Newspaper Page Text
Page 4 — Wednesday, September 2, 2009, The Millen News
Opinions, yours and ours
The Chatter Box
By Deborah Bennett
I recently received word that the food bank at Jenkins County
Family Enrichment is restocked and once again able to pro
vide food to those who need it. This is possible through the
generosity of local citizens. Pat yourselves on the back - well
done!
As most of you are aware, Cotton Avenue is getting a facelift
and a new water line. As a result, different portions of the street
are blocked off to vehicle travel on a daily basis.
Downtown merchants, however, are still open for business,
even if the block they are located on is closed to vehicles. Many
have rear entrances that can be used to enter the business and
boardwalks have been placed at Cotton Avenue entrances.
Please continue to support local merchants while these con
struction projects are taking place. When everything is com
pleted. it will be worth the inconvenience we are experiencing
now.
The poll question on our website last week was, "As the de
bate continues on health care reform, whose voice do you think
is being heard the most?”
Responses, as of Monday morning, were are follows: Citi
zens - 5; Politicians - 22; and Special Interests Groups - 14.
To participate in this week’s poll, go to http://
www.themillennews.com.
Happy birthday this week to: Johnny Becton Sr., Rudolph
Becton, Jamie Linder, Ginger Herrmann, Wesley Kent, Emma
Coney, Rachel Lynn Griner, Racheal Boynton, Jackie Landrum
and David Waters.
Military Active Duty List: PV2 Brianna Joiner, U.S.Army
National Guard, Lt. Leonardwood, MO; PV2 Jeremy Johnson,
U.S. Army, 59 th Quartermaster Company, Lt. Carson, Colorado;
Ronnie Perryman, Charlie Troop, 108 th Calvary Division, 4 th
Platoon, Afghanistan; Lance Cpl. Adam Lanier, U.S. Marines,
8 th & I Marine Barracks, Washington, D.C.; E-4 Sr. Airman
Roy Davis, U.S. Air Lorce, RAP Molesworth, United King
dom; Lance Cpl. Patrick Barnette, U.S. Marines, Baharia,
Iraq; Sgt. Adam Demshar, 44th Signal Battalion, Baghdad,
Iraq; Cpl. Lee Ogden, U.S. Marines, Camp Pendleton, CA;
E5 Petty Officer 2 nd Class Eric B. Kelsey, U.S. Navy, NSA
Naples, Italy; Senior Airman Charles F. Woods, Moody Air
Force Base, Valdosta, GA; Stuart Burrus, U.S. Air Force, Osan
AFB, Korea; SPC 4 Travis D. Motes, 1st Calvary Division, T.
Hood, Texas; Capt. Donald Slade Burke, 735th Air Mobility
Squadron Detachment 1 Commander, Richmond Royal Aus
tralian AFB, Richmond, Australia; Staff Sgt. Gilbert C.
Sheppard III, 48th Brigade, 118th Field Artillery, Iraq; Petty
Officer 3rd Class Jamie A. Yager, U.S. Navy, Marine Corps
Base Hawaii; Petty Chief Officer Andy D. Crosby, U.S. Navy,
Elroy Destroyer, Norfolk, Va.; Stephanie Crosby, R.N., U.S.
Navy, Lafayette Destroyer; Jimmy Cooper, U.S. Army Na
tional Guard, 878th Engineering Battalion-Augusta, Persian
Gulf ; 1st Lt. J.R. Taylor, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 25th
Infantry Division, Iraq; SPC. Daniel Stuart, 18th MEDCOM,
121 General Hospital, Seoul, Korea; Jeffrey Sweat, U.S. Navy,
USS Kauffman, MM3 59/E-Division, A-Gang, Norfolk, Va.;
Cpl. Larry Lamont Clark, U.S. Marine Corp, 2nd Marine
Expeditionary Force, Camp Lejeune, N.C. Bagdad, Iraq; Khan
Young, U.S. Navy, U.S.S. Kitty Hawk, Persian Gulf; Robert
Milton Jr., E-3, U.S. Army, Ft. Stewart, Hinesville, Ga., Mis
sion Kuwait; Arnold R. Mosley, 2nd Lt., U.S. Air Force,
Randolph AFB, Texas; and Debra A. Mosley, Tech. Sgt., U.S.
Air Force, Randolph AFB, Texas; and SPC Charles “C.J.”
Amerson, U.S. Army, Camp Adder, Iraq.
Letters policy
Letters to the editor of The Millen News are welcomed and
encouraged. These are pages of opinions, yours and ours.
The unsigned editorials generally appearing on the left side of
the editorial page represent the opinion of the newspaper and not
that of any one person on our staff. Personal columns represent
the opinions of the writers whose names appear on them and are
not to be considered the opinion of this newspaper, its manage
ment or owners. Letters to the editor voice the opinions of the
newspaper’s readers.
The Millen News reserves the right to edit any and all portions
of a letter. Unsigned letters will not be published. Letters must
include the signature, address and phone number of the writer to
allow our staff to authenticate its origin. Letters should be lim
ited to 400 words.
The deadline for letters is Friday at noon. You can email letters
to themillennews@yahoo.com.
Chartered 1903
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Publishing Company, 601 E. 6th St., Waynesboro, Ga.
