Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, May 7, 1994 TAG: 9405090106
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-7 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
After reading the news article, I still don't have a clue what his position is on anything. Only two paragraphs seemed newsworthy - one about his name recognition outside his district, and the other about his commitment to his constituents. Both topics could be surmised by anyone who thinks about political realities.
What about health-care reform, the budget deficit, education, women's issues, welfare and crime reform, the death penalty, military downsizing, and Social Security concerns, to name a few national issues? That list makes no mention of international concerns, such as foreign policy, economic ties with other countries, our relationship with the United Nations and NATO, etc.
How can we be informed voters with no more information than what was mentioned? I'd rather that space be left blank than devoted to emotional froth about candidates' personal judgments. (I won't get into statistics about how common the kind of personal behavior alluded to is; however, I question using a higher standard for judging political candidates' behavior than we're willing to use as criteria for our own behavior.)
For the future and for an informed voting populace, let's see news articles that stick to campaign issues - issues that will be voted upon in the Senate and which will affect us all, either directly or indirectly. Let's clean up our political discourse.
NANCY ALEXANDER
BLACKSBURG
Simple solutions for parking problems
REGARDING parking and tickets in downtown Roanoke, I suggest:
Make the parking lot on the east side of the Municipal Building public two-hour parking. I compliment Mayor Bowers for giving up his parking spot in this lot.
Make all of downtown's half-hour and one-hour parking spots into two-hour spots so people can shop and conduct business without running back to check their cars.
Paint parking-space lines on the street around the state office building on Second and Third streets and Luck Avenue so a car doesn't take up two spaces.
Don't immediately ticket cars from outside the Roanoke Valley region for overtime parking. Put a friendly warning and welcome to Roanoke on the windshield.
CHARLES M. BAUSERMAN
GOODVIEW
Don't turn America into an 'evil empire'
I'M AN American citizen who once lived in the former Soviet Union, and I am quite concerned about the president's plan to reform the health-care system. I immigrated to America with my family because I got tired of being a guinea pig in socialist/collectivist experiments in ``the empire of evil.''
The national health-care plan proposed by White House charlatans is really quite analogous to socialized medicine in the former Soviet Union, or Nazi Germany. It's time for people to realize that socialized medicine is a genuinely totalitarian concept.
Bringing health care (or any other industry) under central government's control won't benefit the nation. When government is empowered to preside over medicine, it's able to make cost-benefit decisions involving human lives. Ultimately, that means apathetic bureaucrats will decide who gets necessary medical treatment and who should be ``eliminated'' as a worthless or unproductive element of society. Will mental patients and other undesirable groups be liquidated ``for the benefit of the state,'' if the president's socialistic agenda is implemented?
The Constitution doesn't authorize federal officials to establish mandatory social programs, and their so-called solutions to problems plaguing the industry are also unconstitutional. Any compulsory program is totally incompatible with the American ideal of individual freedom and self-reliance.
ILYA BELOOZEROV
BLACKSBURG
Another cost hike for bus-pass users
I READ the April 20 news article by staff writer Michael Stowe, ``Valley Metro wants service, fare increase.''
The extended hours proposed would be wonderful for many with no other means of transportation. However, I beg to differ with the statement: ``If approved, this would be Valley Metro's first fare increase since 1990.'' That's not quite true. Its passes increased $1 weekly and $4 monthly effective Jan. 1. Passengers paying cash per ride got no fare increase at that time, which seemed very unfair to me. Why single out those using passes to pay more?
Under this new proposal, those using passes will pay an additional $2 weekly and $8 monthly, while those paying cash will pay increases of only 25 cents per ride. For those using passes, that's an increase of more than 37 percent over the cost prior to January. For the second time this year, Valley Metro plans to discriminate against those using passes.
Why not increase weekly passes by $1 and monthly passes by $4 to help defray costs of extended service? Most could afford that, and it would be more fair.
SHERRY BECKNER
VINTON
by CNB