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Heroes needed:
No experience required
If someone were to ask "What is a here? ” most people would probably
reply that a hero is one who is recognized for outstanding courage, brave
deeds and noble qualities. A hero is usually considered a role model or
ideal person. The title of hero is often given to someone who saves
another person's life, often at great personal risk.
Heroes come in all shapes and sizes, all races and religions, and from all
backgrounds and levels of education. A great number of unheralded heroes
live in our area. While they have not experienced great personal risk or
sacrifice, their spirit of heroism is evident. This is because they have done
something to help save a life or to improve the quality of another person.
What noble deeds do these heroes perform?
They give blood!
In fact, this summer, all blood donors could be considered Super
Heroes. During the summer months, there is usually a severe drop in the
number of people who donate blood at American Red Cross blood drives.
Vacations, school closings, and more active lifestyles of summer are
frequently cited as reasons for the decline in the number of people who
volunteer to give blood.
Yet, every day in the United States, one out of every 10 hospitals needs
blood--one patient every 12 seconds. The overwhelming majority would
die without it. Their need can only be met by healthy volunteer blood
donors.
When most people think of the need for blood, they generally think of
emergencies, but for thousands of Americans, it's a way of life. For
example, people who suffer from sickle cell anemia, cancer, heart disease,
leukemia, and other major illesses need blood transfusions to survive. For
these people, every donor is a hero.
Most healthy people age 17 or older, who weigh at least 110 pounds are
able to give blood. And you can give blood every 56 days.
So how about it? Want to be a hero this summer? It's free. It's easy.
It'll make you feel good. It may even save a life. Maybe someone you
know.
In support of Lightle
Dear Editor:
Ive known Bill Lightle for quite some time. He comes from a working
class background and has worked his way up to a graduate degree and
teaching position in American History. Bill is the kind of man that
remembers where he came from and the people he grew up with.
Bill has always been a leader-in athletics in his earlier days when he
was an all-around athlete; in education where he works on issues related to
improving education; and now as a candidate for Congress where he
listens to the people and works to represent them faithfully.
Lightle's idea of adopting an 800 number for the entire Bth district is an
example of his desire to keep in touch with the people. Why should a
constituent have to place a toll call to be heard? An 800 number is a good
step to providing citizen access and better representation.
Bill Lightle is a man who is level-headed, caring, and enthusiastic. He
would make a great representative in Congress.
Sincerely,
Roger Marietta, Albany
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Should we change the players this election year?
Maybe Feulner, president of the
Heritage Foundation, a Washington
based public policy research
institute, wrote a column recently
about big government and whether
or not the American taxpayer was
getting his money's worth. In the
column Feulner compared the way
business operates to the way
governments operate, which
provoked some thoughts of my
own.
Businesses will make refunds on
their merchandise or services if the
product doesn't work properly, yet
the taxpayers never get "refunds" on
government programs that don't
work. All we do is continue to pay
more taxes in an effort to fix that
failed government program that we
didn't need in the first place.
The average American family
with children, paid only two percent
of its annual income in federal taxes
in 1950. Today, that same family
pays almost 25 percent of what
Am. / y
Perry Scrapbook
Forrest Johnson and his mother admired all the trophies he was awarded at Perry High's
Spring banquet in 1990. Johnson won no less than seven awards, including the Houston
Home Journal's Top Male Athlete award. Johnson also received a University of Georaia full
track scholarship.
Memorial Day ceremonies are
not the only way to honor heroes
They said goodbye to their
mothers and fathers, sisters aid
brothers, and went off to war.
They hugged their children tight,
and kissed their spouses or
sweethearts one last lime with a
sense of the great longing that was
to come.
They left the towns and cities
and farms where they had been bom
and raised. They left schools and
jobs, hopes and dreams, careers and
callings. And they went off to war.
They said they’d return. And
everyone hoped and worked and
prayed for that day. But they enver
came home again.
