LETTERS

The difference is …

Normally when I write, I take up the full 250 words allowed. This time I would just like one question answered.

I am a conservative Republican and possibly not the brightest bulb in the box, but would someone please explain to me why, if I were to refer to someone of the black persuasion with the “n-word,” that makes me a racist, but when Trayvon Martin refers to George Zimmerman as a “cracker,” he is not called a racist?

Both terms are highly charged with negative connotations, yet when such words are used by blacks, it seems nobody ever refers to them as racists.

This leads to another question. If I were to have voted against Obummer simply because he is black, that makes me a racist, while 95 percent of the blacks in the last election voted for him (I am sure most voted that way simply because he was black) and that is not racism.

I just don’t see the difference.

KIPP WOODBURY

Mountain Home

Take up a collection

Are taxes levied and taxes collected linear? Ask Fort Smith, Little Rock, and Art Laffer.

MIKE BROWN

Redfield

A one-day weekend

Having only lived in Arkansas for three years, and in Cabot, I don’t know a lot about Little Rock, but do enjoy some of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. I would really like to subscribe to the weekend paper-except your “powers that be” don’t seem to realize that Saturday is a weekend day. I would only get a Sunday paper. I also want the Saturday paper.

What gives?

It would be nice also to get a senior discount for the subscription. The answer I received on that in a phone call was laughable. Everyone who has heard it just laughs.

Get with it, Arkansas!

JANE WALKER

Cabot

Wrong comparison?

I think Scott Vaughn made the wrong comparison when he wrote about the war in Syria.

Syria is not a civil war. It is a brutal dictator and his regime destroying its own people.

I think this compares more to Hitler during War World II than to our Civil War, and it took the cooperation of the world powers to bring Hitler to an end.

SALLY MAYS

Roland

Not rooted in reality

Men with men and women with women are playing with fantasy more than living reality. They do the unusual, meaning living a lie, trying to get ill-gotten gains for expressing nothing.

You cannot compare gay marriage to the civil-rights movement. It’s based on injustice living in America. I believe gay marriage is nothing but an ungodly thought between two people of the same sex being pushed by the devil-nothing more, nothing less.

Excitement, greatness, happiness and joy come from the womb, meaning the birth of a child. Men with men or women with women can’t do that at all because that lifestyle, by itself, goes against God’s definition of a union between a man and a woman raising a family.

JAY J. JAMES

Lonoke

Are you kidding me?

Do you really think that proponents of the immigration bill just passed by the Senate will really wait on securing the border to implement the plan?

You’ve got to be kidding. As soon as such a bill becomes law, proponents will begin lobbying to accelerate its provisions regardless of whether the border is secure or not.

When I stop and think about the argument over border security, I begin to think that border security is just a pipe dream and a cover for those who will vote for a bill with such a provision, using it as a reason for their vote. I can see it in print now: “I am against illegal immigration but I voted for the bill because it provides for strengthening the border.”

So, do you think that we will enforce any provision of an immigration bill?

You’ve got to be kidding. If we cannot get a comprehensive voter-identification law passed on the federal level or simple enforcement of existing immigration laws, then surely we don’t have a prayer of having our border secured by the current administration.

Last thought: I agree that we must help others not as fortunate as us when possible, but as a concerned taxpayer, father, grandfather and citizen, it is clear to me that we must place our families, our country and its citizens first if our nation is to survive in the hostile and violent world that we live in today.

You know what? I’m not kidding.

JOHN WILLIAMS

Sherwood

Price of our liberties

I remember reading an historical study which showed that when a people of a nation divert their sexual energy into other forms of activity, creativity, productivity and progress expand. On the other hand, when the people of a nation indulge their sexual energy in all types of expressions, the nation’s creativity, productivity and progress collapse.

Christians believe that the hand of God can be seen in these experiences.

Regardless of your belief, you can look about you and heed the warning.There are good reasons that for centuries marriage has been protected and human life considered sacred. The Ten Commandments of the Bible are a blueprint for fostering successful societies.

Just so, moral teachings are not restrictions on behavior, but guidelines for a healthy individual and national life. Ask yourself if our nation is healthy, and if your answer is not a resounding yes, then what are you going to do about that? For the health of a nation depends on the preventive care of its citizens.

Or as my father would quote Wendell Phillips: “Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty!” MARY H. DYAR

Hot Springs Village

Thank you for service

Well said, Rear Adm. Luke McCollum. Your description of the Navy’s place in our nation’s defense and commerce echoed my feelings. Thank you for your years of service to see that my family remains safe and free.

GAYLE JUNGKIND

Roland