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♦ SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 2007
4A
Daniel F. Evans
President
Editor and Publisher
Julie B. Evans
Vice President
Spread the joy
Thanksgiving is over and Christmas is less
than a month off, which means - for many of
us - that it’s a time for parties and gatherings,
decorating every room in the house, turning on
Christmas lights, shopping, wrapping, giving and
getting presents, and eating more goodies than
we should.
In short, it’s a time of plenty.
Now, this is not to put a damper on anybody’s
holidays, but just a reminder that there are peo
ple around the world and right here at home who
are in need.
While we discuss the relative merits of white
meat over dark meat, an estimated 820 million
people in the world are undernourished, and one
in six is hungry and lacks safe drinking water.
That’s according to the Evangelical Lutheran
Church, which is working on world hunger and
hunger here in the U.S.
While some of us ponder whether to buy our
kids the latest electronic gizmo, ver 35 million
Americans are living in poverty, and in a state
that the U.S. Department of Agriculture politely
calls “food insecurity.”
Here in Houston County one out of 10 people
lives below the federal poverty threshold. That’s
below $10,210 for one person, and below $20,650
for a family of four.
Now why would we bring up these depressing
statistics at the outset of the holiday season?
That’s simple. It’s not to put a damper on your
holiday joy. It’s because we know you’re going
to help others.
We know what a giving community this is, and
how many churches and organizations will be
working to spread the joy during the holidays.
No child in this community should be without a
toy on Christmas morning. No single mom should
be worried sick about filling stockings. No elderly
person should be eating alone as if it were any
other day.
Now’s a good time to be thinking about what
your contribution will be -whether it’s a dollar or
two more each time you see the Salvation Army
bell-ringers, or a donation of brand new toys to
one of the organizations gathering presents for
kids from poor families.
Involve your children and grandchildren, and
make this holiday season a time of giving not
just to those who are nearest and dearest but to
those most in need of our help.
And, finally, if you have a special project going
to make the holidays a time of joy for those who
need some help, please let us know about it.
Letters to the editor
Richardson plan a work in progress
Your recent editorial on the Ponzi scheme devised by
our Speaker of the House Richardson sounds like a
work in progress.
The abolition of property and ad valorem taxes sounds
wonderful but it would seriously harm our local govern
ments and school systems. They would take orders from a
huge state bureaucracy of faceless bureaucrats who would
tell our local officials how much funding they would get.
Metropolitan Atlanta would get most of the revenues and
we would get the crumbs.
I wonder what our local state Rep. Larry O’Neal, who is
chairman of the Ways and Means Committee where they
will write this new tax legislation, has to say about this lat
est example of “Voodo Economics"?
Also, about their elderly Reaganite and paid consultant,
Laffer, who believes only in tax-cuts for our richest? What
about someone who cares for the rest of us?
- Frank W. Gadbois, Warner Robins
HOW TO SUBMIT:
There are three ways to submit a letter to the editor: E
mail it to hhj@evansnewspapers.com, mail it to Houston
Home Journal at 1210 Washington St., Perry, GA 31069, or
drop it off at the same location between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m.
Monday through Friday.
Letters should not exceed 350 words and must include
the writer’s name, address and telephone number (the last
two not printed). The newspaper reserves the right to edit
or reject letters for reasons of grammar, punctuation, taste
and brevity.
Foy S. Evans
Editor Emeritus
Don Moncrief
Managing Editor
Just visiting on Saturday a.m.
Good morning. Hope you have
a good weekend - what’s left of
it. And, I hope you are enjoy
ing your turkey and ham sandwiches.
I had no significant coherent thoughts
on one subject, this week, so I thought
we would just visit - like we used to do
at the Coffee Cup in downtown Perry.
Back when the Coffee Cup crowd was
running the country and solving all its
problems.
Too bad we are still too busy or now
too old to go to Washington, D.C. I
believe we could still help.
Here it is:
Nuts to You. If you don’t have
a pecan tree or an oak tree, you prob
ably don’t realize this, but it’s been a
bumper crop year for our native nuts.
I’ve never seen such crops - and, as I
recall it, in the spring, there were dire
predictions that the frost had killed
the pecans and we would have very
few this fall. Wrong! Bumper crop of
pecans.
Still, even with a plentiful supply,
pecans are selling for about $lO a
pound for shelled. I hope the farmer is
getting his/her fair share and that the
“bottom won’t fall out of the market”.
And, as for the acorns, the deer have
to be eating as never before. Hunters,
it must be difficult to get them to come
to the feeders.
Cotton: King Again? Since
I’m giving an ag report, let me talk a
little about cotton. Across from our
farm on Highway 127, was (it’s already
been harvested) Franklin Bledsoe’s
irrigated cotton. Franklin is a gifted
farmer, but even by his standards,
“That's how Thanksgiving works...first your belly is full,
then the next day your wallet is empty!"
