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OpEd
What do you think?
Should Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax funds be
allocated to make infrastructure improvements in established
developments in which the developer elected not to finance
the work at the time of development, requiring sometimes
costly retrofitting? Should the improvements in roads, water
lines and other types of infrastructure be financed by ad val
orem taxpayers, i.e., from the general fund budget of the
county? Or should special tax districts be created to allow the
residents of the areas where the improvements are needed to
finance their own projects over a period of time?
Send your response to:
Forsyth County News
P.O. Box 210, Cumming, Ga. 30028
It makes no sense to accommodate people when it is to their detriment
By Carl L. Andreasen II
Guest columnist
California’s passing of Proposition 227
js a major victory for American society. The
proposition will cut bilingual education
down to one year of English courses, and
require students to take normal courses on
their own.
When our Grandparents and great
Grandparents came to America, they did not
ask for special privilege. What they wanted
to do was assimilate quickly. Children were
admonished by parents to speak only
English in public, being told that to do any
thing else was rude. None of our forefathers
seemed any the worse for wear for having
had to learn the language. It’s simply just
plain silly to spend thousands of dollars
educating someone in another language and
then to turn them over to society, where
their productivity and ability to cope will be
severely limited because no one forced
them to learn the language. When the con
cept of bilingual education came out, it was
apparent that the whole idea was a huge
waste of money that would actually only
Nukes and other nasty things
to consider related to safety
I was bom in Oak Ridge, Tenn.,
which is the real birth place of the
atomic age. The town’s nickname is
the “atomic city.” Oak Ridge, located
in the hills of Eastern Tennessee,
was a top secret town created by the
federal government during World
War II to develop enriched uranium
for the Bomb. It still has today more
Ph.ds per capita than any other city
in the United States. Long after the
war it produced the explosive material for most of our
atomic arsenal. My father worked at Oak Ridge during
the War and has a government certificate to prove it.
America has the distinction of being the only country
in the world to use an atomic device against another
country. The decision to drop the bomb has been revis
ited by scholars, ethicists and critics for years. The fact
Remains that Truman believed the bomb would bring
about the surrender of Japan sooner and would avert an
allied invasion of Japan which would have cost by
some estimates a million allied casualties. Since our
use of the bomb in 1945, we have witnessed the spread
of nuclear weapons to some 15 countries. We devel
oped a seemingly senseless, but apparently effective,
national defense policy called MAD, or mutually
assured destruction. The idea throughout the cold war
was if any country launched their nuclear weapons
towards the United States, our nation would retaliate
with enough missiles to destroy them completely. We
have fought the cold war and now America is doing its
best to prevent other nations from “going nuclear,” that
is developing nuclear weapons of their own.
The recent nuclear tests in India and Pakistan reveal
how ineffective our non-proliferation agreements are.
The United States cannot even get signatories to the
non-proliferation pact to support economic sanctions
against India or Pakistan. The fall of the Soviet Union,
which millions of people around the world celebrated
justifiably, has created very serious problems over the
control, maintenance, launch procedures, security, and
sale of nuclear materials and weapons. With the cen
tralized communist control gone, individual countries
and commanders who are strapped for money are sell
ing their atomic secrets to third world countries like
Iraq. It does not take a genius to understand that a
nuclear device or other weapons of mass destruction in
the hands of radicals pose enormous problems for
national security and defense.
The scientists who worked on the bomb during
World War II had serious misgivings about their
research and for good reason. Nuclear weapons ought
to scare every thinking person in the world. Those not
killed immediately by a nuclear blast will be exposed
to long term health problems related to radiation and
fall out. Some of these problems will result in genetic
deficiencies which can be passed on to children. The
> 3.
help to divide America.
The most amusing part of this vote is
that the liberal democrats who were
attempting to coddle Hispanics in the area
were rebuked. The population of immi
grants in California is like any other group
of people who found their way to America
they want to be a part of the country, not
apart from the country, that’s why they
came to this great land of opportunity in the
first place. No immigrant group wants to be
treated as outcasts. Economically, this is not
a wise way to operate. So now misguided
liberals are left standing in the room all
alone looking quite confused.