The Millen News
856 East Cotton Ave. • Millen, Ga. 30442
Phone: (478) 982-5460 • FAX: (478) 982-1785
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Walter Harrison Frank M. Edenfield
Editor 1946-1985 Editor
1985-1998
Roy F. Chalker Jr Publisher
Bonnie K. Taylor General Manager
Deborah Bennett Editor
Lavonna Drawdy Advertising Composition
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DID You SEE rm
Georgia Family Council
KNOWLEDGE AND CHARACTER: A POWERFUL, NECESSARY COMBINATION
By Randy Hicks
President of Georgia Family Council
School has started, so my house has become the proverbial beehive
of activity and learning. (At least, I hope the latter is hue.) And that
means homework. And homework means, well, skirmishes here and
there. You see, most children - if left to then own devices - will take
the path of least resistance and gravitate toward activities that are “fun.”
It takes a parent to direct them to what matters.
I was no different as a child. Come to think of it. I’m not really that
different as an adult. I’d still prefer to do the fun thing as opposed to
the necessary thing. (Ask my wife; she’ll tell you.) The difference is
one of learning and maturity. (Okay, another difference is that I have
a loving wife who is willing to remind me of the “necessary thing.”)
Anyway, last night was one of those skirmishes over homework.
One of my sons - a good kid with a kind heart - was being a kid. He
didn’t want to do his homework once he hit a tough spot. And in the
midst of our skirmish, I was reminded that my objective was not just
to get my son to get his homework done, it was to help him under
stand something about perseverance, stick-to-it-iveness.
And I was reminded that the very foundation of education is char
acter. Education should not just be about learning facts, figures, people,
places, processes and proofs. It should be about having the character
to handle the power that comes with knowledge and skill. This is
something that I run the risk of forgetting and something that our
society may already have forgotten.
Martin Luther King, Jr. put it this way:
“Education which stops with efficiency may prove the greatest
menace to society.. .We must remember that intelligence is not enough.
Intelligence plus character - that is the hue goal of education.”
King knew that knowledge constituted power and that good or evil
resided in the possessor of the knowledge, not in the knowledge itself.
The scalpel is a helpful illustration. A scalpel in the hands of a skilled
surgeon is quite different from a scalpel in the hands of a thief. In the
case of the former, it’s a tool for healing, in the case of the latter it’s a
weapon of destruction. The one who wields the tool determines its
usefulness, not the tool itself.
So it is with knowledge.
It’s ironic that we often decry the moral failings of our youth. Yet
we fill them with facts and know-how while failing to train them in
the character that will enable them to wield the facts and know-how
we give them.
C.S. Lewis expressed a similar conviction and concern decades
ago. Lewis, the highly esteemed Oxford scholar, Christian apologist
and popular writer - he wrote The Chronicles of Narnia among other
great works - said that a society that ignores transcendent values ig
nores them at its own peril. He asserted that if we fail to pass on
specific standards of right and wrong, of what is worthwhile or worth
less, admirable or ignoble then we must share the blame for the con
sequences in our communities.
NOTICE OF PROPERTY TAX INCREASE
The Jenkins County Board of
Commissioners has tentatively adopted a
millage rate which will require an
increase in property taxes by 1.36
percent.
All concerned citizens are invited to the
public hearings on this tax increase to be
held at the Jenkins County Senior Citizen
Center (just pass the City Hall building) on
September 10, 2009 at 10:00 A.M. and
September 10, 2009 at 7:00 P.M.
Jenkins County Board of Commissioners
“And all the time,” Lewis wrote, “.. .we continue to clamour [sic] for
those very qualities we are rendering impossible. You can hardly open
a periodical without coming across the statement that what our civili
zation needs is more ‘drive,’ or dynamism, or self-reliance, or ‘cre
ativity.’”
“In a sort of ghastly simplicity we remove the organ and demand
the function. We make men without chests and expect of them virtue
and enterprise. We laugh at honour [sic] and are shocked to find trai
tors in our midst. We castrate and bid the gelding be fruitful.”
I think Lewis is dead on.
If character is that which instructs our kids to make good decisions
and consider the good of others, then we should not be surprised at
the consequences of de-valuing character instruction.
When we mock or fail to teach values, we should not be shocked to
discover that the majority of college students cheat on tests, that a
ridiculously high number of employees cheat their employers - and
vice versa.
Why should we be surprised to hear of computer hackers - highly
skilled and knowledgeable - stealing identities, shutting down busi
nesses and pilfering accounts? Why should we be surprised at Ber
nard Madoff, Enron, Global Crossings or WorldCom? Or by people
cheating on their taxes?
This is what King was talking about. “Education which stops with
efficiency may prove the greatest menace to society.” It often results
in knowledge and skill being misused to the detriment of others.
As parents (and educators) we must see character education as be
ing more important than - and intricately tied to - every other ele
ment of education. Most importantly, parents must be purposeful in
imparting character to their children. That begins by modeling char
acter and allowing one’s actions to speak louder than one’s words.
Georgia Family Council is a non-profit research and education or
ganization committed to fostering conditions in which individuals,
families and communities thrive. For more information, visit
www.georgiafamily.org, call (770) 242-0001, or email
stephen.daniels @ georgiafamily.org.
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