Editorial
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No More Free Rides For Water Customers
Some Marshall residents (ire apparently upset that the town
\ board wants them to pay thbtr overdue Water bills. i
Well, that's just too bad. The town has allowed the delin
quent water bills to go unpaid for too long. Town officials
should have taken steps long ago to collect the unpaid bills.
Their decision to do so is almost as overdue as some of the bills
they are now trying to collect.
Marshall officials have for months threatened to cut off
water service to those customers who haven't paid their bills.
. Until recently, those customers have realized that those were
just threats, and nothing more.
But now the town is cracking down on the delinquent water
customers. Pay your bill in full or a town employee will
: remove your water meter. If you want your water turned back
on, it will cost you what you owe the town for water you've
already used, plus a $25 reconnection fee.
L That? "get-tough" policy has made some erf the customers
angry. They want to pay their outstanding water accounts on
the "friendly, monthly installment plan." Town officials are
right to refuse to go this route. Those customers who have let
their accounts go unpaid for a year or more have already ruin
ed their credit ratings.
There may be one or two instances in which a water
customer may have a legitimate excuse for not paying his or
her water bill. In those rare cases, town officials should take
the extenuating circumstances into consideration.
But for those who have simply not paid for they water
they've used - allowing the rest of us to foot the bill for them -
the free ride is over.
AIDS Hysteria Hinders A Sound Policy
Americans will hardly be able to protect themselves against
the AIDS epidemic by falling victim to another affliction: a
political paralysis of the national will. President Reagan's
proposals, which fall between compulsory mass testing and
sole reliance on safe-sex education, seek to avoid harmful im
puse. Whether they succeed in doing that depends on how the
president's plea for "routine" testing is interpreted.
Reagan calls for mandatory AIDS tests for selected people
under U.S. government control: federal prisoners, im
migrants and aliens. Then he proposes that states offer
."routine" testing for marriage license applicants, persons
served by venereal -disease and drug-abuse clinics, and in
mates of state and local prisons. If, as Surgeon General C. -
Everett Koop believes, "routine" does not mean compulsory,
the president will have found a reasonable middle ground.
Several presidential policy advisers, their fingers in the
political wind, had urged a much broader program of
^ automatic testing for the AIDS virus. There had been similar
m lewirf on Reagan from New Right activists, whose sights
for mandatory testing are fixed on homosexuals and in
travenous drug users. But with a debate raging ova* civil
liberties versus public well-being, Reagan has chosen a more
restrained course until more is known about the AIDS
scourge.
Public health authorities, led by Dr. Koop, have offered per
suasive dissent to widespread mandatory testing. For one
thing, it would be enormously expensive. Already, the nation's
AIDS bill figures to total between $10 billion and $15 billion by
1991. That doesn't even count the vast productivity losses
when the disease claims victims in their prime working years.
Sweeping mandatory tests within the general population
may be counterproductive as well. Since the testing is im
perfect, a false finding can easily blight a person's life.
Moreover, persons at great risk by contracting the AIDS virus
may avoid tests and the medical system altogether, out of fear
of losing jobs, insurance, housing and even social acceptance
if they become known as carriers.
History shows that the civil liberties of Americans come
under gravest threats at times of national fear bordering on
hysteria. Public policy on AIDS can't be made in that kind of
Heard
And
Seen
By POP STORY
Area Churchgoers
Do 'Do Windows'
The Rev. D.E. Lytle, pastor of Ponder's Chapel Church of
Marshall and Mount Olive Church of Mars Hill, and members
of churches enjoyed an appreciation dinner at Western Steer
Steakhouse in Mars Hill on Saturday evening, June 6, for those
who helped with new windows for the^Mount Olive church.
Manuel Briscoe's choir of Mars Hill was among those atten
ding.
"We enjoyed the dinner and fellowship," said Everett
Barnett.
Speaking of Everett Barnett, here are a few of the jokes he
recently submitted to me:
IT'S DISH WATER
Gen. Smedly D. Butler, always careful of the welfare of his
men, when in France met two soldiers carrying a large soup
kettle from the kitchen.
"Let me taste that," the General ordered.
"But General. . .," the soldier said.
"Don't give me any 'buts.' Give me a spoon," the General
said.
Hie General took a taste. "You don't call that stuff soup, do
you?" he shouted angrily.
"No sir," replied the soldier, "That's what I was trying to
tell you, it's dishwater, sir."
USE DELTA OIL
A western evangelist makes a practice of painting religious
lines (Mi rocks and fences along public highways. One read,
"What will you do when you die?"
An advertising man came along and painted under it. "Use
Delta Oil - good for burns."
THAT DARN DOG AIN'T DEAD
The swain and his swainess had just encountered a bulldog
that looked like he might shake a mean lower jag.
"Why mercy, M she exclaimed as he started a strategic
retreat. "You always swore you would face death for me."
"I would," he said as he flung a look back over his shoulder
at the dog. "But that darn dog ain't dead."
Folkways And Folkspeech
Excuses, Excuses ...
By ROGERS WHITEN KR
As % teacher who has been in
harness for more than 40 years, I
have given my share of final exams:
take-homes, research projects and
traditional blue book concoctions.
It took me several years, however,
to realize that I, too, was being ex
amined at every semester's end by
students more skillful than I in
preparing their material.
Tine, most of their quizzes were
regulation true-false, but they were
demanding. Example: "My mother
is getting married again so I need to
take your test early in order to get
home for the wedding." True or
false?
Or "I need to leave a week before
your final - you see, my parents are
rewarding me for passing my courses
by giving me a trip to Jamaica - and
the second week in May is the only
cruise they can fit in their schedule."
True or false?
What's a teacher to do in order to
pass the exam - hold the regulations,
label the statement false, and be I
bed an S.O.B., or resf
"true" and be classified as ? t
wfth ?
he bluntly informed me that I was
four months pregnant. Well, my
boyfriend and I talked it over, decid
ed that we weren't ready to be
parents, and so I had an abortion. It
was so rough that I had to miss over
two weeks of school." True or false?
I marked it true. And gave her a
make-up exam.
A somewhat more amusing story
comes from a lady professor who was
approached by a male after missing
tier test. He was hesitant in delivery
but earnest in expression :
"You have to understand that I
play baseball, and the other day when
we were playing Chattanooga I tried
to stretch a single into a double by
belly-sliding into second. I made it,
but on the way in I - well, you know, I
slid on my - well, golly, the doctor
says I broke my. .
"All right, all right, I believe you,"
the professor interrupted.
Later that day, as she related the
story to her husband she began to
have doubts about her response
Especially when her husband scoffed
at her naivete: "Why, Gertrude,
you're old enough to know who can't
break those things!"
But you can break an arm and be