Speak Out 10/18/05

Hardworking band

THANKS TO Callie Clark Miller for the excellent article about the Central High School marching band. It shows what you can accomplish with hard work, teamwork and dedicated teachers. I hope a lot of students and educators read it.

Band auditions

I'M IN the Central High School marching band. Auditions for this year's band have made a positive change in student attitude and participation. We all work harder and don't have slackers. Anyone wishing to be in the band had multiple times to audition, and the band directors would help as much as needed. With this change the band has been successful in competitions this year and, I hope, for years to come. Auditions are not trying to keep anyone from being in the band, but we want those students to know we are serious about what we do. If auditions turn them away from the band, they have no reason to be there in the first place.

High school tryouts

THERE'S NOTHING wrong with trying out for the marching band. At the high school level you try out for everything: football, cheerleading, soccer, baseball, dance team. If you do not want to try out for marching band, there's always concert band (full year), as well as solo and ensemble contest at the end of the year. If students decide that auditions are not for them, there are always other options.

Spending elsewhere

HOW IS Cape Girardeau a classy town? It wants other towns and cities to get our money by not wanting to put in a water park, by not wanting a casino, by not wanting to do this or that in order to keep our money in our town. Cape would rather we spend our money elsewhere and have a good time.

Call the police

IN RESPONSE to the person complaining about the abandoned car on Perryville Road: Unfortunately, Speak Out is not a direct line to the police department or other city officials. They do not take complaints via Speak Out. Contact them at 335-6621 and state your problem. I'm confident our wonderful police department will take care of the issue.

Following the lead

IN HIS defense, David Limbaugh does not attempt to shape public opinion to his radical right-wing views. Rather, when there is a division among extremists of the right, he waits until some sort of consensus emerges and then attempts to spread the gospel by creating the illusory view that he was out in front in determining the party line long since decided by others.

Positive results

THERE ARE, indeed, over 60 cures using adult stem cells and none with fetal cells. There is a never-ending source of the adult cells. Why is funding being withheld and directed to fetal cells? These questions have not been adequately answered by any official I've asked. It is frustrating and makes no sense to not go forward where there have been positive results.

Cloning warning

I THOUGHT cloning of humans was illegal. So how do you explain the exact duplication of the Missouri Chamber of Commerce by the Missouri General Assembly?

Blame poverty

AS I watch TV and read the paper about the hurricanes on the Gulf Coast, I wonder who is to blame for the recovery effort. It is not just Homeland Security or FEMA. It is everyone: the president, Congress, the Louisiana governor and the New Orleans mayor. We're told the people in New Orleans are the poorest of the poor. Some of them did not have cars or money to leave their homes. Yet the president and Congress are still sending our jobs to other countries. When we vote next time, we need to vote for people who will keep our jobs in the U.S. so people can rise above poverty.

Who will pay?

DO WE need more facilities such as a water park? Maybe. But everyone who wants these additions needs to understand that they cost money. Are we willing to pay additional taxes to get everything we want? Look at the trouble the Jackson School District has had passing bond issues. Look at the problems Cape Girardeau had passing a tax for fire and police needs. We can't keep asking for more and more without realizing we will have to pay more and more. And if we aren't willing to increase taxes, why do we keep asking for more goodies?

This is intelligent?

WE READ incessantly about the battle concerning the Big Bang theory, intelligent design, evolution and so on. If it becomes a reality that intelligent design is a part of the school curriculum, will it be part of the course to attempt to analyze why any so-called intelligent design would create such a place as this where over half of the world's population is starving to death or at war -- or both?

Smoking litter

THE GREAT majority of litter on Jackson streets is cigarette butts and empty cigarette packages. Does nicotine cause people to be trashy? Or does nicotine have nothing to do with the way smokers trash the environment? Can we expect nothing more than litter from people who spend $3 or more every day for things they put in their mouths and set on fire so they can suck smoke into their lungs?

Better postal facilities

THERE HAS been much said and written about the need for additional postal facilities in Cape Girardeau. Is our U.S. representative going to push the U.S. Postal Service into doing what it should have done all along? Are our U.S. senators doing anything? What are the mayor and city council doing? And since better postal operations affect businesses more than anyone else, where is the chamber of commerce leadership? As long as we settle for second best, that's exactly what we'll get. Cape Girardeau needs to push harder for convenient postal facilities. What we have now would never be tolerated in the business world. It's like the U.S. Postal Service wants to drive away business instead of accommodating postal patrons.