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A contemporary fable

A long time ago, in about 1971, kids rode bicycles around delivering newspapers to earn money for better bikes or an old car to fix up, and grown-ups sat in line on odd or even days to buy gas for their cars. But the grown-ups ignored the problem, and it went away.

Then the world changed and the grown-ups decided it was cruel to make the kids deliver newspapers, so moms started driving around in cars delivering papers to earn extra money so the kids could have ATVs and video games and such.

But the world kept changing, and more and more people in more and more countries wanted bigger and bigger cars so they could buy stuff for their kids, too, and the people at home started having to pay world-market-priced gasoline, and moms couldn’t afford to buy gas to deliver the papers anymore, and the grown-ups started looking for mass transit to get to their real jobs.

Then the newspapers didn’t get delivered, and nobody knew what was on sale at Safeway, and so everybody’s diet deteriorated until there was nobody left who could ride a bike to deliver the newspapers, and people canceled their subscriptions.

Now nobody knows anything except that they’re paying 4 bucks a gallon for gas, so I guess the price of gas is the newspaper’s fault.

Donna G. Davidson
Anacortes


The problems we face today

I am afraid we are facing the greatest threat to our country since Pear Harbor.

We are on the verge of electing a president who says he wants change. What this country does not need, is the radical changes that Obama says he would make. What is needed is to iron out the wrinkles that have been caused by continuous sliding to the left. Obama may have charisma, but he has little grasp of reality. We have no idea what utter havoc his presidency could wreak.

We have abandoned common sense. We condemn the death penalty for heinous criminals. Instead, we let taxpayers provide these criminals with free amenities that the taxpayers can’t afford. We refuse to effectively stop gang activities. We profess to dislike violence, yet we promote a so-called sport “ultimate fighting” — intelligence at its lowest.

Our wise ones now decide that showing any evidence of Christianity in public places is out because it might offend someone.

What sort of fool thinks depriving law-abiding people from owning firearms will stop crime? Criminals don’t obey laws. Wounded veterans are coming back unable to work and unable to pay for their homes. Yet we send millions of dollars to members of the U.N. who vote against us every time. We spend huge amounts of money on pork projects that are merely re-election insurance premiums for inept politicians.

There is a saying, “The world is full of educated fools.” I might add that they often wind up in positions of authority, even in high office. But who’s to blame? We the voters. No we don’t need change, we just need to get back to the principles that made our country the best in the world.

Matt Burns
Oak Harbor


Victims’ lives are of greater value

In consideration of Goff’s “How much is innocent life worth?” May 3 letter to the editor:

My support for the death penalty goes far beyond the money issue. Truly, however, the execution of Mr. Logan would have been a tragedy, for the evidence to establish his innocence was there and should have freed him at the time.

“How much is innocent life worth?” is a good question, and deserves a broader scope than the application in Goff’s letter. Perhaps it depends on whose life is being considered.

What value do we place on the lives of murder victims? What value do we see for subsequent victims of murders who were not put to death and escape to kill again?

Aren’t the lives of victims more valuable than those who murder?

What about the victims of repeat murderers, serial murders, massacre murders and enraged rampage murders? It seems to me that these innocent victims are of greater value than their murderers. Justice and the safety of the innocent demand the death of the murderers!

“Innocent” lives brings to mind another class seldom considered by our “evolved” race. There have been about 45 million totally innocent and totally defenseless human lives taken by abortion since Roe v. Wade. Were they of no value (except to those in the abortion industry)?

Someone has complained that executing murderers may deprive our society of individuals who might make great contributions to our well-being. Murdering the innocent and unborn multiplies that likelihood many times over!

Ward E. Ellsworth
Mount Vernon


Keeping one foot in Old Testament

Jack de Yonge wrote a great letter (May 31) about the claim that the lack of traditional Christian values is leading to the degradation of our society. But he ran out of space. My personal favorite of the values is that men own their wives and parents own their children. I actually saw that on a reader-board of a Christian church in Edmonds, Wash. It said, “The only possessions you can take to heaven with you are your children.” Wow! This “ownership” is the basis for sexual, physical and emotional abuse. If you own property, then you can do with it as you wish. Right?

Then there is the rampant sexual abuse of children by the clergy. Maybe as God’s agents on Earth they feel they own what God owns by proxy. And don’t think this is limited to Catholics and men. It isn’t.

