and Juliet” clauses. Rape is rape, no adjectives necessary.

Keep your hands off my girl child, my sister, my mother, my wife, our women and our boys and men. Get out of the house and into our communities. Let us use our strongest voices. We are all responsible. Get it straight.

— Bridget Starkey

Greensboro

N.C.’s money problem

With North Carolina facing billion-dollar deficits, it seems our leaders in Raleigh would want to evaluate every financial policy used to govern our state. Even the statewide lottery needs a closer evaluation. Since we live in the Bible Belt I take it for granted that many Christians oppose and many support our lottery. Here are reasons why the Christian community should view our state’s gambling system with suspicion. First, God presents work as the normal way to earn money to support our families (Eph. 4:28; II Thess. 3:12). All of our incomes belong to God, and we are only caretakers of all God has allowed us to earn. It is God’s plan to use money or the lack of money to accomplish a few things within us.

The blessing of more money earned allows us to help others. My gift to others comes from the work from my own hands rather than the hard work of others (i.e. giving lottery money to the church is giving away other people’s money rather than what you have earned). Next, greed and covetousness are basic motives in gambling (Exodus 20:18, Hebrews 13:5). These, like all sins, are to be avoided. Our lottery system, then, generates these devastating qualities in citizens and promotes a get-rich-quick attitude which harms the economy. Also, the Bible teaches that wealth gained the wrong way breaks up families (Proverbs 15:27). It’s also disastrous for people to develop a get-rich-quick attitude (Proverbs 28:20,22). Our state’s gambling laws produce disgruntled people who would rather play the lottery than work. As a result, higher unemployment, higher welfare population and higher taxes follow, much less the crime perhaps generated in some areas.

The lottery system needs to be repealed. And remember: every time you see or hear a pro-lottery commercial about someone who won the lottery or obtained an educational scholarship, we fail to hear about the multiple families that broke up over impulsive, greedy gambling habits that caused mountains of debt and family pressure.

— Sid Stewart

Trinity