North Carolina can have beautiful beaches and offshore drilling

Offshore drilling would benefit N.C.

Objections to drilling seem to be driven more by the leftist ideology to stop all carbon energy production, than by the “environmental threat” posed by drilling.

North Carolina can have beautiful beaches and out-of-sight oil rigs off our shore.

Turning immigrants into scapegoats

My anger and frustration is boiling over. What is Congress doing?

It is preoccupied with turning immigrants into scapegoats for all of what ails America, while important issues like Medicare for all, quality education for all, and creating a level playing field so that we all can play get ignored.

Is this some kind of joke?

Can we please all work together and give immigrants the respect, amnesty and citizenship they deserve? And then move on to healing our divisions, get back to work and give hope to America again.

Are there any adults in the room?

Stop pointing fingers and find solutions

Our politicians have become moral segregationists. Each party is claiming the high ground while dragging us through the mud.

They point their fingers at one another saying “see, see how awful they are” while refusing to compromise to find solutions to problems. They’ve believed the lie that those with different views are morally flawed.

Trump not fit? He’s making great strides

Forum writer Tom Rafferty writes that Donald Trump is unfit to be president and suggests a Constitutional amendment to prevent a future occurrence.

Let’s see, since Mr. Trump was elected a little more than a year ago, overall unemployment is the lowest in 17 years; black unemployment is lower than it was under President Obama; consumer confidence is up; stock market growth continues to shatter records; and our adversaries once again fear us.

I can only imagine how much better off we would be if Mr. Trump were really fit to be president!

Women can restore balance in politics

Observer reports about the recent Women’s March in Charlotte and around the nation encourage those of us who are concerned about the corroded values and appalling conduct of what too many Republicans are somehow persuaded is good leadership in Raleigh and Washington D.C.

It’s also heartening to learn that women are running for public office in unprecedented numbers.

As a society, we are not well served when women are under-represented in any human endeavor. This may be particularly true in our political life.

Move NASCAR Hall, add a zoo to get HQ2s

So, Charlotte, you lost out on your Amazon bid. Let’s stop looking for excuses and take steps toward making this a more desirable and cosmopolitan city.

First, move the NASCAR museum out to Concord where it belongs. It has been a money losing venture since it was built.

That location could be used for an aquarium that would attract residents, tourists and businesses.

Also, if Charlotte would build a world-class zoo somewhere in the area we could compete with Asheboro and Columbia for tourists. Charlotte is good about paving over green areas to build apartments and businesses; maybe it could build something that would preserve wildlife rather than destroy it.

This story was originally published January 28, 2018 at 12:00 PM with the headline "North Carolina can have beautiful beaches and offshore drilling."