Love and Little Rock
I am intrigued and downright proud of the recent response Little Rock provided Amazon, which was searching for a city for its second headquarters. Amazon’s search was highly competitive, with hundreds of cities vying for selection.
Little Rock did not fit Amazon’s criteria and, furthermore, we were not willing to sacrifice all that it would have taken to be chosen. Yet our city is the perfect choice for many industries and corporations looking for a home.
Rather than fall into Amazon’s large file of “losing presentations,” our city did much more.
We gained national recognition with a clever “Love, Little Rock” campaign that not only informed Amazon that we were “breaking up,” but noted Little Rock’s tremendous assets. It was a smart and highly creative investment in our city’s economic development future. Kudos to all involved!
My hope now is that “Love, Little Rock” is transformed into a powerful internal rallying cry for our city. Little Rock, like most cities, would benefit from its citizens showing more love and respect for one another. The division and name-calling that is so rampant nationally does not have be practiced here.
BRENDA SCISSON
Little Rock
Columns misleading
We know that Walter E. Williams leans hard right. I think his comments are extreme and very misleading. In a recent column he railed on nondiscretionary programs, expressly created to help the average American, to the point of calling it slavery and ignored the fact that the military budget is 16 percent of the entire budget and a whopping 57 percent of the discretionary spending, and growing. In his next column, he complained that the wealthy pay too much in taxes and ignored the fact that the top 1 percent control about 40 percent of the wealth and the top 10 percent control about 76 percent of the wealth.
He seems more interested in serving as a political pawn of the right side of the political spectrum than providing complete information. We are sure he is doing quite well himself. His half-truths should not be allowed in a newspaper with integrity. A person who knows the full facts but tells a half-truth is telling a full lie.
Shame on the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette for publishing his misleading columns. So sad.
PAUL WAGENER
Jacksonville
Poor Sarah at podium
How terribly sad it must be making that sweet Pastor Mike Huckabee to see his baby girl fronting those miserable fluffy fabrications from the POTUS press podium. I’m sure he knows he must have let something go adrift in Sarah’s childhood upbringing if she can, in maturity, play kitty-litter cover-up shtick in full view of an appalled press corps.
Mike, our former sweetie-pie governator, please tell your girl to scoop up her jacks and mascara brushes and bail the heck out … Sarah, you are breaking your daddy’s heart.
ELIZABETH K. HARRIS
Cherokee Village
Execution harms all
I am writing to second the substantive concerns raised in your recently published piece, “A terrible mistake/Take execution off the table” about the scheduled execution of Jack Greene.
As an attorney and former circuit judge who presided over felony criminal cases, I believe strongly that if we are to have the death penalty, all laws must be followed and all rights must be honored in its administration. Our shared legal heritage, both for the United States and Arkansas, informs us that the execution of persons with mental illness so severe that they lack a rational understanding of the punishment they face is forbidden. Our notion of criminal justice rests on the foundation that inherent in the concept of punishment is the concept of understanding, which leads in turn to accountability. To kill a fellow human being—and that is what Jack Greene is—when the whole rationale for punishment is absent is demeaning to each of us.
Certainly, if you and I focus only on the horror of Jack Greene’s deeds and the untold suffering he has caused for which he has been convicted—to in effect dehumanize him—then our normal resistance to engage in the act of killing is overcome by our emotions of disgust and revenge-seeking. Its understandable how we get to this point. But do we give in or do we tell ourselves that to dehumanize a fellow human being hurts each of us? Would we rather not recognize and honor in Jack Greene the spark that makes him human, a trait he shares with you and me, and confine him from society for the balance of his life? In following this path, don’t we give honor to each of us?
We all benefit when the law is scrupulously followed, including the provisions against the execution of the severely mentally ill, like Jack Greene.
JON COMSTOCK
Rogers
Arithmetic question
A long time ago when were learning simple arithmetic, we were taught that when adding or subtracting we would “borrow the one” (example, 39 plus 23=62, having borrowed the one, adding the 9 and 3=12, but carrying it over to the 2 and 3. The subtraction of 123 less 39 would also result in the carrying of 1. I understand this is no longer taught. So my question is: Where did carry the one go?
I’ll bring this question up at the next session of SWINE (Spectators Wildly Indignant about Nearly Everything) to be held at Williams Junction at a later date. Also please do not forget the celebration of the annual Who is Renfrew Day at Catholic High School for Boys.
DAVE STUFF
Little Rock