The only other group other than some
group of socialists who were quite upset,
(but when aren’t socialists upset these days,
what with every socialist nation in the
world starting to realize that socialism just
doesn’t work) was the teacher’s (Gestapo)
union. They can’t stand the thought of los
ing power. They certainly don’t like the
thought of losing members, and of course,
control over one more area of the education
system. What bureaucrat is ever happy to let
go of a slice of controlled pie?
Phil
Both of these countries are very poor in comparison
with others. The wealth of those two nations could be
far better spent on programs to improve the living con
ditions of their citizens. The muddled foreign and eco
nomic policy of the United States has most likely con
tributed to India’s push to go nuclear. Serious charges
are being made now in Congress that the President
relaxed trade restrictions with China which resulted in
technology being given which will increase their
nuclear capabilities. The Chinese military establish
ment is a major provider of nuclear technology to other
nations. This puts the illegal Chinese donations to the
Democratic party in a completely different light.
India has communicated that it feels threatened by
China and Pakistan. The largest democracy in the
world gives e\ery appearance of developing a nuclear
deterrent. Pakistan has said that it feels threatened by
India. It is already scary enough to ponder that Israel
has nuclear capabilities and the militant mind set to use
them if threatened. It again does not take a mental giant
to assume that the dispossessed Palestinians are doing
everything in their power to obtain such a weapon. For
militant radicals who strap several pounds of high
explosive to their bodies and then blow up buses with
innocent men and women aboard, obtaining a nuclear
device would be a dream.
However, as Saddam Hussien has proven to the
West, it is not just nuclear weapons which can unsettle
the balance of power of any region of the world.
Biological weapons are far easier to manufacture, far
easier to deliver, and pose an even greater danger to
nations of the world. The advancements in military
technology will make the war of the future far more
deadly than we could ever imagine.
The President of the United States needs to formu
late a strong policy on nuclear proliferation and
weapons of mass destruction. We need to use the
tremendous economic an military resources of our
nation to make our world safe for all the people of the
world. The president must focus his attention on for
eign affairs. The very first charge of government is
national security. In our connective and shrinking
world, instability and war in one part of the world
could result in disaster for the United States and her
allies.
What do you think? .
Conspiracy theories: JFK riddle
I watched part one of the movie “JFK” last
week. Why, I don’t know. It takes a combination of
great resolve and uncommon good luck for me to
actually see all the different parts of a multi-part
TV movie. But I had seen this one at the theater
years ago, and part one was enough to refresh my
confusion.
As best I could tell, the gist of the thing was that
Kennedy may have been assassinated by pro-
Castro Cubans, anti-Castro Cubans, the mob, our
own government, and/or U.S. defense contractors.
Basically, that is, anybody except Lee Harvey
Oswald. The thing that struck me was that there
were so many plausible and semi-plausible sus
pects. Perhaps JFK should have heeded the advise
of Oscar Wilde, who said a man cannot be too
careful in the choice of his enemies.
Just for fun, I began to wonder who the sus
pects might be or might have been if other present,
past or future presidents were assassinated. Take
Bill Clinton, for example. The choices are really
few. Kenneth Starr and the Republicans surely
don’t want him dead; he is the source of their
livelihood. I can’t think of a single foreign power
he has irritated enough to kill him. I can’t imagine
any unwilling woman killing him just for dropping
his britches, and a spumed mistress can do herself
But for the rest of us, it’s a real victory.
We finally realized that the best way to help
folks out is to leave them to their own
devices and to treat them as human beings,
not like puppies that must have constant
care, coddling and attention. We realized at
least in one arena, that heaping money at a
situation can actually make things worse.
Not only that, we decided that everybody is
better off if we push them to learn one lan
guage. This country never would have been
as great as it is today if the Europeans came
over here and established a little Europe,
whereby everybody stuck to their own cul
ture and language. All of the immigrants
who came here learned the English lan
guage and quickly, because they came to
this nation hoping to do better. That is what
made America so great, the constant striv
ing for success; and for every family, that
started with fitting in, which meant learning
English.