I
HMC gets high marks; vouchers don't
I spent a few days in Houston
Medical Center and can’t under
stand how anyone is not pleased
with being a patient there.
The personnel were friendly and
helpful. Actually, they were more than
helpful. I saw many smiles and no
frowns.
I came home pleased with my stay
in the hospital and proud that it is a
first class operation run by people who
obviously like their jobs and remem
ber their first priority is caring for
patients.
■■■
Utah may be the first state to vote
for education vouchers. They will be
worth between SSOO and $3,000. The
idea may spread because there are
many advocates across the country
who believe that vouchers will result in
better public education.
I am a contrarian on this issue. I
am of the opinion that giving vouch
ers to parents and letting them select
the school they want for their children
would destroy the public education
system.
An argument in favor of vouchers
is that parents can use them to move
their children to better schools. In my
opinion, if a school is nonperforming
the answer is to face the problem and
improve the school. Whatever it takes.
If principals or teachers are not per-
Larry
Walker
Columnist
lwalker@whgb-law.com
this had to be an exceptional crop. I’ve
never seen such cotton. It made me
want to get out and pick a little - not
really, and if so, just a little.
And, on our farm is Brad Prickett’s
non-irrigated cotton. It, too, is excel
lent. I hope that all cotton farmers
do as well as Brad and Franklin are
apparently going to do.
Could it be that cotton will be king,
again?
Dogs, Jackets, and
Panthers. I went back and read
what I predicted about these football
teams in my column just as the 2007
season began. I did pretty good. I said
that Georgia would win nine - they
already have this number with Tech
this afternoon. So, they might win 10
or even 11.
I also said that Tech’s coach, Chan
Gailey, was better than generally cred
ited. I might be right, but Gailey is still
in trouble. I doubt he will survive if
Georgia beats Tech today (which will
be seven straight for the Dawgs).
Then there are the Perry Panthers.
I’m very proud of them. They’ve had
a great season regardless of wheth
er they won last night (this column
was written on Tuesday of this week).
Foy
Evans
Columnist
foyevansl9@cox.net
forming, replace them. Do whatever
it takes to provide a good education
environment.
I know teachers who are outstand
ing. I know teachers who are not so
good. Children should not be in their
classes, but I know that there are
forces at work beyond the control of
the local school board.
if 1 the problem is the students, then
moving them to another school will not
solve the problem. Some want to learn.
Some do not. Some have parents who
help them. Some do not.
If vouchers actually would be good
for students, the logistics of busing all
of them to school would be an impossi
ble nightmare and the number of buses
needed would be phenomenal.
Vouchers to improve education is
something that sounds good, but on
the local level is not practical.
What we really need is neighbor
hood schools and a requirement that
they live up to a system wide mini-
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Incidentally, the last time a Perry foot
ball team did this well was 1959 - and,
I was on that team.
I hope Perry’s 2007 edition will go
further thqn we did 48 years ago when
Herb St. John’s Panthers made it to
the final four. That would put Perry
in the State Championship game,
wouldn’t it?
For Insurance Purposes.
Frequent readers of my column will
know that I like to watch Antique Road
Show on television. Other than college
football, it is the only thing I watch
with regularity.
There is one thing about the show
I don’t understand. The expert will
value the item - let’s say, at “$20,000”.
And then the expert will say: “But, for
insurance purposes, $25,000”. What
does this mean? I thought it was
unlawful to insure things for more
than they were worth. Am I missing
something?
Cold Virus. Now, the “experts”
are telling us that the common cold
can kill you. And, that’s news? I’ve had
several that almost killed me. “They”
cite 10 or 12 people who have died from
the cold virus. This is in a country of
about 300 million.
I put it on my calculator and this
came to zero (0) percent. It wouldn’t
compute. Give us a break.
By the way, stopping breathing will
kill you. It gets 100 percent. Now,
that’s something to worry about.
I enjoyed the visit. Thanks for read
ing. As my Grandmother Walker used
to say, I’ll be back next week, “God
willing”.
mum standard. It is impossible while
performing under unwise and unfair
federal legislation aimed at meeting
quotas instead of quality education.
Here’s some information that I
consider unbelievable. The Southern
Education Foundation says that 52
percent of high school students in
Georgia are “considered low income.”
What is low income and who says how
much income is low income? Compare
us with Bill Gates and everyone else
is low income. I get the impression
that someone is dealing us information
from a marked deck.
Some Evangelical churches have
been in the news lately because of lav
ish spending by some of their founders
and ministers. The IRS is beginning
to show an interest. But the churches
are resisting disclosure of the way
they spend their millions a year, hid
ing behind the cloak of separation of
church and state.
Bishop Eddie Long, pastor of a mega
church in Atlanta, has said that what
the IRS is doing is “unjust and an
attack on religious freedom and indi
vidual rights” In my opinion, this does
not fly. Scoundrels who use churches
to finance lavish lifestyles with tax
exempt money should be brought to
task.