Speak Out

The senior citizens in Piedmont hope our mayor, city council members or county representatives can help us.

For the last several years, the seniors have picked up their Farmer's Market Senior Nutrition Program coupons at our own senior center on Calhoun Street. We were told this year we would have to drive to the Jacksonville or Oxford senior center to pick up our coupons. Why did only the Piedmont seniors have to drive to another out-of-town center to receive our coupons? Several calls to Rep. Lea Fite's office were not returned with an answer.

Piedmont's senior citizens need to stand together and demand to be treated the same and receive the same benefits as all seniors in Calhoun County. Again, we hope an elected official will call and give us an answer to this troubling question. We can be reached at 447-6567.

Doris Kirkpatrick, Maxine Simmons,
Josephine Young, Helen Reedy and Nellie Jo Prater
Piedmont

Drill! Drill! Drill!

Our country's leaders in Congress and the whacko environmentalists are sending us back to the stone ages.

Based on the theory of global warming and endeavors to save the "whacko bird," we are now captive to partisan politicians who are captive to environmental extremists. These factions have decided that the United States must be the only industrialized country in the world that doesn't develop its own resources.

These opponents of capitalism want us to stick it to the oil industry. Of course, their hero, Jimmy Carter, tried that years ago and guess who got stuck? The consumer, of course.

Face it, our world's No. 1 energy source will still be oil when we're all pushing up daisies. We must act as a matter of national security, economic stability and independence from foreign oil by extracting the billions of barrels of oil within our boundaries. We should build nuclear power plants and use clean coal technology and the technology we have to extract shale oil under the earth.

The whackos have already legislated turning corn into ethanol. We know how successful that has been. We can either use our resources in an ecologically safe manner in our country and offshore, or we can watch the Chinese and Russians and other adversaries do it.

It's a joke to demand that Middle East countries increase their production to help us when we won't help ourselves. The whackos said 27 years ago that it doesn't help to drill because it takes seven to 10 years to see any results. They're still saying the same thing.

William L. Gray
Anniston

Voter responsibility

If voters cannot compromise on such things as evolution, abortion, prayer in schools, pledge of allegiance, euthanasia, gay rights and medical marijuana, how can we possibly find answers to truly important issues such as civil rights, education, environment, health and foreign policy?

If the United States fails that test, then there is little hope for more murderous confrontations like Arabs versus Jews, Hindus versus Muslims, Shiites versus Sunnis, and tribe versus tribe in Africa, etc.

Please elect representatives who will "promote the general welfare" and reject candidates who tout their support of divisive, polarizing, governmental-destructive, personal issues.

Joe Boyett
Montgomery