MORE LETTFIK
Old-Time Education,
Celebration Would
Keep Us All Safer
To the editor:
Southeastern North Carolina's most righteous liberal spent the glori
ous Fourth of July deploring the dangers of fireworks. How time distorts
mental balance!
Before achieving the age of awareness I can remember envying one
12-year-old son of a rich man who had a whole box full of two-inch
salutes and he was punking them off as fast as he could and throwing
them out into the stream at the public park we attended. Wow!
One landed in a canoe propelled by some Romeo and his girlfriend,
and the explosion was indeed momentous, as was the scream, but after
ten seconds when it was ascertained that no hole was blown in the bot
tom of the canoe and all was safe, and love was interesting than retribu
tion and accusation, the Romeo kept on going and the scion of indul
gence kept up the barrage. No other fireworks or product liability suit or
anything.
Excitement is sometimes very fleeting.
A few years later when we were almost desperately poor, somehow 1
got 50 cents to celebrate and, for some now unknown reason, had saved
one of my precious chcrry bombs for the special occasion which ap
peared magically: our female, anti-boy neighbor gossiping over the back
fence. I positioned the cherry bomb under an empty fruit juice can about
20 feet behind her. Kerplow! A twisted piece of metal was propelled
about 30 feet upward, and the inspiration for the mischief propelled her
self halfway to the moon.
The town's most famous pastor had two sons who put Peck's bad
boys to shsme, -r.d to cclcbiau. iln. Fouiui iiui evening ihcy had a io
gaugc shotgun mounted on a couple empty crates with a rope tied to the
trigger, aimed at a bark-covered fence post about 12 feet away, stuffed
the barrel of the gun with wads of newspaper and 22 -caliber cartridges.
Whilst we timid onlookers backed off in amazement, one of them
yanked the rope. All the flames of Vulcan belched forth at the hapless
fence post, blowing the bark off like so much tissue paper and leaving it
pockmarked like a Marne River battlefield.
Of course we had other dangerous toys to play with in those days:
lead soldiers we molded ourselves, chemistry sets, erector sets (small
pieces for babies to swallow), steam engines (egad, they burned alco
hol!), swimming holes and quarries without lifeguards, small-bore
firearms, bows and arrows, sleds and dangerous vehicles, and even spe
cial effects devices for Halloween like the rosin can whose cacophony at
a front window would propel the resident of an easy chair six feet into
the air!
Yes, they were dangerous times. And today, in the interests of safety,
we have substituted imaginative and effective education for AIDS pre
vention classes and all kinds of sex education and nothing else very ex
citing.
Now our young people can experiment with sex and drugs at an early
age and let others pay for the consequences. And there will be more lives
ruined, even physically destroyed, and more crime resulting from our
"liberal" educationists' prescriptions than all the hazards of yesteryear.
Give us that old-time education and that old-time Fourth of July cele
brating and everybody would be happier and safer, too.
Karl E. Brandt
Shallot te
Principal Is ' Valuable Unk'
To the editor:
Waccamaw Elementary School parents wish to express our apprecia
tion to Dr. Johnston and the school board for being sensitive to our wishes.
Over the years, Mr. Chestnut has become a valuable link between the
school and the community. Thank you for allowing him to remain with
us.
Pat Purvis Brown
Ash
No SeH-Control At Graduation
To the editor:
As a friend's son graduated from West Brunswick High School, I
was astounded by the behavior of the audience. There was absolutely so
much noise and disruption going on in the bleachers that one could hard
ly hear the name of the next graduate being called. It appeared to me that
the graduates exercised more self control and respect than the audience!
In the future, it should be expected and understood that no person in
the audience shall leave the graduation site until after the last graduate
exits the field. Let's make our young men and women as proud of us as
we are of them. After all, we as parents spend our lives teaching our chil
dren self control, discipline, manners and respect for others.
Selena Jordan
Matthews
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It's Because We Let Them, Stupid...
A billion here, a billion there, and
pretty soon you 're talking about re
al money.
? Everett McKinley Dirksen
? ? ?
Interesting things I learned today:
? Only about S8 billion of the
$11 billion set aside by Congress for
earthquake relief actually will go to
California.
