Border war

Conserve; stealing's a bad idea

Fighting Tennessee over border and water rights is such a bad idea that it is inconceivable that the Georgia Legislature is considering such irresponsible action. The only group to benefit would be the legal teams representing Georgia.

Stealing water from a bordering state by redrawing property lines accepted for over 100 years is bad policy for two reasons. First, it will only postpone the inevitable. We must learn to protect and conserve all our natural resources, starting with our water supply. Second, this "border dispute" will turn state against state and neighbor against neighbor. Similar actions in the western United States have resulted in retail and vacation boycotts by zealous, revenge-minded citizens.

It would be far more productive and permanent if Georgia would focus on conserving, recycling and protecting our water resources rather than stealing water from the Tennessee River.

BOB PETERSON, Brooks

Grab will create a hornet's nest

So moving the boundary north is the Georgia Legislature's solution to the water problem? If this happens, will the boundaries of Alabama and Mississippi move north also? How would the good people of Tennessee in those affected areas like paying state income taxes to Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi? Will Tennessee then go after land in the western tip of Kentucky?

It is legally established that a boundary or property line marked and accepted by interested parties becomes the true line. New or improved surveying equipment does not justify relocating any boundary. Allowing this would create a hornet's nest beyond imagination. The solution is as Nashville attorney Justin P. Wilson suggests: Negotiate the water-transfer policies between Georgia and Tennessee presently in place (@issue, Feb. 25).

WILLIAM ROSSMAN, Lilburn

ON AJC.COM

> Blog about the controversy at www.ajc.com/opinion

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U.S.-Mexico fence a sop to conservative base

No one lies to us like our government and no one in government lies with as much brio as Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff.

When he says landowners along the Rio Grande border "want to make sure [their] view of the river is unobstructed," he patently misstates their objection. The proposed fence the landowners are rejecting would cut them off from up to two miles of their land along the length of the fence, effectively ceding hundreds of square miles of privately owned American soil to Mexico. Worse, for farmers and ranchers, it would deny them access to the most precious asset in the region — water for crops and livestock.

The border fence is a political sop to the conservative base. It cannot and will not work. As one U.S. border patrolman said, "Show me a 50-foot fence and I'll show you a 51-foot ladder."

And I'll show you a 51-foot long wooden nose.

BILL McNEW, Fayetteville

Campaign-trail senators shirking their duties

Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and John McCain are U.S. senators elected to work for the American people. How are they performing their duties in a professional manner when they are spending months on the campaign trail? They are all being paid salaries while neglecting their duties. Elected officials who choose to run for office should take a leave of absence when they are campaigning, and not receive their salaries for the period they are not performing the duties they were elected to do.

MELANIE HOBER, Griffin

Let's 'earmark' some rain for kids' pools

My kids are grown, so I could not care less about pools. But we have now had some rainy days in Georgia and inches of rain have fallen. To use a political term, couldn't we earmark a little of this water to swimming pools this summer? That way kids could be kids and enjoy one more summer of their childhood. For all you Scrooges who have written letters using this issue to bludgeon Gov. Sonny Perdue, would this be OK? After all, using a political phrase once again, shouldn't we "do it for the children"?

LEN CAYCE, Suwanee

Don't add to overarmed society

For former Secret Service agent James Cool to champion even more guns in an already overarmed society is bewildering ("We need students, teachers better-armed," @issue, Feb. 22). Cool highlights "the right of the people to keep and bear arms" while ignoring the qualifying phrase, "a well-regulated militia being necessary."

Just how could an armed faculty at Northern Illinois have prevented a deranged former student from popping out from behind a curtain and, in seconds, gunning down a score of startled students? Jack Ruby shot Lee Harvey Oswald surrounded by dozens of armed police officers.

JAMES T. MILLER, Hoschton