Espousing faith only when it fits
Let the Pope proclaim that abortion is sinful or that God, not evolution, designed all living creatures, and certain conservatives proclaim us to be a Christian nation that should enshrine sacred dogma in temporal law. But instead let the Pope declare that we have a moral obligation to the environment or to our lower classes, and the same people will shout that he’s been brainwashed by the liberal media and by President Obama and should stay the heck out of politics.
Never has it been clearer to me that these people hold themselves above the law, and above the Pope. Their only faiths are in their own infallibility, and that they alone have the right to tell us what God wants.
ROBERT WOLFSON, MARIETTA
Marijuana is still unproven remedy
Although Georgia House Bill 1 allows medical marijuana for several severe medical conditions, it needs to be emphasized that none of these conditions have been shown to be helped by this approach, except for some instances of nausea and vomiting in people on cancer chemotherapy. I recently reviewed more than 200 articles in the medical literature back to 1950 on the efficacy of marijuana for many severe medical conditions, and found absolutely no evidence in controlled studies for any other documented benefits.
Although I am very concerned about the severe difficulties of people who are now allowed to use medical marijuana, they need to be served by continuing studies of effective treatments for their afflictions, not being allowed to use medical treatments of totally unproven medical efficacy.
JOHN S. O'SHEA, ADJUNCT PROFESSOR OF PEDIATRICS, EMORY SCHOOL OF MEDICINE
Trump gets it right on Iraq invasion
I never in the world thought I would ever have anything positive to say about Donald Trump. But lo and behold, on his last visit to New Hampshire before helicoptering to Iowa, and several times since, Trump spoke the truth when he called the Bush Administration’s invasion of Iraq as totally disastrous and destabilizing to the entire Middle East, causing the United States to lose everything in that part of the world. Besides that, allowing allowing Iran in effect to take over the territory of their former enemy. And of course another fallout: ISIS
I vividly recall how sensible residents all over our country — many here in Georgia and including former U.S. Sen. Sam Nunn — in early 2003 tried to persuade George Bush and Dick Cheney to use diplomacy instead of invading Baghdad, as George Bush’s father had cautioned against in earlier years.
A sad story. Trump had it right
JOSEPH E. DABNEY, BROOKHAVEN
