Unaffiliated NC voter: I sure wish GOP candidates shared my traditional Republican values | Opinion

GOP candidates

I am an unaffiliated voter and I possess many “traditional” Republican values, namely, a belief in personal responsibility and fiscal responsibility. But those values are nowhere to be found today among Republican candidates. My only choices are reasonableness (Democrats) and what I’ll call Hateful Crazytown. Most choices are between democracy preservation (D) and democracy destruction (R). John McCain, I sure do miss you!

Stacie Hagwood, Garner

Border bill

The immigration/border legislation debacle last week was inexcusable.

The Republican-requested immigration reform bill tied to aid for Ukraine failed in the Senate, with only four Republican senators voting in favor. North Carolina Sens. Thom Tillis and Ted Budd voted against it.

Tillis and Budd apparently lack the grace and courage to stand up those who would rather see border chaos and point blame. By voting ‘no,’ they did not do what’s right and best for the people of North Carolina and the country.

Marlene Greer, Elizabeth City

Durham schools

The writer is a retired N.C. Superior Court judge.

In the Leandro case the N.C. Supreme Court declared that every child should have an equal opportunity to obtain a sound basic education.

Every day a child sits in a classroom without the presence of a competent certified teacher their constitutional right is being denied.

For more than a week, the focus in the Durham Public Schools was not on children, but on adults — and pay and money. Some days, a dozen DPS schools were closed due to staff outages and pay protests.

While presiding over the Leandro case, I said that the failure of students to read and write by grade 3 is the result of lack of competent classroom instruction, not money.

Children in closed DPS schools are being denied their constitutional right to obtain a sound basic education.

What is more important here? Children or the pay dispute by adults?

Howard E. Manning Jr., Raleigh

Social media

Regarding “Protecting kids on line should be both technologically and politically possible,” (Feb. 7 Opinion Extra):

This Opinion piece omitted another viable solution. Perhaps parents should take control and start a grassroots campaign to replace their children’s smart phones with flip phones. Children would still be able to contact their friends and parents if needed without being exposed to posts that would harm their self esteem. As suggested during the Senate hearing, companies that face a significant loss to their bottom lines may have greater incentive to make platforms safer.

Amelia Casey, Cary

‘We the people’

Alexandra Sirota’s Feb. 6 commentary about economic insecurity in North Carolina is the most common sense I’ve read in a great while on how “we, the people” of the United States “promote the general welfare” — for all the people in our country. Enough of me, myself and I! Instead, it should be “of the people, by the people, for the people.”

Diane Latorre, Raleigh

Vulnerable people

Thank you for the recent work of op-ed writer Rayad Shams and reporter Teddy Rosenbluth on the way North Carolina treats migrant farmworkers (Jan. 15 Opinion) and people with complex developmental disabilities (Feb. 1). There really is no believable explanation for not funding care for these people other than political indifference to them, and this is unconscionable.

Karen Wiebe, Raleigh

Haw River

Regarding “Will Burlington 1,4-dioxane release affect Cary or Apex?” (Feb. 4):

We’ve seen this before: industries in Burlington send pollutants (either by accident or by intent) into the Haw River which affects millions of people downstream. When are communities affected by pollution going to demand that their health is more important than the industries and tax revenue provided by those polluting industries in another county?

Those chemicals are also seeping into private wells in areas adjacent to the river. What can our state representatives do to affect this problem? Here is where the Feds must step in, as the state government is unable to protect its citizens.

Janice Woychik, Chapel Hill