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Challenges to faith and reason

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Monday, 16 September 2019

Written by Karl Merritt

Over the past week, I received comments from three readers regarding two of my recent columns. They raised questions and challenges that some other readers likely share. Consequently, I will respond in this column.

Investing in our future is a no-brainer

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Monday, 16 September 2019

Written by Bill Bowman

Will Fayetteville get a new North Carolina state-operated North Carolina Civil War & Reconstruction History Center? That’s a good question. Basic logic would dictate it’s a no-brainer for a community like ours that is working hard to attract business and industry to Cumberland County. As the General Assembly readies itself to approve $46 million for the Civil War Center, the appropriation hinges on Cumberland County and the city of Fayetteville both supporting the project with financial commitments of $7.5 million each. At this moment, both have tentatively committed their support. Fayetteville Mayor Mitch Colvin is waffling, though, stating that more public input is needed and suggesting there may be more pressing needs to address as Fayetteville rallies to shake its Tier 1 status.

 

Education and awareness are essential for peace and tranquility. The proposed Civil War Education Center offers both. For those in the city who think the $7.5  million in tax dollars could be spent on more pressing needs, we ask: What can be more important than education and awareness to future generations?  Where is the vision? More importantly, where is the logic?

 

This is an $80 million-plus state-funded project for which the city and county would both invest $7.5 million.  That’s a 0.094% buy-in after the museum foundation has raised over $10 million in donations and $15 million in pledges. Using community support and donations to evaluate and monitor this mandate, I’d say the Fayetteville community is pretty much in favor of the project. So why the hesitation on the part of the city at this late date? Personal political maneuvering? Mind games? Who knows?  However, if it’s a game, it’s a gamble with stakes so high that a loss here would be so devastating that  the consequences to the Fayetteville/Cumberland County community would be felt for decades. 

 

Need proof? Look east of Fayetteville about 5 miles, where millions of vehicles travel both north and south along Interstate 95 each day, avoiding our community.  The interstate was predicted to be an economic boom for Cumberland County in the late 70s and early 80s, promising decades of growth and prosperity. Nearly four decades later, only one of the 11 Cumberland  County exits have been developed — exit 49. A bad decision made in the 70s has stifled, and continues to stifle, the progress and development of this community. Why? Because of political self-interest and a lack of vision. We can convene all the public hearings we want. The location of Interstate 95 was the topic of several such public hearings. Public hearings do not substitute for intelligence, logic or leadership. And, in the case of championing the History Center here is a project that would pay big dividends to the Fayetteville community indefinitely.

 

By the numbers:

1. The Museum is a state-funded operation. In other words, once it’s built, the state maintains it. There is no cost to local residents.
2. The Museum will create hundreds of new jobs.
3. It will have a $20 million annual economic impact on the community.
4. It will attract 100,000+ visitors annually to our community.
5. It will make Fayetteville a statewide destination point.

 

In closing, I know both our Fayetteville city councilmen and women and our Board of County Commissioners have a sincere and heartfelt passion for doing what is in the best interest of local residents. Escaping the grasp of our Tier 1 designation can only be obtained with honest, objective leadership and vision. We don’t need another Interstate 95 fiasco that has netted us zero over the past four decades. We need to partner with the state of North Carolina, this time, in building a highway to prosperity that leads directly to Fayetteville and  Cumberland County. The  N.C. Civil War & Reconstruction History Center is that master plan.

Power speaking truth to power

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Monday, 16 September 2019

Written by Margaret Dickson

American business — big, small and in between — is rarely seen as a force of political liberalism. In fact, business interests are more often than not conservative, as political money given by both business executives and business entities demonstrates. Business helps itself by lobbying for less regulation and lower taxes and often contends these positions help everyone else as well — proverbial trickle-down economics.

The business leaders, representing companies including Levi Strauss & Co., Lyft, Gap Inc., Royal Caribbean and a financial operation founded by Jared Kushner’s brother, wrote this to senators. “Doing nothing about America’s gun violence crisis is simply unacceptable, and it is time to stand with the American public on gun safety.”

