Kirk’s poster in school was political
In a guest column under the headline “Kirk poster was about freedom of expression” (Oct. 23), Horizon High School teacher William Loggans defends displaying a poster with a quote from conservative Charlie Kirk, founder of Turning Point USA, shot and killed in September at a speaking event at Utah Valley University: “Never underestimate the power of your voice and the impact you can have on the world when you speak up for what you believe.” Administrators said the poster violated school board policy on political activity in the classroom and ordered Loggans to take it down.
I have no quarrel with Kirk’s statement. But it’s hardly original. Google and you will find countless paeans to freedom of expression from the likes of Ellie Wiesel, Martin Luther King Jr., Mahatma Gandhi, Albert Einstein, William Faulkner, and on and on. My favorite is from Robert F. Kennedy (murdered in 1968 while running for president) in a 1966 speech to students at the University of Cape Town when South Africa was in the grip of apartheid: “Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring those ripples build a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance.” I wonder if the author had ever posted Kennedy’s — or anyone else’s — tribute to free speech prior to displaying Kirk’s. Even if he didn’t intend it, honoring Kirk this way in the politically charged aftermath of his death carried an inescapable political message.
Greg Dawson Maitland
Writer criticized spending without proof
Former state Rep. Bob Rommel, in a Sunday commentary (“Time to rein in local spending and protect Florida’s seniors”) does not present concrete examples of the spending the author criticizes. Show us examples so we may agree or disparage. I know expenditures come before the municipalities and county commissions for citizen input.
He talks mostly of the rate of inflation and the Consumer Price Index, saying government cost should not exceed them.
He says his current organization, the Florida chapter of the America First Policy Institute, champions fiscal conservatism. I highly recommend he take a look first at the millions of dollars in pet projects and, in my view, clearly unconstitutional spending of the Florida governor — apparently with the blessing of the Florida chief financial officer — and he will find concrete examples of unnecessary spending on pet projects for which the people of Florida never had the opportunity to object.
Choice Edwards Clermont
Trump won’t end drug trade
More chest-beating by Trump (“US is sending an aircraft carrier to Latin America,” Oct. 24)? Stemming the flow of drugs into the U.S. is like the proverbial sticking a finger in a dike. Will drug addicts suddenly all race to rehab if their supply dries up? Of course not. Is the more likely outcome that (lab) drugs will be made domestically which will fulfill another of Trump‘s goals — independence from imports?
William Shallcross Longwood
Guns were around before open carry
Everyone who’s afraid to go to the grocery store that they have been happy with for years because they allow open-carry guns has no clue how many of us have always legally carried a gun in all the grocery stores, malls and restaurants.
We never had a gunfight, but if a crazy person was trying to do you or anyone else great harm, I would have and still will be the one that might save your life.
I haven’t seen a openly carried gun in Publix yet.
Mike Seamon Longwood
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