Published: August 18, 2009 12:44 am      

Letters to the editor - Tuesday, Aug. 18, 2009

Some of us need affordable care

I am one of the misfortunate Americans without insurance. I don’t understand why people would not want all Americans to at least have the option for a healthy life.

I don’t want free coverage, just give me an affordable option to be able to take care of myself.

I just don’t get it. If one of these anti-reform Americans had a family member in the situation that I and so many others are in with no insurance at all, would they feel the same?

I recently asked a Chrysler worker who was complaining about the reform how he felt about the chance he hadn’t been called back to work and had lost his insurance? Would he want the insurance reform then? He could not answer me.

Please understand how this will affect us that need it and put aside all the reading between the lines and think American!

Becki Lynch, Kokomo

Remove imports from CARS plan

Toyota, Hyundai and Nissan all were major contributors to the downfall of the American auto manufacturers. They are now reaping the benefits of the “clunker” program put in effect by the government.

It seems to me that our tax dollars should be going to help the American industries instead of the foreign ones.

These companies do have some America-based assembly plants, and these could be included in the clunker program. But the cars that are imports should not benefit from the trade-in program now in effect.

Neil Farr Sr., Marion

Free speech applies to atheists, as well

Atheists and freethinkers in Des Moines, Iowa, wish to put up ads on buses that state, “don’t believe in God, you are not alone.” A rather mild statement. A statement by no means critical of religion or Christianity.

In fact, a statement that isn’t even really pro-atheist. A statement that even the most devout Christian should be fine with seeing, even if they disagree.

After all, I, as an atheist, commonly hear Christians state, “no atheists in foxholes,” which forwards the myth that every atheist on a battlefield finds religion, even though there is an organization of atheist veterans called the Military Association of Atheists and Freethinkers.

Now, I respect the right of Christians to further this myth, call atheists “evil,” “wicked,” “immoral,” and a host of things commonly said about people who often just want to voice their views.

With that in mind, I am deeply disappointed that many Christians in Iowa and around the nation have opposed atheists putting up billboards and signs (by complaining to government officials to not allow such speech) paid for by nonbelievers expressing the view, basically, that there are indeed atheists.

If a Christian disagrees with an atheist sign, then by all means put up your own, but don’t demand that atheists not be allowed to express their own views.

I don’t want the government to further atheism or nontheism. I don’t ask that the currency say, “In no God we trust.” I don’t ask that the Pledge state we aren’t under a deity.

All I ask is that atheists have the same right to express their views as anyone else, and that people not try to get the government to remove such free speech.

Jerome McCollom, Kokomo