LETTERS

LITTLE ROCK — Replace G&FC members

Hunters, fishermen and wildlife enthusiasts, beware. We have a crisis in our Game and Fish department created by none other than some of our Game and Fish commissioners.

Their recent actions relative to the staff and micro-management of the agency are reprehensible, arrogant and abusive, and constitute gross misconduct in office. Some commissioners apparently are power-mad, self-styled administrative experts who usurp and ignore the knowledge of a professional staff and executive authority, and establish numerous committees for every possible purpose and then attempt a decisive blow to the Freedom of Information Act while attempting to shift blame to the staff attorney.

What does this mean to you? It means that if powers can be seized by these commissioners, staff ignored and state law relegated to indifference, we sportsmen can receive the same treatment. The special interests of a few commissioners will prevail.

What can we as sportsmen do? We can explain our alarm to Gov. Mike Beebe and ask that he use his power under Amendment 35, Paragraph 5 and Article 15, Section 3 of the state Constitution to remove the offending commissioners from the commission “for good cause.”

Some commissioners are obviously administratively incompetent. They are unaware of the limits on their powers. They must be replaced. Now.

GIP ROBERTSON North Little RockBe smart at the polls

There are groups out there that want to fool you into thinking that because you aren’t happy with how things are going in our federal government, you shouldn’t be happy with your state government, either.

We’re told that if we don’t like how things are going in Washington, we should vote everyone out at all levels. Do we really know what we are getting ourselves into here?

I can’t think of a thing my state representative could have done to change the decisions being made that I haven’t liked in Washington. Arkansans have a state that’s been managed pretty well, by (mostly) Democratic legislators who have nothing whatsoever to do with what’s going onin Washington. Yet, because they are Democrats and a new bunch of political activists is telling us how mad we should be at them, wemight just throw all their experience and all the good they’ve done out the window so we can experiment with new people who want to take advantage of this anti-incumbent political climate.

I am not sure why being unhappy with the federal government means that someone must be unhappy with his state representative. Arkansans are independent, common-sense voters, and I think we are smart enough not to be fooled into getting rid of good state legislators just because we aren’t happy with what some federal legislators are doing.

JULIE McDONALD GreenbrierStatesman in waiting

Please inform your readers about the independent candidate, Trevor Drown, who was the first on the ballot for the U.S. Senate seat that is held by Blanche Lincoln.

He is a former Green Beret and a small-business owner and has worked for United Parcel Service for 22 years. He will be a great statesman, not a career politician.

AMANDA FRANKS Waldo Eschew ‘party of no’

Registered voters in Arkansas need to get their heads out of the sand and be careful who and what they vote for.

Agriculture is critical to the U.S. population as a whole. We need people on the agricultural committees in Congress who have been associated closely with agriculture throughout their life.

We have a highly qualified senator already on the Agriculture Committee there who also possesses seniority in the Senate. To vote this senator out of office in favor of a soon-to-be former congressman who claims to be a farmer would be very foolish.

Voters should stay the course for the good of Arkansas by not installing a freshman senator who in 10 years as a congressman brought nothing of great importance to Arkansas’ House District 3. Nor did he meet the needs of Arkansans. As an example, he was unsuccessful in bringing in the muchneeded funding for the Bella Vista bypass. He had 10 years to help get this done. Duh?

Also, we need a representative in District 3 who won’t cater to the wealthy in one of Arkansas’ wealthiest areas and “the party of no.” How about electing someone with a good mind and who has a firm grasp of what we need in a representative? David Whitaker comes to mind.

As I said, be careful who and what you vote for.

EMMA GENE BUZICK Bella Vista Support Democrats

The question: Do we want to return the robber barons to power? Or shall we stay to course to work together to solve this country’s problems?

The problems were created by George W. Bush, Dick Cheney and Karl Rove, who opened the doors to corruption in all areas of government. Can we afford the return to unregulated Wall Street? Can we afford to continue to reward wealthy investors and CEOs for sending our jobs over the border? Can we afford to continue to let the wealthy pay less than their fair share in taxes while we working families pay almost a third of our income to the tax man?

Can we let Arkansas be represented by one of Rove’s political operatives, Tim Griffin? No. Joyce Elliot will represent the working folks against the onslaught of lobbyists the rich have sent to cheat us.

Will you have a voice in Washington, D.C.? Not if you vote Republican. Vote Democrat.

LEONARD WEST JacksonvilleFeedback Ballot still counted

After I deposited my early voting ballot a few years ago in a small town in Texas, I asked the clerk if my vote would be counted if I should die before the real election day. I was in my 80s at the time. The clerk said she didn’t know, so she called her supervisor. He came to her desk and said yes without hesitating.

I said I knew dead people voted, but I did not know how it worked with early voting. You may remember in the Democratic primary in 1948 in Texas in Duval County when, it is said, the “Duke of Duval,” George Parr, got enough dead people to vote for Lyndon Johnson that Johnson barely beat Coke Stevenson for senator. That is why Lyndon was nicknamed Landslide Lyndon.

GUY BORDEN Little RockKeep up ‘no’ votes

Our appreciation and thanks go out to the Republican members of Congress who showed patriotic, fiscal responsibility in helping block a cost-of-living increase in Social Security for older Americans.

We would have recklessly blown it on food, rent, clothes, mortgages, utilities and health care. Keep saying no and save us from the socialist Democrats.

JERRY KAHLER Little Rock