Negative effects of Bush remain
We just can’t get away from the George Bush years. We keep on reaping the negative effects of his administration. The economic atmosphere they created brought about the fiasco of Enron and the Madoff scam; reminiscent of Reagan’s failed Savings and Loan Associations.
We are now in the longest war in our history; over a thousand of our military personnel dead. Only God knows how many innocent Afghans have died who had nothing to do with 9/11. We could have gotten Osama bin Laden had Bush and Cheney not invaded Iraq for oil.
Now we are experiencing the worst environmental disaster since the flood of Noah, thanks to the de-regulation. Bush allowed the most dangerous vice president in the nation’s history to conduct secret meetings with oil companies. They decided acoustical safety devices were too expensive; better to chance a catastrophe with a cheaper product.
They did, and now tens of thousands of Americans will suffer for generations from the oil gusher in the Gulf. Someone needs to go to jail. Big government doesn’t seem so bad now to Republicans. Again the “free market” doesn’t look so great. Sadly, our country is controlled by banks and corporations.
WILBOURNE C. MARKHAM
Walden, Tenn.
Volunteer time to be with children
Does anybody really believe the children of military personnel can be bolstered up when farmed out to relatives and family friends for who knows how long? Much less, learn about being part of a whole family?
A child wonders why her/his parent chooses to be away from him/her for such a long time — a period of six or more months. When “they” have an accident, long illness — cancer, are wounded or killed? A child asks who will take care of “me” when surviving mom/dad returns to duty — whatever that means or wherever it is.
Let’s get real: perhaps the parents can’t live on minimum wage with children, or one comes home handicapped or chronically ill and the surviving parents can’t support the children.
This is a real-live, ongoing children’s problem. Not a blip from the Associated Press in the Sunday newspaper (May 30).
Wake up! Go volunteer with your church, a community service organization, a school or daycare center, the children’s unit of a hospital, etc.
Be the 95-year-old man who read at a daycare center every day for 25 years. All through those years he was greeted wherever he went by not only the attending students but by his neighbors and friends.
MARYMOR CRAVENS
Sewanee, Tenn.