Among the hidden "extras" are
$112 for cooperative space ventures
between the U.S. and Russia; $40
million for NASA's "spacehab"
module; $20 million to hire 500 new
employees at an FBI fingerprint fa
cility in West Virginia; $10 million
to convert a post office into a train
station in New York; $5 million so
the state of Florida can buy land in
the Everglades.
Also, $4.5 million for high-speed
rail research; $4 million for Coast
Guard bases in the Midwest; $2 mil
lion for U.S. Information Agency fa
cilities overseas; $1-5 million to dry
dock the commercial ship Savannah
at a stale museum in South Carolina;
$1.4 million to battle potato blight in
Maine; $1.3 million for two sugar
mill communities in Hawaii;
$550,000 to cover travel expenses
for the U.S. Trade Representative;
<uiu $1.2 uilikm fur humanitarian
missions in Somalia, Haiti, Iraq and
Bosnia.
? The ITS Department of Energy
Lynn
Carlson
i
rferi
i t 1
facility in Rocky Flats, Colo., is re
portedly missing more than S62 mil
lion in equipment, including a semi
tractor trailer, forklifts, computers,
camera and furniture.
Their lab in Sandia, N.M., can't
account for $386,000 in equipment.
In addition, computers were improp
erly stored and furniture was left out
in the open.
A DOE facility at Los Alamos,
N.M., cannot account for $100 mil
lion in personal property and equip
ment, including computers and med
ical equipment. Sixty-five percent of
the $7.3 million in equipment on
personal loan to employees was un
justified.
California's Livermore Labor
atory is missing 13 percent of its to
tal inventory, valued at $18.5 mil
lion, and DOE's Fcmald weapons
facilitv in Ohio imrwrwierlv tlnrwl
?
$243,000 in surplus equipment with
radioactive materials, forcing them
to bury the contaminated equipment
a! the Nevada nuclear test site.
? Audits of seven "smaller" de
fense contractors ? meaning not Ge
neral Dynamics, Lockheed or Mc
Donnell Douglas ? recently made
public by the General Accounting
Office turned up $4.9 million in ille
gal or questionable billing charges
on top of another S4.4 million that
the Pentagon's own contracting
watchdogs caught.
Among the expenses charged to
taxpayers: $333,000 for one contrac
tor's "business meetings" in Puerto
Valletta, Jamaica, the Cayman Is
lands and Hawaii; $62,000 for use
of a 46-foot sport fishing boat;
$24,000 in booze; $14,000 worth of
Celtics and Red Sox tickets,
$12,000 in cable television charges;
$10,000 for schooner rentals; $5,800
for running shoes; and $10,600 for
one party featuring caviar, salmon
and smoked duck.
But don't think the bureaucracy is
insensitive to charges that it is bloat
ed ? in January of this year, the fed
eral government granted seven sepa
rate contracts for studies worth $49
million, all identically entitled,
"Studies of the Impact of Regu
lations."
These alarming newsbytes came
from the spring edition of Co'^em
meni WasteWatch, which has been
coming to me unsolicited for several
editions now. The tabloid-sized
n^urcpan^r ic pnKjicjiyj quarterly Ky
Citizens Against Government
Waste, which describes itself on its
masthead as a "nonpartisan, non
pHtfit educational organization."
The publication certainly seems
to have no particular ax to grind,
other than to point out the fact that
billions ? with a "B" and 9 zeros ?
of public funds go toward some of
the most inexcusably inane purposes
anyone can imagine. Anyone, that
is, who pays taxes and is not at lib
erty to write a fat check against the
public account.
There's something about reading
pages and pages of accounts of
boundless boondoggle, audacious
exccss and shameless usury ? some
thing nauseating that starts in the
belly and travels to the brain and be
comes a shrill voice that tells you
what you already know. "It's be
cause we let them, stupid..."
By the way, it's not all bad news.
On the positive side, $144 million
was reportedly saved when the
Clinton administration finally ful
filled a campaign promise to elimi
nate one-third of the no less than
801 "discretionary" federal advisory
panels (410 of them are mandated
by Congress).
riOw in ihe wuiiii wiii wc get
along without the Board of Tea
Experts, the National Digestive Dis
eases Advisory Board and the South
T.>? U.U. r .:~~i
* VOIK ? xvtvu VUllUUIttW ?