It makes no sense to spend hundreds of
millions of dollars (and tree huggers must
agree, many a tree ceases to exist because
of all those extra pamphlets in other lan
guages) to accommodate people when it
ground and atmosphere becomes
unfit for habitation. It is not called
a weapon of mass destruction for
nothing. There exists in the world
today enough nuclear bombs to
destroy the population of the earth
three times over. What the world
does not need today is two coun
tries who have been involved in
three wars in the last 40 years, like
India and Pakistan, going nuclear.
far more good by writing a book and appearing on
a sleazy talk show or two. Aside from Hillary and
a few hundred husbands from Little Rock to
Washington, I can’t think of a soul who would
want to do Clinton in.
Should Al Gore become President, I doubt it
matters how many enemies he makes. I don’t think
they can kill him. A bullet would bounce off his
wooden head, and the Secret Service would never
allow anyone enough time to chip him to death.
Short of being attacked by a gang of rogue wood
peckers, it is unlikely that Gore will be the subject
of a future conspiracy assassination theory.
On the other hand, take Nixon. Thoroughly kil
lable, had Nixon been assassinated they would still
be trying to eliminate suspects. Merely question
ing all the hippies alone could take up to 30 years.
Compounding the problem, few of the suspects
would deny it, preferring to take credit instead.
A similar problem would have existed had
Jimmy Carter been assassinated. Aside from the
Ayatollah, every American with a variable rate
loan wanted him dead when interest rates hit 21
percent. I’m not sure how much Presidents have to
do with interest rates in particular or the economy
in general, but I’m a firm believer in voting them
out when it’s bad. It sends a message that the next
will be ultimately to their detriment. The
solution should be simple. As we require
new folks coming into America to learn
many facts about our history, we should
also require that they make attempts to learn
the English language. But most certainly,
we shouldn’t spend one red cent on all the
hundreds of things that we already do.
There shouldn’t be money wasted on trans
lations for drivers tests, or thousands upon
thousands of reams of paper printed in other
languages for the benefit of the lazy. It’s
getting so that every student in America is
learning a foreign language. I have no prob
lem with schools spending money on a class
that teaches English as a second language.
After all, if the schools spent six years pol
ishing up my German, which 1 seldom get
to use, they can spend some time polishing
up someone’s command of English. But
teaching math in Spanish is ridiculous.
The message that has been sent by
California is clear. The immigrants in the
State don’t want to be treated like freaks.
The population is tired of throwing good
money after bad to support a program
which would ultimately make it more dififi-
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♦ ♦ I
FORSYTH COUNTY NEWS Wednesday, June 10,1998-
one had
better do
something
if he can,
just in
case.
This is a fun little game, although a bit morbid.
In reality, every President of this nation probably
does more than enough to create a host of lethal
enemies. John Kennedy, though a bit liberal for
many of us in the South, was bold. Perhaps it is a
testament to his courage that we have so many
suspects in his assassination. But I seriously doubt
we will ever know which one, or ones, did the
deed.
I say this not as an expert on the Kennedy
assassination, for I am not. But I know a little bit
about the press. Some of the finest, nosiest, most
persistent minds in the nation, armed with the
power of the First Amendment, have dug and
picked and dissected this riddle for 25 years with'
no success. I figure we all might as well pick our 1
favorite conspiracy theory and just stick to it, for
we will never know any better.
As for me, I’m taking the Cubans. Pro-Castro,
anti-Castro, who cares? Just as long as I don’t have
to believe our guys did it.
cult for some of its citizens to cope in the
real world once they leave school. And
finally, the individual, not the Government
is most capable of solving his own prob
lems. I guess California liberals will have to
find someone else to coddle, and search for
government control to seize elsewhere;
because individualism and personal respon
sibility stands victorious today in
California.
One school teacher in California com
plained, “Now we have to throw all these
books away and by new ones. That's going
to cost money, the state should have thought
about that when they passed this proposi
tion,” My response to that is the state should
have thought of wasting money when they
came up with this asinine program in the
first place, but at least now the state cat)
look to save massive amounts of money.
Now we can hope that the rest of America
follows suit.
(Carl L. Andreasen II of Cumming
studied political science at Rutgers. He
enjoys writing about political issues.)
Walker
JKBramblett
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