Newspaper Page Text
PAGE 4A
-FORSYTH COUNTY NEWS —WEDNESDAY, JUNE 6. 1990
Opinion
Our childrens’ futures
could go up in smoke
They say that imitation is the
sincerest form of flattery Maybe
that is why an estimated 1 billion
packs of cigarettes are being pur
chased by children each year.
More than 3.000 teenagers be
come regular smokers each day.
according to the Surgeon Gener
al. At least five million of today’s
children are expected to die of
smoking related illnesses in
their later years.
Why do these children have
the desire to smoke 0 Especially
when smoking is more of an ac
quired taste than a natural in
stinct. These children are follow
ing the examples set by their
idols, role models, their peers.
If this is the trend our children
are following then we need to re
examine the good examples we
are giving.
Additionally tobacco industry
officials should be pressured to
change their advertising meth
ods. Instead of showing a big bill
board of two people fitting the
characteristics of teenage role
models enjoying the pleasures of
smoking, show the long term ef
fect. Advertise the addiction, the
coughing, the painfulness of lung
cancer. How many people who
ON YOUR PAYROLL
COUNTY COMMISSIONERS
Chairman Michael Bennett. 4301 Post Road, Cumming. GA 30130
Vice Chairman Barn Hillgartner. Still Road. Cumming. GA 30130
Secretary Michael McGaughey. Nicholson Road, Cumming. GA 30130
James Harrington, Norcross Road, Cumming, GA 30130
Charles Welch. 102 Laurel Lane. Cumming, GA 30130
NATIONAL REPRESENTATIVES
I.S. Senator Sam Nunn
303 Dirksen Senate Office Building, Washington, D.C. 20510. Telephone: 1-
202-224-3521. Atlanta number: 3314811
U.S.SenatorWyeheFowler
320 Hart Senate Office Building, Washington. D C. 20510. Telephone: 1-202-
224-3643. Atlanta number:33l-0647
U.S. Rep. Ed Jenkins, 9th District
2427 Rayburn Building, Washington, D C. 20515. Telephone: 1-202-225-5211;
Gainesville number 1404-536-2531.
STATE REPRESENTATIVES
Rep. Bill Barnett. District 10
P.O. Box 755. Cumming, Ga. 30130. Telephone: 887-6582.
Sen. Nathan Deal. District 49
P.O. Box. 2522. Gainesville. Ga. 30503. Telephone: 1404-522-9978
Sen. Sallie Newbill. District 49
7205 Riverside Drive. Atlanta, Ga. Telephone: 1404-394-5676
Gov. Joe Frank Harris
203 State Capitol. Atlanta, Ga. 30334, Telephone: 1404-656-1776
Forsyth County News
USPS 205-540
A New York Times Company
(Established 1908) PUBLISHER-SCOTT M. BROWN
Forsyth County News MANAGING EDITOR-SALLYLYN M. HILL
Gumming, Georaia 30130 ADVERTISING DIRECTOR-HARRIET H. VINCENT
Telephone - 887-3126 CIRCULATION DIRECTOR-GRAHAM B. KIMBROUGH
Published Sundays and Wednesdays by Forsyth County News Company, 121
Dahlonega St. Second class postage paid at Cumming, Ga. and additional of
fices. Subscription rate for Forsyth and Dawson counties, $13.00 per year; other
Georgia counties and out of state subscriptions are $40.00 per year. Advertising
rates and deadlines available upon request. Postmaster: Send address
changes to Forsyth County News/P.O. Box 210, Cumming, Ga. 30130.
Street Talk
What’s the hardest part about graduating from high school?
_ ■■■■■ V - ' r . ’*• d
k V
wsjjL- mm^m
Tammy Kinney
Losing all your friends.
,‘_
started smoking as teenagers are
trying to quit now but can't?
Those statistics need to be adver
tised equally.
Additionally, laws prohibiting
the sale of cigarettes to minors
need to be strictly enforced. Cur
rently 44 states, soon to be 45,
have passed laws restricting the
sale of tobacco products to mi
nors. Yet only three states re
ported citations, last year. Laws
are for the protection of both
adults and children. If adults
don't abide by the law and refuse
to sell to minors how are we going
to protect our children?
And finally we need to be care
ful of the image we project to our
children. We say we don’t want
our children to smoke but we let
them buy candy cigarettes. Or
when a child finishes his or her
sucker often times they begin
pretending the stick is a cigarette
mimicking an adult they look up
to. This is when the child should
be taught that smoking is not a
"cool - 'thing to do. Let them know
they are imitating a bad habit,
not a good one.
When it comes to children
smoking, we adults should not be
flattered.
I?* - 1
1 MaS^.'^^p
*?B.' % '/fz*
Danny Pruitt
The realization that you’re going to
be on your own and you control your
life now. I
Watching the changes of nesting birds
I sat on the porch eating lunch and enjoy
ing the beautiful day with its clear air. sun
shine. and nice breeze. Glancing up. I no
ticed the empty nest. 1 remembered last
spring, watching the other robin as she te
diously brought pine straw and sticks, piece
by piece, and formed the home, her nest She
soon got used to my being there, and knowing
1 was not a threat, continued her work. I
remember the day I came home and saw her
just sitting on the nest, and I knew one por
tion of her labors had ended and another
had begun.
Sure enough, before too much longer, she
could be seen flitting back and forth to the
nest with food, and she and the father robin
would light in the nearby tree scoping out
the ground for food, and the nest for activity
of their noisy youngsters.
