Trump’s statements on alt-right too soft
Donald Trump’s lukewarm statements after a white supremacist demonstration in Charlottesville, Va., were disappointingly soft.
But going soft on the alt-right is standard operating procedure for the Trump administration. Why? Because Trump’s former adviser, Steve Bannon, is a white supremacist. And David Duke of the KKK is part of the president’s base.
Mike C. Bodine
East Ridge
We can change discrimination
A Rossville neighbor’s education, religion and community failed her (letter, Aug. 29). She is filled with fear and loathing, and with ignorance, bigotry and disinformation. And she doesn’t know it.
Even as many of us ponder how to commemorate the last lynching of a black person in Chattanooga – Ed Johnson in 1906 – and reflect upon our city’s history of racial and political divides, we’ve left those like the letter writer out of the conversation. We must have, because she writes that black people have stolen her Southern heritage. I’m guessing, because she didn’t say, she’s not black. Maybe she’s Native American. Apart from the Trail of Tears tragedy, how about the white people who sent Indian children to boarding schools and forbade their speaking their language? Maybe she’s Asian, and her history includes the United States government forcing family members into concentration camps? If she’s Mexican, the 1930s-era “repatriation” of American citizens of Mexican descent yanked millions from their homes and banished them to Mexico.
This nation misused, abused and persecuted them all. Every culture, to be sure, has its history of discrimination. Now is another opportunity for us to change that. I hope we can.
Emily T. Campbell
State lawmakers praised for tax act
The state delegation that represents Chattanooga deserves applause. While no one wants a tax increase, the Improve Act balanced a gas tax increase to fund our roads and bridges with cuts to our sales tax on food and business taxes to create a huge tax cut.
Seeing the unending stream of cars with out-of-state tags in the Chattanooga area, it’s a smart move to allow tourists and business travelers to pay for our infrastructure. Hats off to policy that actually gets things done for Tennessee.
Jerry Walls
Southern comrades were patriots, too
The Sept. 3 “‘Patriotism’ can’t cover treason” letter is based on the opinion of Union Gen. George Thomas. After the 13 colonies were formed with the permission and protection of the British crown, they decided to break away and form their own government. They offered the Declaration of Independence, claiming their right and justification to do so.
It states, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any Form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”
The colonists revolting against England were called patriots. If you believe the words in the Declaration of Independence, the Southern states fighting for independence also were patriots.
Johnny H. Frazier