SPEAKOUT

Birth control, not abortions

ON MY way to work, I drive on West End Boulevard everyday, I always see this sign: "Pray to end abortion." It always seems to jump out at me. I think we should not be praying to end abortion. I think we should be praying for young teens and young adults to get smart to use some form of birth control so there wouldn't be any abortions in the future.

REPLY: What about abstinence? Perhaps youngsters need to be taught not to have sex until they are married.

Poor sportsmanship in baseball

I ENJOYED my trip to Chicago's Wrigley Field to watch the Cardinals play the Cubs. While Gary Gaetti was the star, I thought it was very, very bad for that Cub pitcher to intentionally throw at the rat. It was poor sportsmanship for him to take a cheap shot like that and on purpose hit the rat.

Need to be told about molesters

REGARDING THESE child molesters, just because they have finished a prison term does not mean they have finished molesting. Protection from the public's knowledge of who they are and where they live should not have priority over children's protection from them. Police knowledge is not enough, because they cannot provide 24-hour protection for the children. Parents need to know so they can be on 24-hour alert. But in reality, you cannot monitor every play-activity of children as in bicycling and many other activities. So the only real answer is child molesters need to either be kept in asylums away from access to all children or forced to wear monitoring devices or to be castrated. Our children's protection is top priority, not the molesters. We need new laws to prevent these molesters from harming our children so that children can play in peace. The state of Washington has a 1990 Community Protection Act that requires community notification when sex crime inmates are released and indefinite civil confinement of dangerous sexual predators. We need this law in Missouri and throughout all the states.

Veterans should have supported a veteran

THERE WAS a story of proposed cuts in veterans' benefits. My father was a veteran of World War II and Korea and a proud member of the VFW. This is the same VFW that will fuss about these proposed budget cuts but chose not to endorse for president a military veteran who also was shot down and injured while serving his country. This same VFW chose to endorse a person who did everything he could legally to avoid military service and who protested against our country's military involvement in Vietnam. This person they chose to endorse is the same man who Sen. Christopher Bond refers to when he says, "The president came up with the idea that we could serve veterans and cut $300 million." Well, the VFW got what they wanted. I hope the cuts occur. I will call my congressman and senators and ask them to support this particular cut. VFW members, ask yourself: Do you think you should blindly every Democratic presidential candidate? And then ask yourself if you honestly think Republican Bob Dole, a veteran, would have done this to you.

Speaking for Southern Baptists

A RECENT caller to Speak Out who claimed to be a Southern Baptist yet maliciously maligned the denomination was mistaken on all points. The Southern Baptist Convention has no hierarchy and never has had. Each church is autonomous and accountable only to God. In the late 1970s there was a theological controversy in the SBC over whether or not we were going to accept the Bible as the inspired, authoritative, inerrant word of God. This majority view prevailed. A real Southern Baptist would know this. Southern Baptists could never be anti-Semitic as accused by that caller. Our dear Lord is himself a Jew. The very roots of our Christian heritage go back to God's promise to Abraham of a savior. Our heart's desire is that the Jews would recognize and accept our Jesus as their promised Messiah. As for gay bashing, not true. We are even now developing a special ministry to homosexuals and lesbians to help them come out of a lifestyle that God's word says is a no-no. Since that caller is so misinformed, I can say I'm a Southern Baptist, I know many Southern Baptists, and believe me that caller is no Southern Baptist. Southern Baptists are not shy or embarrassed about taking a stand for family values and Christian morals. It's what Jesus would have us do. I say this in his love and mine.

No mobile home in residential areas

I AM so glad that the city council did not approve the request to put a mobile home in a residential neighborhood. Trailers and mobile homes belong in a trailer court.

Boycott appears to be working

I WOULD like to comment on this Disney boycott. Disney said the reason it's latest release, "Hercules," did so poorly at the box office was because people did not get out and watch the movies on the Fourth of July. That's simply not the case, because if it is, look at "Men in Black." It grossed over $50 million. So the boycott is working.

Police response is appreciated

WE WOULD like to thank the Cape Girardeau Police Department for the quick response and thorough investigation of a late-night Sunday call. Your efforts were very much appreciated.

No professional discipline

DOES ANYONE else detect a lack of discipline with the Mars mission control team? They hoop and holler, and I don't blame them. They've accomplished quite a feat. However, they now seem so passive and unfocused. That little rover has already collided with a rock due to untimely steering data. Now the wrong data is being supplied telling the rover when to listen for commands, losing 24 hours of exploration time. Who knows how many billions that cost. The original mission controllers may have seemed stiff and self-centered, but they got Apollo 13 and the crew home safely. Why can't today's young controllers exhibit such professional discipline?

200-foot limit should be removed

I THINK the city council should rethink the ordinance on complaints if a dilapidated house or building is just over 200 feet from you. The city council should know that whether it's 200 feet or 1,000 feet from this dilapidated building, it still devalues the property in the whole neighborhood. Therefore, I feel that they should give the chief of police the power to file complaints against these people and make them clean their places up for the benefit of the ones who do keep their place clean. If one neighbor lets his property go, it just runs the whole neighborhood down and this 200 feet is strictly wrong and they should rethink and eliminate the 200 feet completely.

Don't give our money to Korea

BILL CLINTON has just recently authorized giving $30 million to the government of North Korea to feed its citizens. And obviously, this will include the military. Yet the North Koreans are spending $190 million building a monument to their late communist leaders. This all comes at the same time that this administration is cutting into the veterans benefits. Perhaps if Bill Clinton would have had to crawl in the mud and snow and blood to fight these people, he would not be so anxious to give them $30 million at the same time they're building $190 million monuments to their communist leaders. I hope and pray at the next election that we will get a man in that White House who will look out for the veterans of this country and stop worrying about these other countries. I do not like to see children starve. I'm not that way. But I also don't believe in giving the communists any of the taxpayers' dollars.