GUEST COLUMN
State Leaders Should Allow Initiatives
BY PETER HANS
Democracy is a popular idea.
Although there are many forms of
initiative and referendum proce
dures, roughly half the 50 states al
low the people some form of direct
access to the ballot. Other states,
like North Carolina, vest their legis
latures with enormous power over
legislation and deny their citizens
the opportunity to vote on public
policy issues.
Historically, the N.C. General
Assembly is a powerful institution.
This can be traced back to the colo
nials' fear of the royal governors
and to Jim Crow-era legislative re
sistance to pluralism. Today, North
Carolina is the only state in the en
tire country whose chief executive
lacks gubernatorial veto.
. A 1990 study by UNC-Chapel
Hill political scientist Thad Beyle
found that North Carolina's gover
nor was the nation's weakest in
terms of formal powers. The result
is that the N.C. House Speaker,
eiecied 10 serve 65,000 people in
one section of the state, is at least
equal in power to the state governor,
who was elected to represent six r.nd
a half million citizens.
With so much power concentrated
in the hands of the General
Assembly, it's understandable why
legislators would be extremely re
luctant to allow ordinary people to
have direct access to the statewide
ballot. Yet there has been a strong
effort in the legislature to create a
state lottery through a binding popu
lar referendum. Why? Because the
lottery is one controversial issue that
many legislators would rather pass
to the voters. Rather than searching
for political cover on one particular
issue, state legislators should have to
either establish or reject a lottery ?
or, alternatively, give citizens the
ability to place any issue, including
the lottery, on the ballot.
If direct democracy were a reality
in North Carolina, the lottery, along
with several other high-profile, un
resolved issues, would surely quali
fy for the ballot. That would give
people an opportunity to debate and
argue, not rubber-stamp, questions
as varied a? a state lottery, term lim
its, gubernatorial veto, environmen
tal protection and education funding.
Only issues with strong popular
support would qualify for the ballot
if the petition signature threshold
were set at a level guaranteed to
eliminate fringe or special-interest
issues. It is vitally important that di
rect democracy legislation be writ
ten to ensure a responsive and re
sponsible process where the people
gain a greater voice in their govern
ment.
It would be better for everyone
concerned if legislators could spend
most of their time deliberating com
plex budgetary and policy issues not
amenable to "yes or no" decisions.
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opportunity to take more straightfor
ward questions directly to the peo
ple.
Popular disaffection with govern
ment has reached all-tune highs as
people feel that political decisions
are conducted in an atmosphere
which is remote to their concerns.
The advent of career elected offi
cials, the increasing iiif!ucr.cc and
number of lobbyists, the never- end
ing cycle of campaign fundraising,
negative advertising and bizarre re
districting plans all contribute to
widespread citizen anger with poli
tics and government.
In any event, legislators have as
much of an interest as anyone else in
seeing that public respect for the in
stitution of state government is en
hanced. Direct democracy would
clearly accomplish that goal. A re
cent national poll by the Americans
Talk Issues Foundation found wide
spread support for initiatives that let
citizens bypass or veto the votes of
elected officials. For example, 64
percent of those interviewed favor
conducting national referenda on
?viajoi issues and want the govern
ment to give a referendum approved
by a majority the same weight as
legislation passed by Congress. In
addition, 66 percent favor submit
ting tax increases that past congress
to vote of the people in in the next
election, and 71 percent favor in
cluding a voluntary questionnaire
with federal tax forms to give citi
zens an opportunity to define tin:
government's spending priorities.
Commenting on these findings, poll
ster Frederick T. Steeper said: "I
think we need to rethink the whole
idea of indirect democracy that
we've committed to for over 200
years
There is every reason to believe
that North Carolinians agree with
voters across the country that a more
direct form of democracy is urgently
needed. It's time our state's leaders
recognized that fact.
Hans is director of communications
and public affairs at the Asheville
Area Chamber of Commerce and
author of a policy report on direct
democracy just published by the
John Locke Foundation.
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