MEDIA
Buyers can take blame for entertainers’ smut
The article concerning “unspeakable” words only scratches the surface of the problem (“Unspeakable now spoken,” Living, March 21). The morals of our citizens have been weakened by the constant barrage of filth being foisted on them by so-called entertainers. One can only wonder what might cause folks to pay good money to sit and listen to someone insult their intelligence with profanity and smut that might make a sailor blush.
It has been said that the “shock” value of these words is what the practitioners rely on. I served 24 years in the military, and I can say that such language is often used, but is not universally accepted. We cannot blame these performers for the filth in their presentations. The blame should lie with the folks who help pay their salaries by watching and listening to them.
Bob Grayson, Cumming
ENVIRONMENT
Public rights of way should be free of trees
People never complain when they cut down trees on their own property — but let a tree get cut on property they do not own, and just watch the complaints pour in (“Billboards over trees doubly bad for Tri-Cities,” Opinion, March 19).
Trees in the public right of way live on borrowed time. The public right of way is where buried and aerial utilities reside. Trees and their limbs protruding into overhead lines in the public right of way add a substantial expense to utility maintenance and are a common cause of power disruption.
The public right of way also serves as a life-saving buffer when cars unintentionally leave the road at high speed. Keeping public rights of way clear of trees is entirely proper. All public rights of way should be thought of as being tree-free zones.
Chuck Norton, Alpharetta
HOPE
Scholarship fund needs better management
I must be missing something. Students receiving free funds from HOPE are protesting that they may have to pay for a portion of their education. Illegal students and others who are not U.S. citizens are protesting that they should be given a free education by the U.S. Something’s wrong here.
The HOPE scholarships started out as a great way for deserving U.S. students to get an education that they otherwise could not afford. What happened? The lottery money that goes into that fund is mismanaged. It would appear that those who manage the fund should get an education in how to manage money.
Jim Carter, Snellville
TRANSPORTATION
Signs are needed leading to roads under repair
Is it possible for anyone at the Department of Transportation to understand that when you are fixing the expressways, you need to let people know before they are on the entrance ramp? How hard would it be to have signs placed on the road leading to the ramps? I’m sure money can’t be the issue. There are six or seven signs on the expressways (when it is too late to turn around) that say the road is being fixed. I believe that the roads need to be fixed — but how about using some common sense?
Alma Freedman, Atlanta