The remains of many were
relumed to rest beneath the green
grass of a thousand cemeteries in a
thousand cities and towns across
this great land.
Some were buried where they
fell, far from home. Thousands
more fill the sprawling military
cemeteries overseas. And the great
oceans have swallowed the crews of
a vast armada.
The fate of untold numbers is
known but to God.
Each Memorial Day we honor
the memory of those men and
women who went off to war, never
to return.
Our nation owes its very
existence to those who answered the
call of duty.
Thomas Jefferson said: "The
ground of liberty must be gained by
inches." Yes, by inches, and by the
lives of those who fought for
liberty’s hallowed ground.
More than 6,000 patriots died in
battle during the American
Revolution. Who will honor their
sacrifice if not those of us who are
blessed to call America our home?
The Civil War, which tore this
nation apart, has since bound us
together with the strength of a
common history that we might not
otherwise have had. We lost
500,000-North and South-in that
war.
In World War 1, 116,000 lost
Houston Times-Journal
they earn to the federal government,
and by the time you add state and
local taxes, the percentage jumps to
38 percent. And that figure will
increase thanks to the 1993 tax
increase passed by the Clinton
Administration.
Let's look for a minute at two
areas of our federal government's
spending that has increased
tremendously over the years.
During 1994 the Department of
Education will spend $30.3 billion,
and the Department of Justice will
spend $10.2 billion. Any of us
laymen know that even after these
huge expenditures school
achievement scores will not go up,
nor will the crime rates go down.
Should business increase their
spending in targeted areas at the
levels these two departments have
over the years, without doubt you
would see positive improvements
in those areas.
their lives in service to America.
Who will cherish their memory and
mourn their loss if not all
Americans who love this country?
World War II saw 400,000 U.S.
servicemen and women lose their
lives. Then came Korea, Vietnam,
and more recently, Desert Storm.
And we must not forget those who
have died in our latest peacekeeping
missions.
In all, more than one-million
Americans have died in war since
our country was founded. Who will
remember those who gave the last
full measure of devotion to the
cause of justice, freedom and
democracy if not those who live
under the protections of these great
principles?
All Americans--"We The
People"-must remember what they
fought for. We the people must
cherish their memory and honor
their sacrifice.
Memorial Day ceremonies are
not the only way to honor our
fallen heroes.
Whenever we show respect for
the American Flag, we honor our
war dead. Whenever we vote, we
confirm the democracy they died
for. Whenever we exercise our
freedoms of speech and to peaceably
assemble, we honor their sacrifice.
Whenever we gather in places of
worship, we are blessed by this
greatest of freedoms which they
fought to protect.
As national commander of The
American Legion, I’m proud to say
that throughout our organization's
75-year history, we've never
forgotten our fallen comrades.
Each Memorial Day, in cities
and towns large and small across
the United States, my fellow
Legionnaires gather at cemeteries
and town halls, at churches and in
parks, to pay tribute to those who
did not return.
And overseas. The American
Legion provides the 16,000 flags
that decorate the graves of our fallen
troops and allies each Memorial
- Saturday, May 28,1994 "Houston Times Journal
Page 4A
Our federal government is noted
for continuing to dump our tax
dollars at highly increased levels
into programs that simple have not
worked, or programs that we once
needed but have long run their
course. Three decades and five
trillion dollars later our government
demands more money for a war on
poverty that has been recognized
even by most liberals as a failure.
And then we have these
wonderful, much needed pork barrel
government programs such as the
International Coffee Organization
that will spend $947,000 this year
and the Junior Duck Stamp
Program that will spend SIOO,OOO.
Small dollars when considering the
overall federal budget, yes, but
these are only two of hundreds of
pork barrel expenditures, and the
only way to remove them from the
scene is to give the president line
item veto power. A bit risky at
Day.
To the young people who may
read this column, I want you to
know that those we honor on
Memorial Day did not die because
they loved war. They did not.