The doctor will see you now

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Monday, 09 September 2019

Written by Pitt Dickey

It’s the most wonderful time of the year — the presidential election of 2020 has arrived full-blown, even before the pre-Halloween Christmas decorations show up at Walmart. As Frank Costanza once said, the presidential election campaign has risen like a Phoenix from Arizona into full mushroom-cloud status. Political ads are now looming everywhere above the fruited plains like a hangover from overconsumption of Mad Dog 20/20 Electric Melon wine. 

One of the hot topics in the coming election will be the future of health care in America. There is a wide variety of options from Democrats from the plan to outlaw private insurance and have Medicare for all to Biden’s improved Obamacare. On the right, the Republicans want to abolish Obamacare to bring back pre-existing conditions. They have a Double Secret Plan for as-yet-undescribed medical Vapor Care. Thinking about health care got me pondering the good old days when doctors made house calls. That thought drove me back to medieval times when doctors wore scary bird mask outfits to cure the Black Death. Precious memories. How they linger. 

As the Republicans haven’t proposed their replacement for Obamacare, allow me to suggest they resume making medical care great again with Vapor Care. Vapor Care sounds perfect in the abstract when Dear Leader tweets. Vagueness counts. Mix together some warm, fuzzy words like “lower premiums and deductibles,” “far less expensive and far better,” and “block grants” and pretty soon you have the basis for Dear Leader’s replacement for Obamacare — new, improved Republican Vapor Care. 

In returning to Medicine’s Golden Days of Yesteryear, what better place to start than to require medical providers of Vapor Care to wear the Plague Doctors’ bird-head black costume? Take a walk down Memory Lane to consider how these costumes will make medicine great again. When the Black Death was stalking Europe, no one knew what to do about it. The Plague Doctors’ Bird of Death costume was a humdinger. Plague Doctors’ — PD for short — jobs included treating and curing victims of the plague and burying them when the cure didn’t take. Being a PD meant you had to be around plague patients and the plague cooties that the patients gave off. The PD’s uniform was designed to keep the doc safe as he practiced Vapor Care. A dude named Charles de l’Orme is credited with inventing the Plague Doctor bird outfit in about 1619. Chuck was the Dr. Phil celebrity doc of his day, including three French kings and the Medici family in Italy as his patients.

The PD wore a black leather cowboy hat. Beneath that, he wore the well-known bird mask. There was some belief that the plague was spread by birds, so the giant bird mask might scare away the disease-carrying birds. The beak of the mask was stuffed with flowers and sweet-smelling herbs because another theory was that the plague was spread by bad air. With the PD breathing the sweet smell of excess in his beak, the bad air cooties could be warded off. This left the PD to heal the sick unafraid of getting the Black Death himself. The PD wore a long, black overcoat from his head to his feet to protect his skin from the plague demons. To keep the demons from sticking to the overcoat, the PD would slime the overcoat with animal fat. 

 Greasing up the overcoat was done for several possible conflicting reasons — the grease would keep the plague cooties away from the PD, or it might draw the plague gremlins away from the patient and onto the overcoat. If any yucky plague secretions oozed off the body of the patient, the gruesome juices would slide off the grease-covered coat, thereby protecting the PD. One can imagine the healing effect of a giant bird figure covered in smelly grease on a hot day in Italy on a patient suffering bubonic plague. If the patient lived, he would remember that event forever. To complete the outfit, the PD carried a wooden cane to be used for poking the patient during examination or defending the PD from the patient if the patient became freaked out by the appearance of a giant smelly bird messing with him during his death throes. 

The advantage of dressing people in Plague Doctor Bird Suits to apply Vapor Care is that the PD doesn’t need a medical degree. Just a bird suit. No expensive medical doctors need apply. No medical malpractice cases will exist because the patients will all die, and the PD can’t be identified because of the Bird Suit. This all keeps down the costs of medical care. 

 The late, great singer Warren Zevon predicted Vapor Care with his immortal lyrics in his song “Life’ll Kill You.”

“From the president of the United States/ To the lowliest rock and roll star/ The doctor is in and he’ll see you now/ He don’t care who you are/ Some get the awful, awful diseases/ Some get the knife, some get the gun/ Some get to die in their sleep/ At the age of a hundred and one/ Life’ll kill ya/ That’s what I said/ Life’ll kill you/ Then you’ll be dead.” 

Remember to vote early and often. The life you save may be your own.