Tolerating other views
Can we agree that not all females are destined to be birth mothers? My daughter from a very young age always insisted she did not want to ever give birth. While she fretted, I would assure her that nobody was going to force her to have a baby. Apparently that will no longer be the case in our country once the court throws out our previously "settled law." She is now an adult who uses an IUD as birth control. She tells me that some conservative states are looking at making IUDs illegal. Where does it stop?
My understanding is that these laws are being struck down in the name of religion and God. Where do my religious rights come in? The religion I was brought up in believes that life is for the living and that a human being does not exist until God breathes the breath of life into its body. We do not believe that a clump of cells has a soul. We believe we should support all women as they follow their soul's destiny. If I can tolerate other religious views, why can't they tolerate mine?
Why are our laws now overlooking the tenet of separation of church and state? Heaven help us.
MELODIE MARCKS
Fayetteville
Deaths' responsibility
One of the comedian Ron White's famous lines is "You can't fix stupid." I could not help thinking of that listening to the congressional hearings with Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas. He seemed to have no feeling of responsibility for the fentanyl overdose deaths or the burdens on communities due to an unsecured southern border. He seemed to have no fear of impeachment as critical representatives came at him. Dereliction of duty is probably not in his vocabulary.
However, what if he became the target of multiple civil wrongful-death suits as his department's failure to enforce the law makes him and those in the chain of command, both above and below, accessories to fentanyl deaths? Suppose they had to face a jury of their peers and explain their motives.
CHARLES VERMONT
Bentonville
Looking for an enemy
I served three voluntary years in the U.S. military during the Vietnam conflict, so I am certainly not a pacifist. However, some of the political ads on TV disturb me. Some candidates trumpet their Christianity while loudly voicing their desire to fight, fight, fight. Their candidacy appears to depend on a need to have an enemy to defeat. I think they could be labeled "belligerent Christians."
I don't claim to have any power to determine who is and is not a Christian as I believe no individual or organization has that power, but this approach flies in the face of my understanding of basic Christian principles.
BILL POLK
Conway
No 'free money' here
This letter is not intended as a diatribe against rent subsidies. Its intent, though, is to respond to a letter published in this newspaper that lamented the cancellation of rent subsidies because those dollars were "free money." Unfortunately, many others might join the letter's author in asserting federal monies are "free." Even if there are millions of our citizens that feel that way, in response I will offer a bit of economic wisdom often attributed to the economics Nobel Prize laureate Milton Friedman: "There is no free lunch."
Even if there are no other valid reasons, there is no "free money." Each of us is certainly being financially assaulted by the current levels of inflation. While I cannot speak for all, I believe many knowledgeable in economics will tell you that a great deal of the inflation we are experiencing today is attributable to the trillions of dollars ladled into our economy in the federal government's efforts to reduce the financial impacts of things being done in hopes of countering the impacts of covid. Whether those federal government dollars were good or bad from the health, financial or political perspective, if inflation is induced via government spending, it can be viewed as a form of taxation we pay as we go shopping.
As I said earlier, even if there are no other reasons, the inflation we are current enduring affirms there is no "free money."
PHILLIP TAYLOR
Fayetteville
Stooping ever lower
Every campaign season I don't feel the advertisements can get worse. And yet they do. This year's seem to have hit a new low. What you basically have is 90 percent attack ads on opponents, with no one seeming to have anything to say about anything positive they've accomplished.
The other 10 percent are vague promises of things that sound great with no details on how they'll be accomplished. Like Sarah Huckabee Sanders, promising to phase out Arkansas income tax. Sure, that sounds great, but please explain how you'll continue to fund services that rely on those, like law enforcement, education, health, human services, firefighters, EMTs, social workers. If you're in an occupation that relies on state funding, be careful what you vote for.
Some of the ads are borderline libelous. As someone whose job involves marketing and advertising, if the company I work for made allegations against our competitors like these, we'd be sued out of business in heartbeat.
Most disappointing to me is John Boozman. I might not have agreed with his policies, but he seemed dignified. His attacks on his opponents and his gladly affiliating himself with Sarah, Tom Cotton, and Donald Trump have definitely lost my vote.
ANTHONY LLOYD
Hot Springs