Thanks to Coker for fun cruise-in
I just want to say thanks to Corky Coker for again this year sponsoring his annual cruise-in at his place of business. I'm an old-timer now and don't get out much anymore, but I do love seeing the old cars and the museum. So thanks to Corky and all who participated!
Ron Cumbie
NYT wrong about Venezuela
It seems the Times Free Press cannot resist reprinting anything from the once-great New York Times, no matter how inaccurate, misleading or biased. Case in point: the Sunday article ascribing Venezuela's myriad social, economic and political problems to populism run amok.
Yes, unbridled populism has some "dark" tendencies, but the article failed to point out the most important cause of Venezuela's economic and political collapse - an incompetent Marxist dictatorship, where people wait in lines for hours for the chance to buy a loaf of bread or basic goods such as toilet paper.
Marxist ideology, not populism or falling oil prices, is the reason for Venezuela's runaway inflation, a devalued currency along with rampant corruption, marked by the jailing of political dissidents. Not one word about communism.
Sorta like writing about the reasons for the Civil War without mentioning slavery.
Ken Sheets
Hixson
In 90 days, Trump hasn't fixed it all
Some of Trump's lies so far: repeal and replace Obamacare with something that covers everyone better and cheaper; ban Muslims; Mexico is going to pay for a border wall; tear up NAFTA, re-negotiate trade deals; get tough with China and Japan, bring those jobs back home; have a plan to defeat ISIS; largest electoral college victory in history; largest crowd to see an inauguration; Obama tapped his phones; not playing golf like Obama, "too busy in White House" working hard for us.
These are just a few of the lies and broken campaign promises already made by Trump, and he hasn't been in office 90 days yet. If you voted for Trump and Republican majorities in both houses, be careful what you wish for. You just might get it.
Stephen Borders
Hixson
DIPG cancer needs funding
In his March 26 Perspective article, well-known oncologist Dr. B.W. Ruffner stated that 1,300-plus pharmaceutical lobbyists in Washington spend $244 million convincing Congress their charges are justified and twice as much on advertising as on research and development.
Out of cancer research, all pediatric cancers get only 4 percent. There is a pediatric brain cancer, DIPG, that is basically using the same protocol as when astronaut Neil Armstrong' s toddler daughter died of it in 1962. Less than 1 percent of children with DIPG survive, and the average life span after diagnosis is nine months.
Parents are grieving for their precious children. Please write your senators or Dr. Tom Price, head of HHS, on behalf of these children and their families, asking for more than 4 percent. Ask for DIPG to be researched, so families can enjoy what we all want: healthy children.
Sandy Harris
Cloudland, Ga.
'In God We Trust' bill only worsens
According to a March 29 article in USA Today Network - Tennessee, state Rep. Bill Sanderson has amended his proposed bill making the phrase "In God We Trust" mandatory on Tennessee license plates.
The amendment seeks to avoid requiring the minority of Tennessee vehicle owners, who are atheists or agnostics, to display plates containing a statement they do not endorse by making the motto optional.
The amended bill seems more, not less, problematic. It would require car owners to either publicly express a religious statement by adding the phrase, or what might be perceived as a non-religious statement by not doing so, thereby allowing inferences to be made concerning the religious beliefs of drivers.
The original bill, and its amendment, appear to be solutions in search of a problem. Tennessee drivers already may decide to purchase a specialty plate prominently displaying "In God We Trust."
The needless imposition of such binary decision-making upon all car owners (except those with specialty plates) seems contrary to our Constitution's intent of building, in the words of Thomas Jefferson, "a wall of separation between church and state," and preventing what John Adams termed "the tyranny of the majority."
Patrick F. Lavin
Hixson
Education key to ending hate crime
The recent hate crimes in Olathe, Kan., and in Seattle, where two Indians were shot by someone using racial slurs, woke me up.
Like, it could never happen in this great country. It is fake news. But I was wrong, so I started looking into more details. What I found, in a nationwide FBI report, was that 5,479 hate crimes were committed in 2014 and 5,815 in 2015, a rise of 6.1 percent.
The basis of the crimes were race (47 percent), sex (18.6), religion (18.6), ethnicity (11.9), gender (1.8) and disability (1.5).
This is shocking. No blame to Republicans or Democrats or anybody. I think we all should take responsibility.
Starting from school to the president of the country, we need to educate the general population that this is a country of immigrants. Sooner or later, we all came from somewhere.
But our primary responsibility is to be a good citizen. Also, media can play a major role to improve this horrible situation.
To remedy this, a nationwide program should be started from Washington to state to city and county to schools: education, education, education.
Ron Bhalla
Hixson
Enough greed to go around
By "rationally priced" drugs, Dr. Clif Cleaveland (Tuesday Life column) means "bureaucratically priced" prices enforced by arrogant bureaucrats on contemptible irredeemables.
The problem is really "crony capitalism": greed using government. The solution, which Dr. Cleaveland's brains and training somehow overlooked, is to use patents according to the original intent of the Constitution: "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times the exclusive Right to Discoveries."
Note: "To promote" and "limited Times." A drug patented by A.D. 1957 should be able to be made by any company. Trademark forever because labels are useful - let competitors call their versions by other names - but the government is protecting the greed of Acthar's maker beyond what seems useful for progress.
Doctors who put down competition are greedy like drug companies. Doctors who want plenty of medical dollars, at whatever cost to peoples' other priorities, are greedy like drug companies.
When nurses, pharmacists, even informed laymen can do cheaply what doctors charge an arm and a leg for, and when doctors need approval from the existing medical establishment to offer a new service, I see greed.
Andrew Lohr