The nest was not at my eye level, so it took
a while for the baby birds to be seen poking
their open-mouthed heads up. But I could
hear them long before that and what a racket
they made. They kept thei r parents busy pro
viding for their needs.
Then, one day when I stepped out on the
porch, I noticed one of the baby birds was
gone. The nest had become very cramped
“This is an emergency! is there a decent role model in the house?!”
Grammar can make language a big pain
By David Grimes
New York Times Regional Newspapers
One of the dangers of writing a newspaper
column is that you run the risk of having
someone read it.
I wouldn’t mind this so much if these read
ers weren't so fond of pointing out my nu
merous grammatical mistakes via arrogant,
self-righteous letters that usually goes some
thing like this:
“Mr. Grimes:
"Perhaps you were home watching The
Three Stooges and stuffing your face with
Doritos and bean dip on the day your 7th
grade English teacher explained the differ
ence between predicate nominative sub
junctive gerunds and dependent participial
conjunctive diphthongs. I’m referring, of
course, to your column of April 18 in which
you wrote: ‘Some say it was Bubba that done
whonked Mr. Deedles over the head with the
frozen carp, but it depends on who you ask.’
Mr. Grimes, allow me to point out that the
grammatically correct construction here is
not who, but whom. Please never let me
catch you making this mistake again.
“Sincerely,
“A Fan”
I have learned not to answer letters like
this because there is always the chance that I
will make another grammatical mistake and
then the correspondence will go on endless
ly. Besides, I do not want to encourage these
people by making them think that they are
correct in pointing out the distinction be
—y n
• ■ 4 « ,??5E3
Hank Gravitt
Living life to its fullest
□Or m
rm
lately, as the babies grew rapidly and pushed
each other a lot, trying to make room for
themselves in their limited world. So I
wasn’t really surprised that one had spread
its wings and flown. I watched as closely and
as often as possible in the next few days,
hoping to see one of the remaining birds
actually take flight for the first time, but I
missed the magic moment The closest I
came was seeing the last fledgling perched
on the nearby tree, glancing first at the
ground, then at the nest, back and forth. I had
to return to work before the young bird took
flight, but when I got home that evening, it
was nowhere to be seen. The nest was empty.
Society members would lob
by dictionary editors to do away
with words that are too easily
confused with other words. Al
most nobody knows the differ
ence between “affect” and “ef
fect,” so let’s do away with one
of the words and avoid a lot of
needless mistakes.
tween “who” and “whom.” I have never liked
the word “whom” and I avoid using it when
ever possible. “Whom” is a pretentious word
that you would never use in everyday speech
unless you happen to be an English butler.
"Whom shall I say is calling?” the butler will
say, scrunching up his nose in a manner that
suggests he smells something dead.
I’m sure “whom” is not the only word that
needs to be pushed overboard, usage-wise.
In fact, I’m thinking of starting a club that
will work to purge our language of all words,
phrases and constructions that I don’t know
how to use properly. I’ll call it The Society
for the Prevention of Grammatical Quib
bling. (Let me know if you think of a good
acronym. I’m partial to BUGOFF, but I can’t
g W
I — < ■ >v^^ fy^,„.-. 1 ».,i-, i
Wayne Minchew
Graduating is the hardest part for
me.
I really don’t need to draw any parallels. I
think you’ll draw your own. This is gradua
tion time. Many of you toiled hard, making a
“nest”, a home, for your children. You pro
vided for them, listened to their noise,
watched them jostling for position And now
you're going to have to stand back and let
them fly.
Like that young bird, many of them will
perch somewhere between the past and the
future, a little scared to let go of the familiar
Others will take off on wings that have been
waiting to fly for a long time. All will have to
learn for themselves the sometimes harsh
lessons of life. For those who have been
blessed with good parents and good teach
ers, the lessons will be less harsh. The oth
ers, hopefully, will find help, and friends
along the way.
I looked at that empty nest a long time. It
represents a lot of work and nurturing. For
you parents whose children are leaving
home, the nest isn’t really empty, just unoc
cupied for a while. For you kids who are
leaving your nests, keep your eye on it. It
represents a lot of work and nurturing. When
you’re headed for the future, it helps to re
member where you came from.
seem to make it fit.)
Society members would lobby dictionary
editors to do away with words that are too
easily confused with other words. Almost no
body knows the difference between "affect"
and “effect,” so let’s do away with one of the
words and avoid a lot of needless mistakes.
Here are some other often-confused
words that the Society might want to deal
with:
- Ensure and insure.
- Emigrate and immigrate.
Well and good.
- Trustee and trusty.
- Cement and concrete.
Disinterested and uninterested.
- Farther and further.
- Impel and compel.
Prostate and prostrate.
- Principal and principle.
That and which.
If some of you are having trouble accept
ing (excepting?) my propose changes, con
sider this: Think of the English language as a
tree and words as its leaves. As the tree
grows, new words sprout while old words fall
off, clogging your drainspouts and making a
mess of your pool. In time, the tree will rot
and fall on your house, causing thousands of
dollars worth of damage.
So, as you can see, this language business
is nothing to be trifled with.
(David Grimes is a humor columnist for
the Sarasota (Fla.) Herald-Tribune. This ar
ticle was distributed by The New York Times
News Service)
Bfa...',a- f - .. _-o;j?j ».:.''
Dahloris Prichard
The choice of whether to go to col
lege or not, and leaving your friends.