VOTING RIGHTS
We still need measure ensuring ballot access
Thanks to Rep. Hank Johnson for citing many cases where voting rights of Georgians and others continue to be curtailed (“Voting Rights Act necessary,” Opinion, March 7).
The methods may be different from 50 years ago when I volunteered to register voters in under-represented neighborhoods, but the results are the same. Redistricting, and cutting back on early voting, are just two examples.
Let’s keep the Voting Rights Act intact until access to voting is truly open to all. And let’s look for ways to expand, not contract, the opportunities to vote. That’s democracy we can be proud of.
SUSAN MAY, ATLANTA
HOMELAND SECURITY
Commend senator for warning about drones
Hooray to Sen. Rand Paul for his heroic filibuster against the grave danger to American liberty posed by President Obama’s drone policy.
In one electrifying move, Senator Paul did something that both the Democratic and Republican leadership has deliberately avoided for years. He has pushed the issue of America’s severely threatened Bill of Rights liberties into the front lines of the American political debate.
Like millions of Americans of all political persuasions, I am sick of government surveillance of innocent citizens, dubious wars, the threat of indefinite detention without trial, secrecy, and contempt for the Bill of Rights. I hope Senator Paul runs for president in 2016, and makes defense of our precious civil liberties a centerpiece of his campaign.
JAMES W. HARRIS, RYDAL
POLITICS
Bipartisanship unlikely given Obama’s attitude
A recent letter headline stated “Bipartisan push could get nation moving” (Readers write, Opinion, March 6). I agree.
Bipartisanship cannot work in the political atmosphere created by the administration. Republicans and Democrats share no common values when it comes to governing. The president is not a traditional American president. His objective is not to govern, but to campaign against Republicans who he wishes to marginalize and/or destroy, politically.
This will only change if President Obama reverses his political course, which is unlikely, or if Democrats lose the White House and Republicans gain both the Senate and the House — and if the Republican president isn’t a “Democrat Lite.”
EDWARD A. WATKINS, LILBURN
LEGISLATURE
Why debate fireworks if guns in church OK?
Regarding “Legalized fireworks pose numerous risks” (Readers write, Opinion, March 11), although I do not support the legalization of fireworks in Georgia, it seems somewhat silly that in a state that supports carrying guns into churches, schools and virtually all public places, we are concerned about firecrackers and Roman candles.
JAY GROUNDWATER, BROOKHAVEN
