Speak Out 07/15/04

More faulty info

HOW MANY people know the United States declared war on Spain in 1898 because of a faulty report concerning the destruction of the USS Maine? Spanish people are still bitter about the mistake. Most Americans are probably not aware of this and couldn't care less.

Jackson and Indians

A CALLER said Jackson should keep the Indian name. OK, keep the name of the group forced from their land and killed by Andrew Jackson, the man whom the city shows on its signs.

All that information

THERE IS more misinformation spread by the Internet, movies, TV and other media in one day than the total amount passed on by word of mouth during the Dark Ages. I am at a total loss to explain Gary Rust's apparent faith in the ability of voters to separate truth from falsehood.

Owners aren't protected

I HAVE worked with hundreds of victims of substandard construction in Missouri and have never met one who was made whole, sometimes after being in the court system for as long as six years. Missouri has no laws to protect the largest single investment a family ever makes, their home. Anyone reading this could be a homebuilder right now. There are no qualifications set out by the state. My nail girl is held to a higher standard than a homebuilder. She has to be licensed by the state. It is laughable that Sen. Peter Kinder believes the Missouri Bar and Missouri Association of Trial Attorneys worked hard to defeat this bill. The truth is that lawyers in Missouri don't want these cases. They are complicated, and of the few homeowners who have been awarded a judgment, many have been unable to collect it because the builder dissolves his corporation and starts a new one in a different name. Missouri victims worked hard to defeat the bill.

Statue needs attention

IF JACKSON is so proud of its Indian statue, why doesn't it take better care of it? It sure doesn't show much pride to me. I have heard many people comment on how bad it looks.

Loud stereo

WHY IS it that I can hear the ice cream truck for more than five blocks away and the driver never gets pulled over for having his stereo too loud?

Practical teaching

WASTE HAPPENS whenever classrooms are misused vainly trying to fix society's ills. Sex education with its how-to condom demonstrations in the classroom is a complete waste in Cape Girardeau. We need productive citizens, not more sexual ones. We need them to know how to fish. To read. To calculate. To write. To work. They will all, every last one of them, figure sex out for themselves.