Country needs old-fashioned revival
One of the old Christian revivals with sound biblical preaching, conducted by such evangelists as D.L. Moody, Billy Sunday or Billy Graham, and Christ-centered music, conducted by musicians such as Ira Sankey, Homer Rodeheaver or George Beverly Shea, would do more to eradicate crime in our country today than all the useless and expensive social programs dreamed up by secular humanists.
It was recorded that after Charles G. Finney conducted revivals in the mid-19th century in Rochester, N.Y., the bars were closed, the strip joints didn't operate, and the jails were empty for a significant period of time.
Barbara F. Swygart, Sewanee, Tenn.
Atlantic offshore underexplored
I am a retired petroleum geologist, and I have news for The Associated Press's Dina Cappiello and your readers. President Obama's potential offering of oil and gas drilling rights in the Atlantic Ocean is far from the "first-ever." Nine Atlantic lease sales were held from 1959 to 1983. Eight of the nine were large sales from Aug. 17, 1976, to July 26, 1983. One small sale was held off south Florida in 1959. All told, oil companies paid over $2.8 billion for the drilling rights to almost 2.5 million acres of federal Atlantic water bottoms. Forty nine offshore Atlantic exploratory wells were drilled, resulting in one noncommercial natural gas find. In addition, a consortium of oil companies drilled five pre-sale wells for geological data in spots deemed not prospective for discovery of oil or gas (data from Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, a federal agency). Although the Atlantic offshore is not unexplored, it is definitely underexplored. Application of 30 years of technological advances in earth science and in environmentally safe marine drilling should create a lot of interest in this offering.
Bob Beu, Ooltewah
TVA debt has public value
TVA's $25 billion debt carried for decades pales compared to the nearly $400 billion cost for the incomplete F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program, only one of the Pentagon's pet initiatives. Is it not obvious which debt benefits the ongoing greater good?
Gary Engelhardt
UTC track, field shortchanged
About UTC eliminating the men's track and field program: Things must have changed in Chattanooga. When my father was a UTC administrator back in the '80s, it only would have taken a few phone calls to get the money to run both programs. Apparently the Chattanooga he knew no longer exists.
Charles Michael Hyder, Dalton, Ga.
We should teach personal finance
Once again, new federal laws are being proposed for stiffer regulations for "payday" advance lending companies. Why are payday lending businesses so successful? Desperate people. Someone who uses a payday lender has likely already borrowed from every bank, finance company, friend and relative. They already know they cannot, or will not, pay it back. Where does the problem lie? We have more advanced math courses that are required, that the majority of graduates never use. Where are the comprehensive courses in "personal finance management" that all students could benefit from? A car salesman told me when he tells a customer, "How does $380 a month sound?" most never ask, "How long the loan is for?" or "What is the interest rate?" Do you know what "points" are on a mortgage? If not, the educational system failed you, too.
Joe Kirkpatrick, Cleveland, Tenn.
More thoughts on Muslims
On Jan. 22, a writer wrote "Radical Muslims have support." Two days later, a writer wrote "Reader slams jingoistic rubbish." First, the Jan. 22 writer did his homework. It's about time someone has the courage to write about a faction of people who are causing so much hell in this world. I would ask the second writer to rethink "rubbish" (meaning nonsense) and to understand the definition of jingoistic. Why would 1.6 billion people worship a man if most of them know his past? Wait! As I write this, the national news has just reported that one of the Japanese hostages was beheaded. But sadly, Islam's holy book tells Muslims to do just that - Quran-Surah 47:4 and Quran-Surah 8:12-14. To kill Christians and Jews? Yes, Quran-Surah 9:29. Second writer, let's go to a Muslim country and attempt to build a Christian church or Jewish synagogue.
Brian Kisner, LaFayette, Ga.
Income estimates off-base for most
Heritage Foundation chief economist Stephen Moore, in Monday's right-side commentary, claims the income per person (every man, woman and child) in the United States is "more than $50,000." For how many of our country's citizens does that statistic ring true? Most probably for his 1 percent associates; for the voters he hopes to persuade to savage their own, not so much. A family of four in Chattanooga - dad, mom and two kids - would all have to work full-time at Volkswagen to even come close to that much annual pay. And those are the "high-paying" jobs we all pay dearly to subsidize in Tennessee and elsewhere. Yes, someone is making all that income, but it's not going to the workers in the jobs we pay to attract. It's just all collecting at the top and not "trickling down." Wonder why that is?
W. Allen Miller, Hixson
Lawmaker barks up wrong tree
I see in the newspaper that a legislator in Georgia is seeking to make the killing of a police dog "murder," the same as if it were a person. This is anti-biblical. Nowhere does the Bible indicate that an animal's life has the same value as a human life (a person created in the image of God). If a police dog attacks a person without cause, would it be "murder" to protect yourself? Would the police dog be subject to charges of assault and jail time? Would it have the right to a trial by a jury of its "peers"? If a policeman sets his "canine partner" on a person who has stolen his girlfriend, does that person have the right to protect himself? What's next? Will the killing of someone's beloved pet be "murder"? What if the "beloved pet" is a snake or an alligator that has escaped? Legislators, where is your common sense? If you want to increase the penalties for killing a working police dog, just do so! Don't try equalizing a dog's life to a human life! Stay off that slippery slope.
Katherine Scott
Rossville 'cop cams' a scam
So Chattanooga is buying a few cameras to put on a few cops to prove that cops are not abusive. Well, la de da! Putting a few cameras on a few cops, probably the well-behaved ones instead of the Neanderthals, is a cop-controlled scam that proves nothing. And giving the cops control over whether the cameras are on or off is letting the fox guard the henhouse. If they want to protect the public, they should put a civilian in every patrol car with a video camera and tell the cops he is not to be interfered with as long as he gives the cops their space. You would not have to pay them as there are plenty of people who have suffered abuse at their hands who would gladly volunteer to do it. Let Fred Fletcher take me up on this. I'll find volunteers.
Richard Shultz