Thoughts at random
It seems Joe Biden is busy buying votes, forgiving college loans. These loans are contracts with a promise to repay. Soon, a college degree will be as worthless as a free high school degree is now. Something is only worth what you are willing to pay for it.
As human workers whose income is taxed to fund the government are replaced by automation (encouraged by tax breaks from the same government), revenue will fall. Why can't we tax the corporations accordingly? If automation replaces five workers, tax the corporation for the same five positions. The corporations still come out ahead, with no costs for benefits.
I am no fan of Her Royal Highness Sarah. However, the opposition to the LEARNS Act wants to hobble the competition by saying the same counterproductive rules should apply to voucher schools, too. They implicitly recognize the real problem is the rules themselves, so why not start getting rid of bad rules instead of hobbling everyone else with them?
If a fertilized human egg is a baby, why can't we claim tax deductions for the dozen or so dependent "babies" frozen in liquid nitrogen at the IVF clinic?
WILLIAM LANDRUM
Mountain Home
Coach from Kentucky
Payback is here at last for all that time in the past decades when Eddie Sutton said he wanted to "crawl to Lexington!"
BILL LONON
Springdale
Great hire for Hogs
A total eclipse and John Calipari coming to Arkansas? End times indeed!
How ironic that Kentucky finally returns the favor for stealing Eddie Sutton. This is the greatest hire for Razorback basketball since Nolan Richardson rolled into town. I probably won't be around for the next eclipse in Arkansas, but I just might make it to see the Hogs win another national championship.
MIKE COPELAND
Little Rock
On distortion of truth
Donald Trump selling Bibles. Interesting. From the Book of Acts: "Even from your own number will men arise and distort the truth in order to draw away disciples after them." Who better to bring reality to those words than The Donald?
CHRIS BAKER
Little Rock
Restoring our rights
This is to address just one of the assertions by Gary Newton in his April 5 guest column. He states that the Arkansas Educational Rights Amendment takes away rights. I find the opposite to be true. The Arkansas Educational Rights Amendment reinstates historic rights for taxpayers by restoring the principle of one education accreditation standard for public dollars.
Arkansas public school education accreditation standards are the product of our Legislature and state executive leadership, both Republican. Logically it follows that both branches agree these standards have value and meet the state responsibility to provide both an adequate education and a standard of accountability for taxpayer dollar investment. The current document is 20 pages.
By comparison, the Arkansas Nonpublic School Accrediting Association, just one of the approved accreditation sources for non-public schools, has its own accreditation standards document. The current document is six pages.
Before parsing these, one thing is clear. Either the current public accreditation standard is bloated with unnecessary requirements which our lawmakers and leadership have been remiss in editing, or the non-public school accreditation standard is missing elements our lawmakers and leadership believe are important.
Where in life, or in business, or in a taxpayer's right to accountability for spending does this make sense? How is it that taxpayers do not have the right to expect one consistent, efficient set of standards for public money intended to deliver an educational outcome? Proliferation of standards is not responsible stewardship. And yet, here we are.
In addition to rights restored, this amendment offers provisions which are complementary to the highest educational aspirations of the LEARNS Act.
I signed the petition because voters are capable of making a thoughtful decision on this amendment at the ballot box. I can't fathom why our state leadership and two well-financed and organized ballot question committees are afraid we might.
JANICE HUGHES
Bella Vista
New Web host awful
Well, I must say that your new Web host is abysmal. Reading the paper has become a chore when the other Web host made it easy and simple to read. You may lose me as a subscriber if this isn't corrected, and would say I am not the only subscriber who feels this way.
I want to be able to scroll one page at a time. I do not need a sidebar telling me I have signed in and I don't need or want multiple pages on the screen at a time. This is terrible.
CHARLES TAYLOR
Hot Springs Village