Today's Letters: Put bins for paper at area schools

By LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Published August 10, 2007

Put bins for paper at area schools

We are all concerned about the environment and how we can re-use the products we no longer need. The blue gag pickup is great for cans and bottles, but we need something for papers, magazines and junk mail, which is an even greater problem.

One suggestion would be to have a disposal bin for papers only located at all school sites. There are so many schools and most of us have occasions to pass them - on shopping and other trips, when parents take their children to school or when older students drive themselves. This would be a convenient way to dispose of the paper products.

Agatha M. Jackson, New Port Richey

Board members not at fundraiser

I am a resident of Country Place Village on State Road 54. Last week our veterans group put on a dance to raise money to buy items to send to our fighting troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The dance was attended by more than 125 people. I was shocked greatly when the announcer asked for all the members of the homeowners association to stand and be recognized. Only the president was there to support our troops. I thought the rest of the board would attend this wonderful event to support our boys and girls fighting and dying over there so we can be safe here at home. If people who want to serve on a homeowners association board can't come out to support our troops, how can they do anything for their neighbors they represent?

The sad part of the dance was how the association locked the kitchen cabinets so no one could get in to get plastic gloves to use while serving food. They couldn't get to towels or aprons, either.

I think this board or some of its members should quit their position because all they are doing is causing a lot of trouble.

I served in the service of my country and maybe some of them never put on a military uniform.

R.E. Doan, New Port Richey

Gun laws must adapt to change Aug. 8 letter

Are doctors more lethal than guns?

Catherine Difani uses an analogy "Guns don't kill people; people kill people." U.S. Rep. Ginny Brown-Waite responded appropriately to that clich to render an inanimate object useless unless a person pulls the trigger to discharge the gun. If a vehicle is parked as well as not in motion, it becomes inert. However, if a driver uses the vehicle to injure or kill a person, then it becomes a dangerous weapon. The same analogy can be used on any object.

There are 700,000 physicians in the United States. Accidental deaths caused by physicians per year total 120,000 (AMA). Accidental deaths caused per physician total 0.171 (U.S. Dept. of Health Human Services).

There are 80,000,000 gun owners in the United States. The number of accidental gun deaths per year (all age groups) is 1,500. Accidental deaths per gun owner: 0.0000188. Statistically, doctors are approximately 9,000 times more dangerous than gun owners are.

Not everyone has a gun, but everyone has at least one doctor. Doctors undergo numerous tests to be certified as a physician and have to pass another set of standards to be board certified. Maybe, in today's society it would be prudent to impose additional testing and retesting so doctors are less likely to cause accidental deaths.

Florida has instituted, amongst other things, a firearms purchase program administered by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. This program requires any firearms dealer to run a criminal history records check of any prospective purchaser over the phone on a special line to FDLE. The records check is a mandatory requirement to purchase a firearm from a licensed dealer. The records check searches the person's record for anything that would prevent the person from purchasing or possessing a firearm under both federal and Florida law. If anything is found, the purchase will be disapproved.

Class III weapons are in a different category. They fall under the National Firearms Act Weapons. They include destructive devices, firearms capable of firing more than one shot with a single pull of the trigger (automatic firearms), shotguns and rifles that have been altered in certain ways usually to make them shorter than legal, anything that qualifies as a silencer or any of its parts, and certain exotic weapons. It is a second-degree felony as well as a federal crime to have such a firearm unless you are a federally licensed dealer with a Class III approval, or a private citizen or corporation that has been pre-approved by ATF, and has already received the special NFA tax stamp on an approved form and are regulated by the National Firearms Act, which falls under Internal Revenue Code jurisdiction. Therefore, it is very difficulty to obtain Class III weapons as outlined for purchase.

The natural or inalienable portion of the right was tied to the right of self-defense, a right that was believed to be so inherent to the individual that no government could legitimately curtail it. The mere thought that government could infringe upon this right was anathema. Thus, the right to keep and bear arms was just that - that every free man had the right to have weapons, and use them in his own defense. It was not tied to a "well regulated militia". In fact, a clause to add a phrase that the right was "for the common defense" was soundly rejected by the Constitutional Convention, just for that reason, and do not let anybody tell you differently.

Nicholas Di GuisNeppi, New Port Richey

Gun laws must adapt to change Aug. 8 letter

NRA's voice heard with cash

Letter writer Catherine Difaini of Crystal River and lots of Americans are confused about the meaning of the Second Amendment. The NRA position is quite clear, it was created specifically to guarantee the right of gun ownership without any controls and for no other reason. Fortunately, historians and our courts have always disagreed, but unlike the NRA have not been in a position to spend millions of dollars each years to educate the public on its intended purpose and place in history.

The NRA describes the Second Amendment as a suicide pact that guarantees each and every American an absolute right to own and use any kind of firearm, without any legislative constraints, placing the gun on a pedestal to be worshiped before all else. At the time of this country's formation, the "Right to bear Arms" in the Second Amendment provided the states with the protection they felt was needed from Federal authority, that bound the original 13 states together and launched the great expansion west that finally created this great nation. It would not have happened without the Second Amendment. Once that happened this amendment disappeared into history with its only purpose fulfilled.

The Second Amendment makes no mention of the private ownership of firearms and like any object bought, sold and utilized in this country, the only restriction on the amount or type of controls on firearms is not limited by the Second Amendment, but only by the amount of political capital legislators are willing to spend.

In Florida our elected official are horrified at the idea of spending any political capital opposing the NRA's suicide pact. They would rather public safety pay the price instead.

Art Hayhoe, Wesley Chapel

Dade City helpful to new business

We want to express our sincere thank you to Dade City once again. Since first arriving in Dade City we have been welcomed by its residents, who have always remarked on our hard work and consistency of product.

Through our current troubles with our inefficient air conditioning, Dade City continues to support us. We currently have 24 fans and two room air conditioners running around the clock to cool our restaurant.

Edna Gonzalez, Tropical Breeze Cafe, Dade City

Schools dangle $1.2-billion budget Aug. 1 story

School money is for U.S. citizens

How much money is in the Pasco School budget to educate illegal aliens' children? As a taxpayer, I do not believe that I should be educating illegal alien children. That is the responsibility of the countries from where they come.

Make all students show birth certificates when they are registered. If they are illegal, they and their parents should be arrested and send back to their country.

Sound cruel? Maybe, but I believe it is more cruel to pay taxes to pay for them when some of us have to sell our houses because we cannot afford the property taxes.

Mark Johnson, New Port Richey

[Last modified August 9, 2007, 21:09:39]