When the Christian explorers left Europe to “discover” lands where people already lived, they had the religious sanction to convert whomever they found. If those people didn’t want to be converted, it was OK to kill them and take what they had.

God gave man dominion over the Earth. Somewhere in the fine print it must say “white” man as witnessed by the way blacks and Indians were treated in this country and the slaughter of indigenous peoples around the globe. Christians abhor abortion but they seem to relish capital punishment. God didn’t give Moses any qualifiers. Thou shalt not kill. Period.

It would be nice if people actually lived by what Jesus taught and didn’t keep one foot in the Old Testament. Stuff like, whatever you do for the least of my children you do for me; and, turn the other cheek. Morality isn’t the sole jurisdiction of Christians. It belongs to all of us.

Robert E. Gigliotti
Sedro-Woolley


Who’s at fault for abortion rate?

Not abortion providers, who are only responding to demand, not creating it. In fact, Planned Parenthood promotes responsible family planning and provides reliable, subsidized birth-control services to reduce unplanned pregnancies, the primary driver of abortion statistics.

The reasons most often given for an abortion are financial: medical costs, lost wages and child care expenses. Among advanced nations, only America lacks universal health care with paid maternity leave and comprehensive family services. Even the limited, unpaid Family Leave Act passed by Congress was opposed by the business lobby and GOP allies.

Do federal government policies impact abortion rates? The present administration reduced funding for Medicaid family planning while increasing funds for ineffective abstinence-only programs.

The FDA administrator ignored the overwhelming recommendation of its medical advisers to allow over-the-counter sales of Plan B, the “morning-after” emergency contraception. His reasons were nonmedical and political. Many months and unnecessary abortions later, he allowed limited OTC sales for women 18 or older.

Another appointee, a doctor overseeing the nation’s reproductive health program, held the unique opinion that condom use actually increased the risk of contracting sexually transmitted diseases. Meanwhile, Catholic missionary priests in Africa are risking Vatican wrath by urging condom use to slow the raging HIV-AIDS epidemic there.

Now, unless an unplanned pregnancy resulted from an angel visitation, some man played a crucial supporting role — a husband, lover, boyfriend, hook-up. Where’s the public outrage, the sidewalk vigils, the sermons, the speeches demanding that men take greater responsibility in preventing unwanted pregnancies?

Who benefits from unnecessarily high abortion rates? Nobody — except Republicans who profess to be “pro-life” and get a free pass from anti-abortion groups while pro-choice, pro-family-planning Democrats find themselves vilified and threatened with ex-communication.

Larry Edwards
Burlington


Biofuel actually worsens problems

“Soaring food prices” — we are hearing it, seeing it, living it. And that impacts not just food for people but also feed for animals. Is there anything that can be done? Perhaps it might be time to consider the thousands of acres of prime agricultural land in this country that have been changed from food to fuel production. We should also ask ourselves whether biofuel production and consumption is economically and environmentally viable.

Biofuels are supposed to be better for the environment. But are they? An article written by Nobel-prize-winning chemist Paul. J. Crutzen reports that maize used as biofuel in the United States produces between 0.9 and 1.5 times the global warming effect of conventional gasoline. Plus, biofuel emissions release nitrous oxide, which is about 300 times more insulating than carbon dioxide.

And let’s consider the cost of biofuel production. Studies have shown that for every gallon of biofuel produced, there is a net loss of energy. In other words, the energy obtained from using biofuels is less than the energy required to produce it. Is this economically sensible? 

Besides, the U.S. government is having to subsidize production at a rate of 52 cents per gallon of ethanol produced. If the government reaches its goal of 5 billion gallons produced, that would cost us $2.6 billion in subsidies (report by Estey Center for Law and Economics in International Trade, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan).

On these results alone, the issue of biofuels could stand some re-examination. We do need to reduce our dependence on foreign oil, but perhaps biofuel is a “feel-good” solution that has produced more problems than it has solved.

Jenny Thor
Mount Vernon

• Saturday Soapbox supplements our regular Letters to the Editor contributions. The length limit is 300 words. Submitting a Saturday Soapontribution does not count against the one-letter-per-writer-per-month limit in the Letters to the Editor section. The other rules of engagement apply: We expect writers to be courteous to each other and considerate of the readers. Submissions may be directed to us in the same way: by mail, at P.O. Box 578, Mount Vernon, WA 98273; or by e-mail, .