Treat protests, prayer the same
Does anyone else see a similarity between football coaches and players praying before or after a game, and football coaches and players refusing to stand or raising their fist as a political symbol of protest during the national anthem?
Both symbolize what they believe. If one is wrong, then both are wrong. If one is allowed, then both should be allowed.
We are a nation no longer under God, no longer indivisible, and with liberty and justice for only a few.
Felicia Kendall
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Trigger-happy cops the real problem
Tyre King's death wasn't the result of obsession with guns by the public. Legal gun owners in this country have 200 million guns and 12 trillion rounds of ammo. If we were a problem, you'd know it.
The problem is that cops are paranoid, trigger-happy Neanderthals who are obsessed with guns. Cops have killed more than 5,000 civilians since 9/11; even if 95 percent of these were justifiable, that still leaves 250 innocent people gunned down by uniformed criminals.
It will take a radical change in the "rules of engagement" before anything is going to improve. Cops should never be allowed to fire at the mere sight of what may or may not be a weapon, and they should be required to order any suspect to drop any weapon at least three times before they are allowed to fire.
Police are given body armor for good reasons, the most important of which is to give them time to choose an alternative to lethal force if practical.
And last, cops should be required to wear a body camera at all times that streams constant audio/video to police servers so they can't lie their way out of a screw-up.
Richard W. Shultz
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Another mental facility is needed
I am a very proud employee of the Erlanger Health System, but I am also an individual who has experienced what it is like to have loved ones in need of exceptional mental health care.
I have experience in seeing what happens to family members when they are turned away because the hospital did not feel it necessary to keep them - the illness was not "severe enough."
The need for another mental health facility in our area is extremely important. I support Erlanger having the ability to build and operate a mental health facility with all that is in my soul. I to this day know many who suffer from mental illness and cannot get the help they so greatly need.
This is my personal opinion only but one that I feel should count.
The Parkridge Medical Center appeal is an absolute slap in the face to this community and should be denounced by the great people of Chattanooga and surrounding area.
Jana Letner, Erlanger Health System
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Media: More depth, less pap, please
Now that Trump has said "born in America," all we need is for Hillary to say "radical Islam" and all of America's woes will be solved.
The political media offers us little more than tabloid fodder. If time were spent on analysis and comparison of the candidates' policies, maybe our resulting votes would be based on an informed, thoughtful process instead of deciding who should make the yearbook's most (or least) popular student.
The media is being played by the candidates and has become as big a joke as some say the candidates are.
It's time for the new media to grow up, put their adult pants on and provide us with information that measures up to the importance of electing the leader of the free world.
Pam Dent, Hixson