I attempted to find information about the three candidates running for Kyle City Council in order to early vote this week. I attempted to be an informed voter as always but I got no where. Only one has a website with very limited info only regarding need for sidewalks. The rest of the candidates have nothing I could find. I wrote to our Justice of Peace Beth Smith in attempting to get some direction and she informed me she had offered a forum for the candidates and NOT ONE of them responded! Appalling, if they would not respond to a forum to get to know them how are they going to first of all take the time to be good council members doing the due diligence required to make informed decisions on the council or then how are they going to be responsive to those they are supposed to be representing? Because I am a diligent voter is the only reason I held my nose and voted, but not happy to have to feel so disgruntled as a voter. What is their vision for Kyle, what is their plan for our city, and how do they plan for us to get there other than sidewalks?  

Genest Harding

Kyle

We must help
the defenseless

The creation of the Legislative Sunset Advisory Commission was a good move gone seriously astray. The proposal to close several of the State Supported Living Centers and that closures be allowed without consent of the legislature has  had, and continues to have, catastrophic results. In an attempt to stay alive by reducing their census rolls the centers are using pressure tactics to move many residents into privately-run group homes where supervision might or might not be adequate.

What the public doesn’t know is that residents of  SSLCs cannot live in normal society without heavy medication and personal attention. Left without adequate medication many of them would do physical harm to themselves – not to others, but to themselves. Nazi Germany used such people as human guinea pigs before sending them to the gas chambers as unfit. And the general population pled ignorance. We as a people are better than that. It is a moral obligation to care for these unfortunates, to help them live as well as they are capable of, and to prevent their harming themselves.

There are some things the state does better than private industry. Caring for the severely handicapped is one of those things. Of course, it costs a lot of money. Of course, we can reduce the cost of government if we shifted this burden onto the private industry. But private industry is profit-driven and will not perform when there is no profit. No amount of governmental oversight is going to make them do it.

The legislature and the poobahs of the Department of Aging and Disability Services must be made to recognize the moral requirement that we care for these people in the best way possible. Hoping for the best by pushing that responsibility onto others is not the best way. Downsizing government and reducing the tax burden are admirable intentions, but they must not be allowed to happen at the expense of the defenseless.

Sterling H. Rogers

San Marcos

It’s hate and distrust 

Re: the Middle East 

Jews hate and distrust Arabs and Arabs hate and distrust Jews. Been that way since biblical times and is not going to change anytime soon.

Israel doesn’t recognize the state of Palestine and Palestine doesn’t recognize the state of Israel.

FACT: Israel is almost completely surrounded by hostile Arab countries.

So, why don’t Americans comprehend that and why does the U.S. and the international community believe they can tell Israel what and what not to do? There will never be “peace” in the Middle East.

 Peter Stern

Driftwood