Say no to tobacco ads

Bob Geary (“What’s the Matter with North Carolina?” INDY, 10/22/14) is right to worry about Republican legislators setting North Carolina back half a century. But just a few pages earlier in the same issue, the Indy does its part to turn back the clock by running a full-page ad for American Spirit cigarettes.

Over 14,000 North Carolinians die every year from tobacco-related diseases, and nearly 9,000 of our teens become new daily smokers. By running ads for cigarettes, as in benighted decades past, the Indy helps to perpetuate this profit-driven epidemic.

Bob Geary asks, “What’s the matter with North Carolina?” Good question. But what’s the matter with the Indy? Taking a cut of the blood money that comes from corporate exploitation of human weakness puts you in the same moral company as the Republicans you criticize.

Michael Schwalbe, Chapel Hill

Support for Kay Hagan

It is of concern to all Chatham Citizens whether Kay Hagan or Thom Tillis is elected.

Thom Tillis ran on “Common Sense” government. By that he meant that Public Education [the Lifeline of Representative Democracy] was no good, unaccountable, and that its professional teachers were bad seeds. Therefore he supported substantially reducing the per student tax dollar support for North Carolina’s Public Education. Plus he supported legislation to hand public tax dollars over to unaccountable private schools, which is prohibited by our State Constitution. Voting or not voting has consequences.

Thom Tillis supported denying health care to around 400,000 of our fellow North Carolina citizens which includes Chatham County citizens. He supported blocking North Carolina’s participation in the Affordable Care Act’s Medicaid expansion. Some of our fellow citizens will die and suffer unnecessarily as a direct result of his actions. Plus his action has meant the loss of 20,000 good medical profession jobs for North Carolinians and Chatham citizens. Political ads show that he cares a lot for the health care of one child citizen. We are all very happy for that family! But, Thom Tillis has a very, very selective heart. It does not balance out. Voting or not voting has consequences.

Does this sound like common sense government? You might ask, whose common sense?

Do your homework. Don’t be tricked by slick misdirection.

Each one of us Chatham citizens is personally experiencing multiple consequences.

There are many more examples … Kay Hagan works every day for Chatham families!

Bruce Davis

Don’t bring guns to the Fair

I wanted to offer some very simple advice to the hysterics/cowards who are afraid to attend the State Fair without their guns. Stay home! Or better yet, if you consider the situation to be as dire as you adamantly profess, provide an army of concealed carry permit holders to escort people from the gates back to their vehicles where they can reunite with their beloved/sacred guns. Never mind the fact that the potential for accidental discharge and/or all of the other firearm mishaps has been eliminated by eliminating guns and will increase when they are reunited with their beloved/sacred guns. Or the fact that up until your whining there has never been a problem at the State Fair. I apologize for interjecting fact/reality into your fantasy world.

Jonthan Sparrow, Durham