Letters

True goal of secretary

Although the quotes from U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos, with the title "Education options" which appeared in the Sunday Perspective section of this newspaper, may seem like a call for student-centered education, it seems its true aim is to justify supporting private, church-related charter schools with public funding. She and her husband Dick DeVos of Holland, Mich., have a foundation which has contributed $8.6 million to private religious schools, showing their commitment to building "God's kingdom" through education.

States can fund such schools by first allowing charter schools, and then allowing charter schools to be paid using support vouchers. Arkansas is one of 14 states that does both. Six states do neither. I believe the real goal of Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos is to get around separation of church and state.

ROY VAIL

Mena

Cars crossing the line

I hope the recent cross-centerline crash near Houston, Texas, which killed 13 people generates a review of the Arkansas Highway Department's centerline rumble-strip policy.

I contacted the Federal Highway Administration's Safety Office in Washington, D.C., relative to other states' policy on installing centerline rumble strips. A study they referred me to indicated that Arkansas is one of just a very few states which do not install continuous centerline rumble strips on higher-volume two-lane highways. The Arkansas Highway Department does not typically install centerline rumble strips in passing zones where the highway alignment is straight. However, drivers are more likely to dial on or text with their cell phones when they are on a straight section of roadway than when driving in a curve.

I reviewed the fatal crash reports for January, and it appears 12 people died in a cross-centerline crashes in Arkansas in just one month. If safety is truly the highway department's highest priority, then it should be installing continuous centerline rumble strips on at least 30 percent to 50 percent of highways which carry the highest traffic volumes.

The department enhanced its snow-removal policy by adopting some of Missouri's practices. It could also save many more lives every year by adopting many of Missouri's highway safety policies and practices. Missouri has reduced its rural highway fatality rate in the last decade much more than Arkansas has.

What public benefit is gained by not installing more continuous centerline rumble strips, which warrants the loss of lives by not doing so?

TOM WELCH

Fairfield Bay

Compare newspapers

Every time the price of a subscription to this paper increases, I see letters about how it's not worth it. I want to share a perspective of having been reading another paper for a week.

My husband and I spent last week in the Tampa, Fla., area. We bought the Tampa paper every day. There is no comparison to the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. Very little news at all, especially national. It was completely a waste of money. Be thankful that we have a paper that has a lot of news. I am.

KAREN HERBERT

Little Rock

On cuts to foreign aid

The UN has said recently that the world is facing its worst humanitarian crisis since the end of World War II, with millions of our neighbors worldwide facing poverty, starvation and famine. Foreign aid and relief are imperative in today's world.

Since 1990, the amount of global poverty has been cut in half, thanks in large part to the increase in international spending to lift some of these poverty-stricken regions up from the ashes. But there is still work to be done if we are to meet our Millennium Development Goals by 2030. Despite this, and the fact that the U.S. already gives less of a percentage of its budget than almost all other major nations (less than 1 percent of our entire budget goes toward foreign aid), the Trump administration is proposing a 28.7 percent decrease in spending toward USAID.

If this happens, we will face the consequence of knowing that we could have done more to stop preventable deaths in regions of the world that are in crisis right now, and we will risk our own national security in the process.

President Ronald Reagan, who advocated for increased foreign-aid spending (and double what we spend now) said this: "You know the excuses: We can't afford foreign aid anymore, or we're wasting money pouring it into these poor countries, or we can't buy friends ... Well, all these excuses are just that, excuses--and they're dead wrong."

Increased spending on foreign assistance is something that Democrats, Republicans, military officials, and even the 9/11 Commission have agreed upon for years. I believe these drastic proposed cuts to foreign aid are not only ethically flawed, but they are unquestionably un-American.

DUSTIN JAYROE

Little Rock

Of justice and mercy

Governor Hutchinson: Quakers have a long history of respect for "that of God" in every human being. The Fayetteville Quaker Meeting is united in our belief that the death penalty is wrong, just as murder is wrong. You are planning to kill seven people this month in the name of the people of Arkansas. That makes all of us share in the responsibility for their deaths. Let it be known that this is not done in our name.

How you address this matter is also important because it represents to a world under the shadow of terrorism what we as a nation believe about the sanctity of human life.

We do not ask for pardons for these men; we ask that you commute their sentences to life imprisonment. Let us be a civilized state, an example of justice administered with mercy.

DEIRDRE PHILLIPS

Fayetteville

Deirdre Phillips is clerk of the Fayetteville Monthly Meeting, Religious Society of Friends (Quakers).

Editorial on 04/12/2017

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