Noise levels are disturbing
Residents of Catoosa County: We live in a subdivision over five miles from Boyd’s Speedway, the Drag Strip, and now the Motocross track.
In the summer, families in this area cannot be outside their houses because of noise levels on Friday and Saturday nights (and now on Sunday afternoons). These events supposedly close at 10 p.m.; however, they go later.
We are told these businesses were here long before us, so we have no recourse. We also are told that notices for commission meetings about these businesses are posted at the tracks (which no one sees except patrons attending events) and are in newspapers; that we should attend commission meetings (senior citizen residents cannot always get to meetings); that these businesses’ taxes are necessary for county coffers.
Fellow Catoosa County residents (who pay taxes too), this is a travesty for a few people who enjoy themselves at the expense of many residents who moved into the county but cannot enjoy weekends because of noise.
Our neighbor, who died from cancer, was captive in her own house and unable to be outside with family because of the noise. These establishment owners live nowhere near them … which speaks volumes!
DR. PAT TAYLOR
Ringgold, Ga.
It’s parents’ job to raise children
School starts next week, and I have a challenge for all parents and guardians to encourage your children to excel.
Sometimes parents unknowingly set their children up for failure.
If we start our day with a bad attitude, so likely will they. When we say mean things about people at home – so goes the home, so goes the school. When our stomachs growl, we eat. When our children are hungry, they can’t concentrate. If our children are disruptive at home, how much more are they away from home?
Parents, if your children don’t work, yet they have money that you didn’t give them or items that you didn’t purchase for them, don’t turn a blind eye. Either your child is stealing or he’s/she’s being rewarded for some unsavory behavior by someone very unscrupulous.
Take control, parents – it’s your job. It’s not the job of the church or school or community center to raise your child. It’s our job to raise the most incredible, magnificent commodity on the face of this earth – our children.
“Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.” Proverbs 22:6.
FAYE J. WILLIAMS
Make right choices in Pentagon cut
The Pentagon is undergoing a budget drill to find savings of $400 billion over the next 10 years. Shouldn’t the Department of Defense be guided by what we want our military to do, not how much savings should we acquire?
Usually the policymaker or planner looks at an array of threats. Next they try to think of counters to the many threats.
Another way to address the problem is to broaden the issue and think about it strategically. The point is that we should be seeking answers to the “what” question before we begin to “run the numbers.” The U.S. military method is called “Strategy to Task construct.” We want our military to: prevent nuclear attack, deter wars, nurture allies, meet treaty commitments, etc. The planner determines what is the best way to attain these missions. Finally, we get to the specifics forces, their costs, and trade-offs.
Policymakers and the administration hold the assumption that curbing defense spending will better serve us in the future. Remember that the military uses what it has, not with what is planned. The Department of Defense and the nation have to make choices. For our children and grandchildren’s sake, I hope they make the right ones.
ARTHUR MacFADDEN
Lt. Col. (Ret.) USAF
Cut commercials for Post Office
If the Post Office is in a financial bind, cut the TV commercials. I know the networks are giving them free time.
“If it fits, it fits.” After two or more years, we get the message. Another example of no intelligence in D.C.
JIM WOLFE
Guild, Tenn.
Name-calling is outrageous
The mainstream media and some rank-and-file Democrats, and also some Democratic leaders including Vice President Joe Biden, calling the newly elected 80-plus tea party members “terrorists” and “hostage takers” is completely outrageous.
The tea party members were sent to Washington to stop this out-of-control spending.
“Enough is enough.”
PAT LUDOVICO
Cleveland, Tenn.
It’s too hot for football
Re: football practice in Hamilton County schools.
I live in the Atlanta area, and two young men died today (Aug. 3) practicing football.
My grandson has played football ever since I can remember, but has quit going, due to the fact of the extreme heat.
What is it going to take to have these football coaches to know what can happen to these young men!
They were given water, Gatorade, etc., but with temperatures like this, it is just not enough.
I think it is time for these coaches to understand the things that could happen to these young men all in the name of a winning team.
Is it going to take someone to die on the field for something to be done? What is wrong with these people?
ANGELA HARTLEY
Obama just cares about re-election
We don’t have a president. We have a Banty rooster who runs down the steps from the White House and jumps on the steps to the airplane and goes wherever he wants to.
He doesn’t care how much gas he uses, and now he wants everything on the table.
Who is he going to put on the table?
He wants more taxes. He wants the rich to give. He would like the rich to give all while he wants it his way or no way.
All he cares abut now is getting re-elected.
IRENE ROSE
Hixson
Enjoy the music without alcohol
I was pleased when I learned that a nonprofit folk school specializing in old-time, bluegrass, Irish and world music was coming to Chattanooga. A ribbon-cutting was held on April 9, 2010, and the Chattanooga Area Chamber of Commerce assisted with the festivities.
The school now offers camps, group lessons, and private lessons by highly qualified individuals.
However, I have been appalled at the announcements to “BYOB” to the concerts and the recent reference to the St. Elmo Folk Stomp, “support your favorite folk music school by drinking beer!” The stomp schedule included “Teen Music Meetup and Jam Sessions.”
This seems to bring a message to our youth that “alcohol” is an integral part of the enjoyment of music even though minors can’t participate until they are “of age.”
Music is a wonderful gift and does not need alcohol to enhance the pleasure it brings.
The National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism has reported that alcohol use during adolescence and young adulthood remains a prominent public health problem in the United States.
CARSON MADEWELL