Speak Out 1/6/06

Making sacrifices

I GREW up poor. I lived in a trailer with no air conditioning or cable TV. I got a winter coat each year as an early Christmas present. There were no vacations. We never accepted any type of public assistance. My mom always had enough money put away to cover a visit to the doctor and medicine just in case someone got sick. I had a happy childhood, but I wanted to live a better life. I worked three jobs putting myself through college. I didn't go out to eat or to the movies. I didn't have cable TV or long-distance telephone service. A vacation was not even a consideration. I now am in the top IRS income-tax bracket. I resent the fact that some people feel they are entitled to have what I have worked for without earning it. This mentality is exactly what is destroying my beloved America. In this country, you are entitled to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Be happy with what you have, or work to change it. I don't mind helping those who are truly in need, but those who need help have to make their own sacrifices first.

Booming businesses

I DON'T think it is fair to compare Cape Girardeau to Cairo, Ill. Cape Girardeau has a large university and booming businesses. Just because businesses are leaving Broadway doesn't mean anything. For every business that closed on Broadway, five opened out by the interstate.

That's no excuse

TALKING DURING movies is rude to other people trying to watch the movie. If you want to socialize, go to a bar or restaurant. Save the comments for after the movie. Just because everyone is doing it doesn't make it OK. It's like driving 50 or 55 mph on the main drag through Jackson. The speed limit is 40 mph. Slow down and shut up.

Leave it one way

I WAS calling with an opinion on the two-way street proposed for Main Street in Cape Girardeau. I drove a delivery truck for years, and I know what it's like when you fight traffic going both ways. I think the people who want to change this to two ways have run out of ideas on what to do and are trying to make up some kind of plan to make themselves look good when it's really going to make them look bad. They don't need a two-way street on Main Street.

Beautiful service

THIS IS a response to the comment about churches closing on Christmas Day. There were several churches open. They observed Christmas and Christ's birth. Our own church, Grace United Methodist Church with pastor Scott Moon, was one of them. We had a beautiful service, and it was very meaningful.

Private pay, not taxes

I THINK it's a good thing that companies that manufacture surveillance cameras get a percentage of the city's collections from traffic fines. In some schools, private businesses stepped in to help one way or another. The state can't pick up all the cost. Here's the state being effective and not taxing people more to spy on us.

Each street one way

I'M CALLING in regard to the Main Street problem. Why don't we put it back the way it was? Water Street one way and Main Street going the other way. We don't have to hire engineers.

Pretty displays

SOME OF the prettier displays at the county park for Christmas were those who did it for the deceased. Those displays promoted love instead of the profit motive.

True love

TEARS FORMED in my eyes after reading the Christmas memory by Dr. Robert Perry. His love for God, his family and especially his wife, Jane, is real. I know because I am his mother-in-law.

Spreading his name

I WANT everybody to know I am thrilled to death. I'm sure God is too, because you're finally hearing his name on just about every channel on television.

Detour concerns

IF YOU are a resident of County Road 206, this is for you. City officials have gone to great lengths to inform residents about Bloomfield Road's closing for three months, but are you aware that County Road 206 is a detour for all that traffic? Having driven that route many times, I know how close many residents are to the roadway. I've seen the crazy drivers, the near misses, the speeding and carelessness with which drivers proceed. This detour is a terrible idea. If you feel the same way, contact your city officials.

Comparing cities

I love stories about Cairo, Ill., because it makes me realize the community where I reside is not all that bad.

Based on faith

Robert Dillon's wrongheaded argument that God's existence can be proven empirically eviscerates the foundation on which religion is based: namely, faith.