ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, July 1, 1996 TAG: 9607010022
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-4 EDITION: METRO
TYPE: LETTERS
IN REFERENCE to Margie Fisher's June 23 column, ``Keep the Mill Mountain Star shining white'':
Thank you for putting into words a not-quite-right feeling I've had about connecting Roanoke's star to death episodes. The idea of the red star really is a morbid concept, and it offers no effective deterrent to drug- and alcohol-impaired driving.
The Roanoke Valley needs symbols of pride for our many attributes and accomplishments, not awful reminders of the failures of a half-witted few.
Let's find more constructive ways to deter driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs. How can we start a movement to get this idea, approved by Roanoke City Council, reversed?
JOHN S. JENNINGS
ROANOKE
Details of procedure rightfully disturb
IN RESPONSE to Joyce A. Blevins' June 22 letter to the editor, ``Intolerant words can cause pain,'' and Terry T. Smith's June 23 letter, ``Late-term abortions can save lives'':
I'd like to call for a little common sense. The portion of a partial-birth abortion that's objectionable is removing the brain when the baby is three inches short of being born alive. If a mother is in good enough health to deliver a baby breech fashion and everything but the head has been delivered, I fail to see how the baby's death at that point could be necessary to save her life. The fact is, as reported by the inventor of the procedure, that 80 percent of the time this is done with a healthy baby and a healthy mother who has decided she doesn't want the child. If a child is so severely deformed that it will die anyway, deliver it and let God decide what happens.
As to knowledge of the details of the procedure hurting people's feelings, there's a reason for that. Recognizing that we've done something wrong is the first step toward asking and receiving forgiveness. Then if we repent of our mistakes, God will help us begin anew.
CYNTHIA H. LANGE
ROANOKE
Many doctors are violating their oath
IT SEEMS Dr. Kevorkian is in the news again (June 21 article, ``Suicide's neighbors sympathize''). Perhaps we should take a look at the Hippocratic oath, which states in part: ``I will follow that method of treatment which, according to my ability and judgment, I consider for the benefit of my patients, and abstain from whatever is deleterious and mischievous. I will give no deadly medicine to anyone if asked, nor suggest any such counsel; furthermore, I will not give to a woman an instrument to produce abortion.''
This oath clearly prohibits a physician from intentionally causing the death of any human being. Furthermore, it's equally clear the oath defines unborn babies as human beings. So we can conclude that Dr. Kevorkian is in violation of the Hippocratic oath as are those who perform abortions, and they should no longer call themselves physicians. Physicians are supposed to heal.
Elsewhere in the oath, it says physicians are also supposed to lead by example. Perhaps it's time that we as a society should set the example for physicians. If we allow euthanasia and abortion on demand, where does the killing stop? What example are we setting for future generations when we show, by our apathy, so little respect for the sanctity of life? Where are we headed - toward another Holocaust? It's time to legislate a high standard of morals lest we all, by inaction, fall.
CATHERINE D. deROSSET
CHRISTIANSBURG
Keep the `service' in Postal Service
ON JUNE 19, Roanoke letter carriers delivered an important message to the citizens of our community - a message critical to protecting the quality of mail delivery in our city and the very viability of the U.S. Postal Service as a great American institution.
As you know, we weren't just out on our postal routes that day. We also walked an informational picket line in front of the main post office to let the public know that they may soon experience a deterioration in mail delivery because of ill-advised decisions and actions by postal management. Members of Branch 524 of the National Association of Letter Carriers (AFL-CIO) don't want that to happen.
We're all proud to be letter carriers. And we know that the U.S. Postal Service is the best in the world, delivering more mail to more people over greater distances and at lower cost than in any other in the world. But all is not well inside the Postal Service. An autocratic and increasingly militaristic management, fueled by shortsighted and misguided directives from Postal Service headquarters in Washington, D.C., wants to take the word ``service'' out of the Postal Service.
Letter carriers in Roanoke pledge to our postal customers that we will continue to provide you with the best service possible, and we will fight those in management who would sacrifice the service you receive just to make some points with the postal bureaucracy in Washington.
JOHN DEATHERAGE
President
Roanoke Branch 524
National Association of Letter Carriers
ROANOKE
Not all are fit following surgery
AFTER READING your June 24 article, ``Back on their feet and as fit as ever,'' concerning heart-surgery patients, I felt that the ``1 to 3 percent'' of patients not surviving should be recognized.
At the age of 40, my dad had suffered a heart attack and, for 30 more years, he was well aware of achieving and maintaining good health practices. The week before entering the hospital five years ago, he had played two rounds of golf with no pain. He walked and/or cycled every day; didn't drink or smoke. My mom saw that he ate heartily.
So when we were told that dad was a ``perfect'' candidate for successful bypass surgery, we were not overly alarmed. After ``dying'' and being revived four times, the decision was made to ``let him go.''
Your article disturbed me in that no emphasis was made as to how truly serious this surgery is, and how painful and long recovery can be.
A dear friend and ``second'' father is in the process of recovering from quadruple bypass surgery, and it's still a day-to-day - sometimes moment-to-moment - experience for him, his wife, children and many friends.
In retrospect, I wish I had known that:
Other physicians and hospitals can be consulted (if not an emergency situation).
There is an ample supply of the correct blood type during surgery and after.
This is a life or death experience.
Time for saying goodbyes should be taken.
The family should also be consulted, counseled and consoled (if needed).
Open-heart surgery is a serious, sobering lifetime event. Not all make it. My dad didn't.
ANNE KATHLEEN C. GOODWIN
SALEM
Liberal views have a high price tag
CONSERVATIVES adhere to Jefferson's stated principle that ``government governs best that governs least.'' Some of the newest ones almost seem to have forgotten this, i.e., those fighting over abortion and the Christian right. Conservatives have a deep-seated fear of large centralized government, and they understand that the natural movement of all government is in the direction of growth and control. They also realize that ``the power to tax is the power to destroy.''
Liberals seem to have a deep-seated contempt for other human beings, a contempt they disguise as friendly concern. They believe that society will sink into anarchy without all of their laws and controls; that free men and women are not capable of planning, and cannot be trusted to plan, their own destinies. Liberals force their all-wise leadership on the rest of us through the creation of huge bureaucracies inside a strong central government. We pay for this through ever higher taxes and erosion of our freedoms.
FRANK F. ELLIS III
ROANOKE
LENGTH: Long : 150 linesby CNB