Not even book-burning dads like mine can stop kids from access to books

Removing books

The fastest way to get a kid to read a book is to ban it. When I was 15, some 60 years ago, my father caught me with a copy of “Candide.” He made me watch while he tore it apart page-by-page and fed it into the 55-gallon drum used for trash burning. It didn’t take me long to get another copy. Right then I resolved to never forbid any children I might have access to any book they wanted to read. If I wasn’t sure about it, I also read it. Most children today have access to cellphones and even if it has been secured by their parents, they probably know someone with an unsecured phone and access to the internet.

Karin Kemp, Matthews

School funding

Fourteen members of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg League of Women Voters Education Team signed on to this letter, including the co-chairs listed below.

In this precarious time of teacher shortages, student learning loss, and eroding confidence in our institutions, a failure to fully fund our schools is not only a breach of constitutional duty but that of the moral responsibility owed to our children.

Action is desperately needed to fund the constitutional requirements of the Comprehensive Remedial Plan (Leandro plan). The state had a $4 billion surplus going into 2021, which grew to more than $9 billion in unreserved funds by October. Only a portion of it is necessary to fully fund the Plan for the first three years.

Providing a sound education for our public school students will generate increased revenues to the state for years. Having a trained and educated population will attract large and small businesses to all of North Carolina for decades to come. The public is tired of waiting and repulsed by the political fights that lead to delayed action.

Jeanne Smith

John Lee

Vaccine refusal

Regarding “Unvaccinated medical workers turn to religious exemptions,” (Feb. 15):

I am struck by the fuzzy thinking of nurse Julia Buffo of Montana who refuses the COVID vaccine on religious grounds. She declares that God is the “ultimate guardian of health” and that accepting the vaccine would make her “complicit with evil.” The logical conclusion of that thinking is that nurses and doctors have no impact on a person’s health. If she truly believes that, why did she choose to be a nurse? By her own thinking, whatever care she gives is useless.

I certainly wouldn’t want any person with that mindset to be caring for me. I believe that any health care professional using this excuse to refuse the vaccine should be terminated and told to seek another profession.

Gene Kavadlo, Charlotte

Healthcare workers

Regarding “We can support health care workers through unions, collective action,” (Feb. 14 Editorial):

I agree that higher wages would help retain nurses. However, the thing that might really have a positive effect on healthcare workers: assignments that really pay attention to the patient-to-nurse ratio. Assignments with a high patients-to-nurse-ratio number will burn a nurse out faster than anything. A nurse who is overloaded with patients cannot do her/his best nursing practice. The pressure to get so much done for so many patients is not fair to the nurses, and it certainly isn’t fair to the patients.

Sarah Cannon, Concord

Vi Lyles

Charlotte Mayor Vi Lyles is running from the hiring of Kimberly Henderson to direct the mayor’s own racial initiative. She protests that she had nothing to do with Henderson’s hiring, but that seems odd when the mayor’s own name is on the initiative. It’s like your dog getting sprayed by a skunk — no matter how many times you wash it, it‘s still there. Good job by the Observer for reporting this.

David Ramsey, Mooresville

Putin, Ukraine

Some say an ego-maniacal Putin wants to secure his place in history by invading Ukraine and making it part of Russia. If he invades, he will secure his place in history alongside Hitler, Stalin and Mussolini. No punishment would suffice for the countless loss of life and destruction that an invasion of Ukraine would bring. Should Putin’s generals resist an order to invade, they would be protecting mother Russia from becoming a pariah state to the civilized countries of the world.

Kent Rhodes, Charlotte