They loved the peace and freedom
that is our American heritage.
As General Douglas MacArthur
said: "The soldier above all other
people prays for peace, for he must
suffer and bear the deepest wounds
and scars of war."
Thus, America's war veterans
and our fallen comrades bequeath
this heritage to our children and
future generations: A free and just
country unlike any other in world
history.
Soon, their young hands will
steer the course that America will
take into the 21st century.
No doubt they too will face
troubled times and crisis from
within and without. No doubt there
will be wars and rumors of wars.
But America will remain strong
if our young people step into the
future girded with the knowledge of
our country's proud history.
On Memorial Day with grateful
hearts we honor those who
selflessly gave all they had to give.
They died for their country, for
their friends and families, and for
you and me.
Let us thank God for America.
Let us thank God for those
patriots who went off to war. And
let us never forget those who did
not return.
Bruce Thiesen is national
commander of the 3.1
million-member American
Legion, the nation's largest
veteran's organization
Bob I
J Tribble I
present, but worth taking the
chance on.
We Americans have been
shackled with high taxes for so
long now we really don't expect to
get our money's worth. Sometimes
we don't expect government to even
run efficiently because we have seen
it take two employees to do what
one should be able to do.
If we get bad service or
merchandise from a business,
usually things will be made right.
The only way to even start towards
making things right in the
government is to change the
players. Remember, this is an
election year.
BVeto L
Roley I
Staff Writer I
Remember
our freedom
Memorial Day
Each time I say the Pledge of
Allegiance, 1 have trouble. You see,
I don't really pledge my allegiance
to flag.
Don't get me wrong, I think the
flag is a beautiful piece of bunting.
I feel a lot of pride as the American
flag is raised, and the Star Spangled
Banner is played. But, I don't pledge
my allegiance to the flag.
Almost 400 years ago, a group
of Englishmen left their native
country, bound for a land that they
had only heard about, bound for a
land filled with little but freedom,
freedom to live the way that they
chose, freedom to worship the way
that they chose. After a long, hard
journey, these people made windfall
at Plymouth Rock. And, although
St. Augustine, Fla., was founded
roughly 40 years prior their land
ing, they set up the first truly
"American" colony.
Freedom, sweet freedom.
America was founded on the con
cept that its citizenry should be
free.
The Declaration of Independence
reeks of this freedom. "We hold
these truths to be self-evident, that
all men are created equal, that they
are endowed by their Creator with
certain unalienable Rights ... That
to secure these Rights,
Governments are instituted among
Men, deriving their just powers
from the consent of the governed."
That freedom was carried over to
the Constitution, written just over
a decade later. The Constitution is a
marvelous document of checks and
balances on government, giving the
ruled the chance to be free.
And, yes, our history is abun
dant with examples where we did
not live up to the ideals of freedom.
Our nation waged a war of genocide
against the native people it found
here, taking their land, and, our na
tion built much of its early wealth
on the slave labor of others, and
many other examples I could point
out.
But these are the aberrations.
Our nation was built on freedom,
and the Constitution enshrines that
freedom into the supreme law of the
land.
That is why I have trouble say
ing the Pledge of Allegiance. It's
not the flag that makes our country
special, it's the freedom. Other na
tions have beautiful flags and great
traditions; but few have our love
and respect of freedom.
I pledge allegiance to the
Constitution of the United States of
America, and to the nation which it
builds and forms from free citizens;
one nation, under God, with liberty
and justice to all.
I think on this Memorial Day,
we need to remember that people
have died for the freedom that is
given to us by the Cbnstitution.
The price of freedom is the blood of
patriots. Well over 1,000,000 sol
diers have died defending the
Constitution.
The flag is beautiful, and the
flag brings great emotions; but,
other nations have flags. Other sol
diers have died defending pretty
pieces of bunting.
Please see ROLEY, page 8A
