Astute observations
It seems former U.S. Senator Dale Bumpers, one of Arkansas' finest citizens, certainly had Ronald Reagan pegged. He also had some astute observations about others.
I think his same observation regarding Reagan would also apply to our Harvard-educated, recently elected senator from Dardanelle.
Probably these writings were private thoughts of Sen. Bumpers and were never meant for public consumption. Unfortunately things like that eventually come out. No real damage done--except to Republicans who idolize Reagan.
JAMES B. DAVIS
Hot Springs
Electoral College tilt
The Washington Post laid out a well-worded argument against changing the electoral college, saying that a change to allocating votes by congressional district would unfairly favor the Republican presidential candidate. What the Post failed to say was that it seems the current rules unfairly favor the Democratic presidential candidate because large states like California and New York tend to vote Democrat, thus gaining big blocks of electoral votes.
Setting aside the political parties, let us realize and recognize that the current practice of allocating all of a state's electoral votes to the candidate with the majority seriously disenfranchises the voters favoring the other candidate. In Arkansas for example, a Democratic candidate for president cannot reasonably expect to gain a single one of our six electoral votes, although he may have garnered 40 percent of the popular vote. Likewise, in California, a Republican candidate cannot reasonably expect to gain a single one of its 55 electoral votes despite winning 40 percent of the popular vote.
Why should a voter even go to the polls? Whether a state's electoral votes should be allocated by congressional district, or apportioned by statewide results is an open question. Perhaps each state should make that decision.
But what the Post clearly--although inadvertently--points out is that the current system disenfranchises voters by effectively nullifying those who vote with the minority in a state.
The presidential election should hinge on the collective will of each voter, not on a winner-take-all system which turns a few states into "battlegrounds" while casting the other states into one electoral pile or another.
JACK SCHMEDEMAN
Little Rock
Constitutional classes
The recent controversy regarding members of Congress sending a letter to Iran about the arms negotiations is overkill. The president, as chief of state, is chief maker of foreign policies. But do members of Congress have the right to give input into foreign-policy decisions? The answer is yes.
Congress has the power of the purse. The Senate confirms ambassadors and ratifies treaties. Both the Senate and the House appropriate funds to implement the treaties. So what is the problem? It is all a matter of the constitutional principle of checking and balancing power.
I would suggest going back to college and take a course on the American presidency. I took this class as an undergraduate student at SAU. The course will clarify these concerns.
LESLIE PUTMAN
El Dorado
Why, that's brilliant!
I have to say how deeply impressed I was by Ashton Miller III's subtle and sardonic letter titled "Tuition troubles."
Miller's ringing sarcasm about past times when the University of Arkansas was dominated by succeeding generations of white, Protestant, heterosexual males really struck home. His penetrating examples of how this dominant strain kept black people, poor people, foreigners and Hispanics (except maybe a younger son of some Banana Republic dictator) out of the university's classrooms, laboratories and library strikingly revealed how these "generational" family students made a mockery of the idea of an open, inquiring center of higher learning established for the shining purpose of bringing enlightenment to all the people of our state.
Besieged as we are these days by the narrow literalism of so many journalists, politicians and preachers, it is refreshing to read the work of a satirist like Ashton Miller III, pointing up the wonderful possibilities available to individuals willing to seek the rewards that the University of Arkansas and other state institutions of higher education made available to Arkansans and other scholars from through the country and the world. Long may they reign.
TOM KENNEDY
Fayetteville
Nation's driving force
Often Voices letters plead for America to return to God, as he made us great and now we forsake him.
If David, a murderer and adulterer, can be God's chosen, then maybe America is God's chosen nation. Historically we have not acted in a very Christian way. Burning women at the stake because they were different, keeping a race of people enslaved for personal profit, seizing land and killing the indigenous peoples because it was our "Manifest Destiny" to rule from shore to shore, working children long hours in horrible conditions; there are a multitude of other examples.
In most cases, Christianity was used to justify our behavior. The truth of the matter is that greed was probably the driving force in America's development.
For those who are despondent about our nation, like Lois Wise, I suggest Romans, chapters 13 and 14. Paul writes about government and hot-button issues of his day and how believers should act.
ED HUDNALL
Bryant
Editorial on 04/01/2015