Election analysis

On Nov. 4, tens of millions of patriotic Americans comprising all races, ethnicities, ages, religion, sexual orientation and political beliefs came together and voted to take our country back from the parasitical, traitorous group who have over the greater part of the past 28 years, virtually destroyed our Constitution, rule of law and prestige.

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In states throughout the country, average Americans made the giant leap out of the 19th Century and into the 21st, but unfortunately the majority of voters in Arkansas were not among them.

Nonetheless those progressives who voted for change and also against the anti-child, homophobic Act 1, should not lose hope, but simply continue the “Good Fight” by staying politically active and outlasting the religious reich wingers, brain-dead hate mongers and all those who want to continue the destruction of our nation and the world we owe to our descendants.

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Lew Huddleston

Fayetteville

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A note to the religious Pharisees and assorted bigots who voted to bar adoption and fostering rights to fellow citizens of the state:

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1. The decent folks remaining will expect you to line up the various churches that campaigned to limit the adoption and fostering rights and require their members to adopt the children now waiting.

2. The preachers who chose to back this abominable legislation should advocate even more strongly that their membership volunteer every home as an adoptee’s moral right among their congregants.

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3. Those who, because of old age or infirmity, can’t adopt these children should be held morally bound to donate every spare dollar they have toward the adoption efforts of the membership who can.

4. Every last one of you religious fundamentalists and assorted other bigots should be aware that Jesus Christ never asked of anyone anything he was not willing to do himself.

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5. If you based your vote on a couple of verses in the book of Leviticus, then you’d best forget eating ham and bacon, catfish, shellfish and the wearing of mixed-fiber clothes as well. Or do you think you are at liberty to enforce only the old rules you agree with in this day?

It is my hope that a movement will form that will take this act and appeal the atrocious mess to the U. S. Supreme Court so that it can be ruled unconstitutional, as was the anti-sodomy law that held sway for so many decades.

I am neither gay nor in a relationship with any partner. I do attend church regularly and serve in an office in that church. I do differentiate between “Christian” folks and those who are just “religious.” I think Christ did too!

Karl Hansen

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Hensley

Enjoy giving

I enjoyed reading your articles on philanthropy in today’s issue of AT.

FYI, in your listings of top Arkansas Foundations by assets and giving, for some reason the Blue & You Foundation for a Healthier Arkansas got left out. [The list didn’t include corporate foundations.]

At year-end 2007, the Blue & You Foundation had total assets of $42,331,769, which would rank us as the 10th largest in Arkansas. In 2007, we made grants totaling $1,388,488, which would rank us as the 14th largest grant-maker in Arkansas.

The Blue & You Foundation was created in 2001 by Arkansas Blue Cross and Blue Shield to make annual grants to health improvement programs in Arkansas. In its first seven years of operation, the Foundation has made grants totaling more than $8.5 million to 129 programs that improve the health of Arkansans.

Thanks for covering the topic of philanthropic giving. As times get tougher, the needs of our fellow Arkansans will only grow, as will the importance of philanthropic giving. If people are disenchanted with investing in for-profit ventures that disappoint them, perhaps they should try supporting non-profit endeavors that help other people. They might find the dividends greater and the returns more satisfying.

Patrick O’Sullivan

Executive Director

Blue & You Foundation for a Healthier Arkansas

Different perspective

I shook my head in dismay at Max Brantley’s Arkansas Blog item about crime reports [a Little Rock police report on crimes on 65th Street, at the State Fair, on Cantrell Road and downtown]. He sounded like a character out of “Nixon land.” With blog items that selectively choose what crimes to write about, he is stirring up fear. He seems to have a wealthy, white-centric view of the world. How come he never writes about crime reports in our neighborhoods? Crime matters only if it happens by the Statehouse, in the Heights or in West Little Rock — white enclaves of the city? Could he try, just one time, to view the world from a non-white perspective?

Kerry Robinson

Little Rock

Demand better schools

For months, I made phone calls, wrote letters and talked with school officials, teachers and parents in effort to prompt the removal of an abusive teacher from Carver Elementary. Finally, almost one year after I placed my initial call to the child abuse hotline, the teacher is gone due to “family reasons.” I know she didn’t leave for the right reason — because the Department of Human Services and the Little Rock School District did their jobs.

Parents, please listen to your children. Don’t assume they’re exaggerating when they tell you a teacher yelled at them or hurt them; ask questions and check it out. Don’t assume that because someone teaches young children that she is competent and nurturing. Don’t assume that school officials will do the right thing once you’ve brought troubling evidence to their attention. Stand up for your children and what you know is right. Educate yourself on the law; school personnel are mandated reporters of child abuse. Any concerned citizen can call the child abuse hotline, even if you’re not positive that abuse has occurred.

And the next time you hear someone who’s in the business of educating or protecting children say they just want “what’s best for the children,” take it with a grain of salt. And demand better.

Melissa Rowland

Little Rock

 

 

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