Readers Write: Nov. 19

Defense of Roy Moore shameful, sick

I’m appalled by the shameless, hypocritical depravity of Alabamans defending Roy Moore. It’s pointless to appeal to their humanity and decency because they have none. These “values voters” will support any scum-of-the-earth demagogue who feeds their twisted fantasy of replacing our Constitutional government with a fundamentalist theocracy. They have the nerve to call themselves “Christians” while spitting in the face of Christ.

Instead, I ask Alabama conservatives of better character to search their souls. Can you really stomach Moore as your senator because you just can’t bring yourself to vote for a Democrat? Can you explain that to your teenage daughters? Do you truly have rational reasons to hate the Democratic Party – the party that historically has stood up for ordinary working families against the predatory rich and powerful? Or maybe, just maybe, have you let yourself become indoctrinated by decades of propaganda from self-serving right-wingers in media and politics?

CHRIS MOSER, STONECREST

Intransigence is reason Palestinians without state

Palestinian leaders wasted their energy in denouncing a 100-year-old letter (“Balfour Declaration, at 100, still divides…” News, Nov. 2). The Balfour Declaration didn’t bring about Israel’s rebirth in the Jews’ ancestral homeland. The efforts of modern Zionists did. Beginning in the 1880’s, their arrival swelled the numbers of Jews in the Holy Land. The Zionists bought land and increased its productivity, established schools and hospitals, and lobbied world leaders. Most of the people today called “Palestinian” descend from families attracted to Palestine by the improved living standards resulting from Zionist activity.

Britain used 78 percent of its League of Nations Mandate for Palestine to establish Jordan. Arab nations went to war rather than accept the partition of the remaining land into a Jewish state and a second Arab state. Thus, the pattern of starting and losing wars, then refusing to negotiate, began. Arab intransigence, not the Balfour Declaration, is the reason Arab Palestinians still don’t have a state.

TOBY F. BLOCK, ATLANTA

KSU cheerleaders’ kneeling is divisive

The KSU cheerleaders and their ilk have won a hollow victory. This so-called freedom of speech protest is simply nothing more than a blatant disregard for the values that many Americans hold dear, and to do it on Veterans Day only makes it more egregious.

What this so-called exercise of free speech is really all about, is their total disregard for anything or anyone other than what their hero — the ex-pro quarterback — espouses. (i.e. all of their problems are a direct result of blatant discrimination). I view this as extremely divisive and find it totally disgusting.

J.W. HOPE, NORCROSS

More expenses should be included as deductions

Much is being discussed and debated about the proposed tax cut bill making its way through Congress. One of the primary issues seems to be what will allowed as deductions.

There are three things that certainly should be included, first and foremost of them being all medical expenses to include the cost of health insurance premiums. Companies that provide health insurance to employees are able to deduct that as expenses, yet those individuals who are self-employed or whose employers do not provide health insurance face limits on the deduction. If we want Americans to be healthier, then medical expenses and health insurance costs should be deductible.

Charitable contributions should also be deductible. Much of the work of charities provides services that then do not have to be provided by government.

Mortgage interest should be deductible. This helps foster more homebuilding, which creates jobs, and it encourages individuals to buy houses, generally making them more stable.

MIKE DEAL, ALPHARETTA