Observer Forum: Letters to the editor 05.12.15
In response to “Editorial on surplus smacked of poor sportsmanship” (May 10 Forum):
Editorial reflected truth about taxes
Now let me get this straight, Mayor Vinroot. If a worker in 2013 had $1,000 withheld from his or her income for the year and received a $250 refund and now has the same $1,000 deducted but their N.C. tax bill for 2014 erased the refund, how is this not a tax increase?
Is that not what the editors of the Observer said in their editorial?
Jack Flynn
Charlotte
In response to “Lincoln County leader backs Christian prayer” (May 10):
Commissioner shows danger of mixing prayer and politics
Thank you, Lincoln County commissioner Carrol Mitchem, for showing why there should be no prayer, of any kind, at any government function for any reason ever. Pray all you want, to any god you want at your home, business or other private property as much as you want. Government should have no influence on your church, either.
How can others trust men like Mr. Mitchem to teach them about religion when he does not understand that Jews, Christians and Muslims worship the same god and go to the same heaven?
Alan Dockery
Newton
Ag-gag bill would hurt disclosure in many places
Imagine for a moment that you have a parent in a nursing home here in North Carolina. Now imagine that your parent is being abused by the nursing home’s staff. You’d want someone to document it for proof and speak up, right?
If N.C. House Bill 405/Senate Bill 433 passes, it would be illegal for someone to document the abuse. It’s utterly ridiculous, but it’s true. It would have other implications too, such as making undercover investigations on farms (which have food safety and animal cruelty issues) illegal.
Please join me in calling our legislators and asking them to oppose the measure before it’s too late.
Lee Smith
Troutman
In response to “Obama lures odd allies in trade fight” (May 8):
Don’t want my representative voting for fast track authority
Your story has me worried my representative, Alma Adams, doesn’t understand that a vote for “fast track” is basically a vote to pass the Trans-Pacific Partnership.
I support the president on issues like raising wages and reforming our criminal justice system. But I couldn’t disagree more on giving him “fast track” power to railroad the dangerous TPP through Congress with little debate and zero chance to amend the deal, no matter how bad it will be for workers and our democracy.
Trade is a test of Rep. Adams’ loyalty – not to the president but to all the hard-working people in Charlotte and beyond whom the TPP would harm.
Kendrick Cowans
Charlotte
In response to “One notch ahead of Baltimore” (Taylor Batten column, May 9):
Answer isn’t education; it’s using contraception
How can you be advocating for higher-quality schooling when Baltimore has the second highest pupil spending among big cities, and the results are failure and more failure?
The Moynihan Report 50 years ago showed that roughly 25 percent of black children lived in a fatherless household. Today, after trillions of dollars in aid to the poor, the rate is over 70 percent.
Let’s get an all-out effort going to convince unmarried women to use contraceptives and reduce pregnancies. Action is needed, not opinions!
Ed Garland
Charlotte
I’m skeptical about study that picks Detroit over Charlotte
Does anyone really believe that poor people would be better off moving to Detroit from Charlotte? Any study done by Harvard elites, especially a study as complex as that one, makes me really suspicious of the outcome.
The poor have problems in every city, and the reasons are numerous. It is not that the schools are bad in the poor neighborhoods. It is that the parents do not get their kids to school every day to learn.
Dick Meyer
Charlotte
This story was originally published May 11, 2015 at 3:18 PM with the headline "Observer Forum: Letters to the editor 05.12.15."