Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, January 18, 1995 TAG: 9501180035
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
There's no reason for polluting the byways with unnecessary signs pertaining to universal laws, such as ``Buckle Up For Safety, It's the Law,'' ``Littering Is Illegal,'' ``No DUI.'' If these signs are legitimate, so is ``Don't Drive With Suspended License,'' ``Don't Drive With Head Phones,'' ``Always Signal Your Turn,'' etc.
VDOT also spends more than $250,000 on Adopt-A-Highway signs. Do we really need ``Governors Clean Highway Award'' signs? VDOT should also stop paying out $3,600 a year for Info-line (telephone) Road Watch. Radio and television give out the same information - free.
HAROLD BOWMAN
SALEM
A poor choice for feminist role model
WHILE I certainly agree with Professor Detine L. Bowers (Jan. 11 commentary, ``Girls still get the work, not the glory'') that, in many families, boys are treated as more important than girls, I certainly think she could have chosen a better role model for young women than Tita in ``Like Water for Chocolate.''
I'm one of several avid moviegoers I know who think the film version of Laura Esquival's best seller is highly overrated. While the film's treatment of issues of women's freedom is at times moving, it's simply difficult for me that I'm ultimately asked to endorse a heroine who has poisoned her sister to death over a number of years.
Part of the problem with girls' self-perception in this culture is the images of women and girls presented to them by the media. A woman who wins back the man she loves by poisoning her own sister (and others) doesn't seem to me to be much of an improvement, and I'm not eager for young women to emulate her.
LANA A. WHITED
FERRUM
Keep tax decisions close to home
YOUR Jan. 11 editorial, ``Give buses a regional ride,'' pinpoints why we need the changes Gov. Allen's budget will produce. You note that ``County taxpayers ... help pay for the system's operation ... through taxes sent to Washington or Richmond and returned (a pitiful few cents on the dollar) to Roanoke city and Valley Metro.''
When state and federal funds are cut, it will be up to local politicians to go to taxpayers and make a case for increasing taxes to offset the loss. Taxpayers, in turn, will determine if this is a good use for their money. They will also know whom to hold accountable. That's called local control. It should also eliminate the ``pitiful'' return on taxes that now go to Richmond and Washington. That's called more bang for the buck.
Local control and more bang for the buck is why Allen's tax-cutting budget is good for the people.
ROBERT J. HUMMEL
ROANOKE
Sinking into a black hole
IT'S HARD living a black-and-white life inside a world of grays. What leads an otherwise moral person to murder anyone associated with legal abortions? Easy answers have already been given to justify such acts. Equally easy answers can be summoned to counter any first set of easy answers. Such debates become moral ping-pong. A war of absolutes becomes relatively absurd.
Even nature's timeless ``law of the jungle'' has a symphonic logic. In contrast, murder for any higher moral purpose feeds chaos and anarchy within society, as life becomes reduced to raw survival of the fittest, much like a violent video game. Only dreamers who do not value life on Earth itself would welcome such a doomsday scenario.
Law within a democracy is designed to allow for passionate but nonviolent disputes among citizens. Within democracy, free expression allows people of like mind to influence others. Sometimes results take a long time to achieve. Impatience has never been an admissible defense for homicide.
Killers justify themselves in terms of moral law transcending national laws. If they really believe that, then why have they been absolutely silent about the millions of murdered female infants within India? Do they imagine that American fetuses are more sacred to God?
Outside the bounds of civil society, only might makes right. Today, it's the abortionist (or his associates) who gets shot. Tomorrow, it could be the anti-abortionist protesters themselves. The spiral of anarchistic violence descends into a bottomless black hole. Hate leads neither to love nor to wisdom. We who were created in the image of God must listen to each other's hearts - not take aim at each other's hearts.
CLARK M. THOMAS
ROANOKE
Dog owners do not cause hungry kids
REGARDING the Jan. 11 letter to the editor by Donna Garrett, ``Dogs fare better than children'':
She sounds like one of the liberal/socialist Democrats who try to tell everyone else how to spend their money, or what little remains after government takes what it wants.
I have three dogs, and all three receive very good care. I suggest Garrett either mind her own business or spend her time going after the unwed (usually teen-age) mothers and fathers on welfare who create the hungry, neglected children of whom she speaks. The system established by the Democrats for the past 40 years is responsible for the situation.
I have sympathy for hungry, neglected children, and I'm very generous at giving to charities of my choice. However, I didn't create this world's hungry children, and I'm not responsible for them. Very bluntly, how I spend my money is none of Garrett's business.
TOM BRIDGES
BLUE RIDGE
by CNB