Sunday's Letters to the editor

OPINION

Inheriting a mess

Dear editor:

Right now with Afghanistan, both Republicans and Democrats are having a field day blaming President Biden for a war President George W. Bush started. Mind you, the war was a violation of the Geneva Conventions. As stated, no country shall invade another country with no provocative for the sole purpose to overthrow the government. Which is exactly what we did in Afghanistan, because they told us "no" when we asked if we could come look for terrorist and Osama bin Laden. Even at that point, we knew the majority of the 9/11 terrorists were Saudi citizens.

These are the facts, now the history is Afghanistan has always been a quagmire. Genghis Khan, Alexander the Great, the British and many other empires have tried and failed in Afghanistan.

The Soviet Union fell because of its inability to win in Afghanistan. Which at that point we, the United States, were selling and showing the Taliban how to use our weapons against them. Made a movie about it with America's favorite actor Tom Hanks, if you want the cliff notes on that invasion of Afghanistan.

Trump made the deal with the Taliban. He had meetings with them. No one blinked an eye or had an issue. Now the president has to honor his deal and it's his fault?

We had no chance, from the start. We got poppy plants, which big pharma used to kick-start the opioid epidemic. Yes, Afghanistan was the biggest supplier of the plant to make your painkillers.

The other thing we got was their marijuana, which is the medical marijuana some of you use today. That's about it.

Three days after Genghis Khan withdrew from the county, the government at the time took back over. It happened over and over again.

So just deal with it. You want to be angry, be angry with Bush and Obama. The president, much like Nixon, inherited a mess. And much like Nixon, he decided to end it.

Just support the men and women who fought in this mess of a war.

Ron Swanson

Hot Springs

ADH problems

Dear editor:

The Arkansas Department of Health is in dire need of some common sense and training.

If you have COVID, say your prayers. The contact tracers cannot figure out who is positive and who is just a contact. From personal experience, I was the last one in my circle who tested positive yet the first one contacted. My two exposures who tested positive were not in the system yet. I gave that information. I was also told I would be getting a packet via email that would have my COVID letter and information on how to take care of myself and not transmit the disease. Well, it's been five days and nothing, so I guess that information is not important.

My two contacts were finally contacted and they have not gotten their packets yet, either. I was contacted since by two other contact tracers who did not have my positive status but that I was at risk only. A brand-new day for them.

Another family member who tested negative was contacted and told they were positive, then contacted by yet a different contract tracer to talk about their possible exposure. We are in the 21st century, folks, and have computers to track this stuff. Do we ask each school district to send their best computer geek to Little Rock to program the system and teach the Health Department how to use it? What about these instructions -- do we email them as the contact tracer is speaking to you? The letters for those who have to return to work but can't until the "letter" arrives puts many in an unnecessary limbo land to return to work or, heaven forbid, kids to return to day care.

One contact tracer says your quarantine time is 10 days from the date of first symptom another says 10 days from the date of your test. Which is it? If the Health Department wants the public to trust the numbers and information being given out, they need to get it together and have accurate information and consistent messaging. Don't call folks and tell them they are positive and don't count that as a positive to release to the media when it is a true negative. Get your messaging straight and consistent. You have lost a lot of credibility in my eyes over this past week.

I had done contact tracing back in the 1980s when we did it by paper and pencil. My employer would never have allowed the mistakes and casualness that is going on today. Before we throw more money at a system that is not working let's make it work right and actually do something to help the people of this state.

Sharon Parrett

Hot Springs

Lack of 'good character'

Dear editor:

Why? The answer is simple. Our people, in increasing numbers, have become both immoral and nonreligious.

Looters flood some of our cities. Mob rule has increased. In some cities, folks are shot and killed just because they part their hair on the wrong side. Human trafficking for forced sex has become commonplace. I wonder if they will soon raid our middle schools to kidnap 14-year-old girls to use as "inventory" -- just as they do south of the border?

Our land is suffering from a scarcity of what I call "good character." Someone called it "unrestrained living." Mobs destroying property and demanding that police departments be disbanded have become commonplace. Respect for the rule of law, authority, and authority figures is leaking out of our culture. Take, for example, the lies and innuendoes that were told in the Judge Kavanagh hearing. It was simply an attempt at character assassination for the purpose of political gain. Some folks approved of it. Politicians have become unethical and outright dishonest -- able to tell lies with impunity (think Adam Schiff in the impeachment hearings). The use of a fictitious Fisa warrant in an attempt to unseat a duly elected president of the United States is another example of lawlessness for political gain. Our elected politicians should not be above the law. The use of the FBI by one political party to destroy elected officials of another party shows government gone amok. The purpose of the FBI was once an attempt to uphold and enforce the criminal laws of the United States.

Living lives that are unrestrained and unaccountable are no longer "sins" in what was once a culture based upon God and religious principles. John Adams, the second president of the United States, stated that "Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other." Today, legal abortion funded by our government is used as just another form of birth control while freeloaders are now "woke" and they demand more free stuff from our government as rewards for just breathing. Socialism is just around the corner, and, I fear that more than just a significant number of us are too uninformed or misinformed to know it.

Many of our people have demanded a corrupted government to mirror the changes in our culture. As we continue to crash and burn as a nation that was once "Under God" we will shake off all law and order and become a police state. I wonder how bitter our kids and grandkids and future generations will be at us for allowing this to happen?

John Grillo

Hot Springs

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