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Today's Opinions

  • After seven years of neighborhood care, Babe is gone

    This letter is to show my gratitude, thanks and respect for the people in my South of the River neighborhood.

    I want to thank you for the care, concern and affection you all shared with me for a wonderful, gentle soul who I had the pleasure and joy to know and, ultimately help care for for the past seven years.

    Her story is a homage to both your wonderful generosity and her courage and spirit.

    Babe, a Labrador retriever mix, was 23 years old when she left this world and crossed over the Rainbow Bridge on Jan. 7.

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  • GUEST OPINION: Why freedon of religion matters across the world abroad

    By CHARLES C. HAYNES
    First Amendment Center
    It was anything but a happy New Year for Christian pastor Saeed Abedini, an American citizen who has spent the last year in an Iranian prison because of his faith.

    In December 2012, the Idaho minister was visiting his native Iran to help start an orphanage when he was arrested for “undermining the Iranian government,” according to the American Center for Law and Justice, a legal group working on Abedini’s behalf.

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  • A VIEW from LICK SKILLET:

    Well, Gentle Reader, here we all are at the beginning of a New Year — 2014, Anno Domini, and so it is fitting to start out this first column of this new year with our wish for you and yours of a Happy New Year.
    May it be healthy and profitable, as well as happy.
    ******

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  • Put civility back in free speech options for 2014

    By GENE POLICINSKI

    First Amendment Center

    The First Amendment protects our freedom to say and write just about anything we want — but that doesn’t mean we ought to, particularly in public life.

    The difference rests between “can” and “should.”

    Our nation’s founders were no strangers to rude, callous and raucous debate in public life and to vicious commentary, even by today’s “anything goes” online standards.

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  • Oncology waiting room — where hope drips slowly

    The last day of the year found me in an impromptu meeting of a strange organization; one that requires no regular meetings or any other standards that identify such public bodies.

    I found myself in the midst of a Waiting Room Society.

    There was no formal structure except, perhaps, for the glass window prominently positioned in the center of the large waiting room.

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  • REACH met goals thanks to efforts of many who helped

    On behalf of the Operation REACH Board of Directors, I want to express our appreciation and thanks to the thousands of people throughout Roane County who helped make our 38th year a success.

    If you are a county deputy, policeman, or fireman under the leadership of the sheriff, police chiefs or fire chiefs, both city and county, who took up money at roadblocks for our program, we are grateful.

    For those businesses and individuals who mailed money in to us, we are grateful.

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  • Policinski right on, but freedom’s cost can be expensive

    Gene Policinski’s “basic course on the First Amendment” in last Friday’s edition is right on. There are, or could be, consequences associated with trying to exercise any of your constitutional rights. The Second
    Amendment says you have the right to bear arms.

    But first you have to complete a firearms safety course and pay the state a license fee to exercise your constitutional right. If you don’t pay that fee, your right is gone and you could be put in prison.

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  • REU needs to show where ‘gift’ is spent

    I always check my wattage when I get my electric bill, and I have no problem with this.

    But I need Rockwood Electric Utility’s accountability for the $1 charge for “Helping Others.”

    I have no problem with giving $1 to help others with their electric bill.

    But I need more information about where my dollar goes, and I’m sure that other REU users want this information as well.

    Please give all your customers a spread sheet to show where our dollars go.  Thank you!

    Jayne R. Jackson
    Kingston

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