Observer Forum: Letters to the editor 02.05.16
Lack of compassion on ACA sickens me
As an African-American woman with pre-existing health conditions, I have health insurance today only thanks to the Affordable Care Act.
The law has created a safety net beneath me that I literally could not live without.
Repeated votes in Congress to repeal the law sicken me, as does the N.C. General Assembly’s failure to benefit 500,000 North Carolinians by expanding Medicaid.
All of these elected officials are offered health care by the government.
What they lack is compassion and a conviction that all lives really do matter.
Flora Jean Busby, Charlotte
Free tuition? Only for useful degrees
Bernie Sanders wants free college tuition and student loan forgiveness.
One does wonder what the taxpayers will get for such generosity.
Talented individuals with useful degrees in business, nursing, medicine, or the sciences may be good investments.
“Waste of 4-years” degrees in psychology, sociology, black studies, women’s studies, etc. should be awarded like mail-order Doctor of Divinity degrees.
A wise parent would ask the young man or woman to check Monster.com to see if anyone really hires art or “studies” majors.
If the young person is still unhappy, just buy them a pony.
George Burnett, Spartanburg
Sanders embraces exceptionalism too
In response to “Where I part ways with Bernie Sanders” (Feb. 3 Forum):
I take issue with Forum writer Barry Marshall’s examples of America’s innovative exceptionalism in the medical, food and aircraft industries.
All of these industries have been been given a helping hand by subsidies from the federal government for decades.
Democratic socialism is, and always has been, a fact of life for the betterment of our shared society by government partnering with private industry.
Bernie Sanders is not a socialist. He is a democratic socialist. There is a significant difference.
Rick McClanahan, Charlotte
Trump proof of how low system has sunk
As the Republican candidates become more desperate for attention they do and say things that can only be described as being beyond nasty and insulting.
For any of them to suggest they’d be ready to assume the office of president not only defames the office, it defames all of us.
Donald Trump getting this far indicates how low the political system has sunk.
Jon Schuller, Charlotte
Roberts should pay for Super Bowl trip
In response to “Charlotte Mayor Roberts will attend Super Bowl” (Feb. 4):
Did the thought ever occur to Mayor Jennifer Roberts that perhaps she could buy her own ticket to the Super Bowl, purchase an airline ticket, and pay for a hotel room just like all the other Panthers fans?
The City is picking up her $5,100 tab while the rest of us are proud the Panthers are in the Super Bowl and thrilled to pay for the pleasure of being there to cheer them on, assuming we’re lucky enough to get a ticket.
Maxine Miller, Huntersville
Stop denying role slavery played
In response to “Let’s be clear about Confederate soldiers” (Feb. 4 Forum):
In 1861 Alexander Stephens, vice president of the Confederacy, clearly stated that African slavery was the “cornerstone” of the new Confederacy and “the immediate cause of the late rupture and present revolution.”
Confederate soldiers fought to protect their homes, and this is honorable. But they also fought for their “right” to brutally subjugate an entire people.
To deny this truth is to put a mask of respectability over the racism that still seethes in the hearts and minds of too many Southerners, and which erupts from time to time in the likes of Dylann Roof.
Terry Neal, Charlotte
Winner aims to help others, not herself
In response to “Honoring Leslie Winner’s work for N.C.” (Feb. 4 Opinion):
Thank you, Mebane Rash, for reminding us how important Leslie Winner is, and has been, to our state.
What makes her achievements so significant is that everything she has done has been for the good of others, never for self-glorification.
Leslie is, indeed, one of the early women warriors. Like Betty Chafin Rash, she is a trailblazer in whom we can and do take pride.
Joan Zimmerman, Charlotte
This story was originally published February 4, 2016 at 5:45 PM with the headline "Observer Forum: Letters to the editor 02.05.16."