Restore funding to public education

Editor,

    I am writing to express concern about the states fiscal policy for higher education and education in general. We have seen a number of proposals from the presidents’ offices of our public colleges asking for fiscal flexibility (exemption from public oversight), increasing tuition and increasing out-of-state and foreign student enrollment simply because they pay more.

    Why have we not heard one word from of anyone in government about restoring state funding to higher ed? Why is Colorado, with one of the highest median incomes in the country, dead last in higher-ed funding? I understand that the we’re in a recession, but so is the rest of the country. Yet 49 other states are managing to provide more than the 3 percent of higher ed budget Colorado currently allocates.

    The fact that we’re dead last is embarrassing and a public shame. Thanks to TABOR, we are in real danger of losing affordable public higher education in Colorado at a time when our kids need an education more than ever. The days of blue-collar jobs disappeared with our parents’ generation, and a college education is not a luxury any more.

    It’s a basic requirement to succeed in today’s world, and Colorado’s kids deserve better than this.

Dragan Mejic

Brighton

Keep it in the closet

Editor,

    Well, folks, after seeing the president is ready to eliminate the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy and then to see the commercial that gay rights organizations wanted to play during America’s Super Bowl of two guys making out, I have had enough.

    This is on the heels of the 2008 election results in California, where the homosexual community rioted in the streets because voters reaffirmed that marriage is between a man and a woman. California is one of the most liberal states in the nation.

    This was followed by attacks on the African-American communities and Mormon Church in California for supporting that marriage is between a man and woman. All across this country, state after state has voted to reaffirm marriage is between a man and a woman.

    Tolerance? Yes. Indoctrination and special rights until we are all throwing rice on the homosexuals at their weddings? Hell no. We take prayer out of our school in the early 60s, and many want to strip “In God We Trust” off our money. Yet some elementary schools have books about two mommies and two daddies and think it is OK. That is wrong.

    Many, if not most, colleges offer pro-homosexual courses at taxpayers’ expense. That is not right. So now we want to jeopardize our national security by destroying an already declining morale among our troops (due to the worst commander-in-chief in our nation’s history: President Obama) by terminating the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy.

    What kind of sick message are we sending to young boys and girls if CBS would have allowed this commercial to air during the Super Bowl? Watching those two white guys go at it with the black guy looking stunned is the first time in my life I was embarrassed to be a white guy.

    All these hate crime laws are special treatment. Murder is murder, Rape is rape. Assault is assault. Why should the sentences be harsher when the crime has the same violent outcome?

    There are attorneys out there that can write up wills and contracts. Employers should not be forced to provide benefits to gay partners as they do for married couples.

    I have no desire to raise kids in a neighborhood where the majority of mommies kiss each other good-bye or the daddies. Move to San Francisco or Vermont or some other gay and lesbian community if that is what you consider normal.

    By no means should it be illegal to be homosexual. But please, for the sake of our society and young kids, consider keeping it to the privacy of your home and not in TV ads. Human sexual behavior does not rise to the level of those protected by civil rights, i.e. race, religion.

    Certainly God and Mother Nature did not create the human body for this purpose.

Tom Janich

Brighton