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Bitterly incorrect
Editor: I am writing to comment on John Banick's recent letter. He has every right to feel bitter. But let's get the facts right.
Sen. Ted Kennedy was no coward and Bishop Martino was not crucified. The questioning of Bishop Martino's competence, he brought on himself.
Sen. Ted Kennedy did not support abortion. He supported a woman's right to choose. It's the law of the land. There's a difference.
Mr. Kennedy made mistakes. No doubt. But he faced the people. He went one on one with everybody: the press, radio, TV and papers.
Mr. Kennedy worked for all the people. Not the chosen few. Bishop Martino would not talk to the people, the press, TV or to The Times-Tribune, even when he was offered the chance.
Jesus told his followers, go out and spread the word to all my children. (Not just the chosen few.) I wonder how Jesus would have felt if he came to Scranton on St. Patrick's Day and was told his church was closed.
To quote Cardinal Rigali, on our next leader, "He's always supposed to help uplift and walk with the people, just as Christ walks with us, so that nobody in the church has the impression of being isolated, being alone, being abandoned."
To me that's says it all.
MICHAEL SENAPEDIS
Scranton
Basic rights
Editor: At first glance the phrase, "a woman's right to choose," brings to mind a positive connotation. We all value our freedom of choice and cherish our rights as individuals in a free society.
Our rights, however, are not without limitations. A condition of our right to choose is the assurance that the expression of that right does not infringe on the rights of others.
There is no assurance that a woman's right to choose to terminate a pregnancy does not infringe on the rights of another individual. On the contrary, now that medical science is in almost total agreement that human life begins at or shortly after conception, it is almost certain that a woman's right to choose an abortion takes away another individual's basic right to life.
Although more than 50 percent of Americans consider themselves pro-life, our government has not yet seen fit to protect prenatal life. When a society neglects to protect the most basic rights of its least powerful individuals, human tragedy quickly follows. Since its legalization in 1973, abortions have claimed the lives of nearly 50 million individuals. That is a human tragedy of monumental proportions.
ANTHONY BATTAGLIA
Dunmore
Inherent dignity
Editor: A woman's right to choose should not be denied, according to Mayor Chris Doherty (The Sunday Times, Sept. 13).
Those who advocate such an obnoxious choice are reluctant to finish the sentence in order to indicate what this involves: a choice to kill her unborn child.
To deal with such unpleasant truths, abortion-rights advocates may try to convince us that there is a dispute about whether an unborn baby is really a human being, and claim this is a still unsettled philosophical question. However this issue has long been settled, thanks to the remarkable advances in the sciences of human embryology and developmental biology.
The really vital question is whether every living human being possesses an inherent and equal dignity. Those who advocate abortion rights have already denied this.
I am mystified how those, who supposedly accept the biblical teaching that every human being is created in the image and likeness of God, can support the intentional destruction of unborn human beings.
LOU LOUMOS
Scranton
Run to put in walk
Editor: Recently I was working in my yard when I heard a siren. Then a number of sirens. A fire? A traffic accident?
Nope - the next day's paper told the story of a fellow resident hit by a car while walking on South Abington Road.
And to be sure, he probably was walking on South Abington Road, because there are no sidewalks to serve pedestrians or bikers.
It is a very dangerous situation, and in just the recent past I can recall three people on foot who have been killed along this road. My neighborhood is defined by South Abington Road, Venard Road and Fairview Road - none with sidewalks. Yet the roads connect educational institutions, offices, banks, shops, churches and hundreds of homes. We have outgrown our infrastructure.
No local officials created this situation, but it is a problem waiting for local leadership to coordinate efforts with PennDOT to create a safe pedestrian corridor.
It won't be easy or cheap or be accomplished for a long time. But if we can spend seemingly unlimited dollars rescuing lost thrill-seekers atop some mountain, or missing yachters off the islands, doesn't it seem just as important to keep people from getting crushed by cars?
If we want people to leave the car in the driveway we have to invest in sidewalk safety. Just ask the fellow who got hit last night if it would be worth it.
BILL RISSE
Clarks Green
The far wrong
Editor: The far right will never learn. By protesting Obama's speech to schoolchildren, they've reiterated that their party is the party of no solution. This so-called grass-roots uprising at these town hall meetings has no grass roots. It's the byproduct of Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Palin and Joe the Plumber. This hatred has been bottled up since the 2008 election.
Eventually the schoolchildren will grow up and remember that which has been reiterated to them by the far wrong. The party that says it's always right is not.
It's the party which, instead of hearing the president give advice on education and responsibility, would rather hear about how to become an unlicensed plumber in Ohio, or about how to shoot moose from airplanes in Alaska. But most importantly they're the party that forgets that hatred is not a family value, and they forget that Jesus Christ was a socialist.
MARK ANTHONY SREBRO
Factoryville
Civics 101
Editor: Rob McCauley, a board member of the Tunkhannock Area School District, recently made a pointed attempt at censorship by calling for a ban on President Obama's speech to schoolchildren.
Rep. Joe Wilson, from South Carolina, displayed an egregious act of disrespect to the Congress by heckling the president of the United States during his address on health care reform.
I am saddened to have witnessed these two individuals behaving in a manner so unbecoming an American.
The America that I love places on each individual the responsibility to critically listen to and examine divergent views on important issues. We must each then make an intelligent, informed decision on our own position. The America that I love calls us to carry ourselves with dignity and to afford respect to each individual, irrespective of their point of view. The America that I love challenges us to cry out "I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it".
I recommend a reading of the Constitution and a viewing of the HBO miniseries, "John Adams." I remind you, gentlemen, that these lessons are what separate us from the monkeys.
CYNTHIA R. STRAUB
Scott Twp.
12 posted comments
A start-up automotive company backed by former Vice President Al Gore has been loaned more than half a billion dollars by the federal government.
According to The Wall Street Journal, Fisker Automotive Inc. has received $529 million in taxpayer money. The loan was intended to help Fikser produce a hybrid sports car to be sold in Finland.
"This is not for average Americans," Leslie Paige, a spokeswoman for Citizens Against Government Waste, told the Journal. "This is for people to put something in their driveway that is a conversation piece. It's a status symbol thing."
------- Gold
Hard to disagree with your conclusion that protesting Obama's speech to schoolchildren was silly. "The blind squirrel often finds an acorn". No one can be wrong all of the time.
Then, the typical liberal attack on anyone who opposes "Anything" that Obama does, has to resort to HATRED as the reason.
No, just a difference of opinion.
Why HATE ?
To your credit, you didn't call them racists.
Are we at a place where any policy disagreement is directly attributable to hate? Or racism?
My best to Cleo.
Cynthia, Rep. Wilson was absolutely correct re: the statement of illegal immigrant healthcare. It has since been corrected to require verification to enroll in a program.
But, shouting (even the truth) at a joint session of congress is wrong! That happens all the time in a "Banana Republic".
Lets everyone agree to,
"I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it".
Politics is a filthy business and both sides are equally guilty. Did you know that Under section 370 of the House Rules and Manual it has been held that a Member could:
• refer to the government as “something hated, something oppressive.”
• refer to the President as “using legislative or judicial pork.”
• refer to a Presidential message as a “disgrace to the country.”
• refer to unnamed officials as “our half-baked nitwits handling foreign affairs.”
It's wrong to accuse a person of bigotry and hate because they object to a program to force people who don't need it to buy health insurance so as to lower costs for those who do and to subsidize part of the price tag by cutting medical care to the elderly.
It's wrong to be accused of Racism when calling an organization like ACORN a thoroughly corrupt bunch of thugs.BTW, loved the "Adam's series.