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Today's Opinions

  • Good people need guns to keep criminals at bay

    ln response to an article by B.J. Gillum in the March 22 paper, Mr. Gillum seems to think that preserving our Second Amendment rights is much ado about nothing and is worthy of poking fun at, that these people wanting to preserve their constitutional rights are animal-slaughtering, moonshine-drinking, third grade-educated dumb hillbillies who can’t find their way out of bed in the morning.

    What good is your right to remain silent if it’s OK for a cop to beat your brains out until you tell him what he wants to hear?

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  • GUEST OPINION: Reporter takes up shield; what will courts do?

    The judge in the Colorado movie theater shooting case has decided to buy some time.

    Colorado District Court Judge Carlos Samour  Jr. has postponed a decision on whether Fox News reporter Jana Winter will be required to reveal her anonymous sources.  

    Winter’s reporting revealed that shooting suspect James Holmes had mailed a notebook outlining  violent plans and depicting illustrations of a shooting attack to a psychiatrist at the University of Colorado, where he had gone to school.

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  • Political parties need to put on big-boy pants

    By LEE HAMILTON
    Center on Congress
    A few weeks ago, the Republican National Committee issued a 100-page report aimed at reviving the GOP after its poor showing in last November’s elections. It was remarkably blunt about the specifics of the party’s shortcomings — its lack of inclusiveness, its hapless data initiatives, its poor grassroots organizing.

    What it did not take on, however, was an issue the RNC can do little about: the diminished influence, if not irrelevance, of both major parties in American politics.

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  • Hire more male teachers to end counter violence

    Several weeks ago, school board member Danny Wright invited people to give input on the current political movement to raise county property taxes in order to pay for uniformed police officers for each Roane County School.  

    I’d like to give Mr. Wright, his safety committee, and your readers my input at this time. I support putting armed guards in schools. But, I am against raising property taxes in order to fund the proposed school police safety program.

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  • OUR OPINION: Disappointment over rejection of ankle bracelets

    It’s a shame the Roane County Commission failed the taxpayers on a potential resource — ankle bracelets — to save taxpayers some revenue while expanding our arsenal to deal with nonviolent crime.

    We’d like to give a nod to the commissioners who voted Monday in favor of the measure, which would have allocated $25,000 for an ankle-bracelet monitoring program.

    The commissioners who stuck their necks out in an effort to save taxpayers some money were Copper Bacon, James Brummett, Randy Ellis, Jerry Goddard, Chris Johnson and Fred Tedder.

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  • A VIEW from LICK SKILLET: Largen: Will the Circle be Unbroken?

    Gentle reader, you no doubt are familiar with the hymn, “Will the Circle be Unbroken?” We, of course, know not the answer to that question about the future, but we do know that as to the present, the answer is definitely “no,” for we find that with each passing year our circle of friends and acquaintances is broken in more and more places.

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  • No price too high for safety of our schoolchildren

    I am writing in response to the editorial in the Roane County News April 3 edition. It made a valid point regarding the price for placing resource officers in our schools.

    The questions I ask in response are how much is your child worth and what would you pay to keep your child safe?

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  • GUEST OPINION: Egypt doesn’t have political sense of humor

    Egypt has reportedly arrested a comedian for mocking President Mohamed Morsi, prompting criticism by the U.S. State Department.

    The State Department said the arrest of television personality Bassem Youssef  was “evidence of a disturbing trend of growing restrictions on freedom of expression,” according to Voice of America News.

    The incident stands in contrast to the robust nature of freedom of expression through humor and satire in the United States.

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Copyright © 2013

The Roane County News is your source for local news, sports, events, and information in Roane County and Kingston, Tennessee, and the surrounding area.