Wants better name to replace ‘The Bend’
In a letter published recently, a reader writes that the naming of the development on the Westside, The Bend, is a "bad idea." I believe an abomination is a better description.
Moccasin Bend is across the Tennessee River and has been designated as a National Archeological District. The Bend, as it is more easily described, has been inhabited for 12,000 years and is an area of unique cultural significance. The area contains artifacts of some of the most historically important Native American sites in the United States.
I believe perhaps a poll should be taken on the naming of this new important development. Some of the suggestions are excellent and reflect a more modern Chattanooga. How about a vote, Chattanooga?
1. The Gateway
2. The East Shore
3. The Left Bank
4. The Foundry District
5. The Heritage Corridor
Sally Scholze
Drop D.C. airport 'perimeter' rule
Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA) is currently governed by a federally imposed perimeter rule. This antiquated rule created in the late 1960s limits the number of flights permitted to take-off and land at DCA outside a 1,250-mile perimeter. Long outdated, this cap does not fit modern-day air travel capacity and consequently creates barriers to Americans' access to our nation's capital.
This barrier limits competition and threatens the free market. Authorizing additional direct flights will substantially improve access to our nation's capital and benefit consumers.
The free market is the fuel for the American economy. Consumers and suppliers contribute to economic growth, transparency and competitive nature. The demand for increased direct flights to our nation's capital is not being met and therefore thwarting the natural supply-and-demand economy. Get the government out of the way and let the free market operate.
Expanding the number of flights to DCA each day will increase necessary competition and reduce ticket prices while increasing the quality of air service.
Modernizing DCA's perimeter rule is essential for a successful free market. I urge Sens. Blackburn and Hagerty, and Rep. Fleischmann to support these efforts. It's the right thing to do.
Adison Wilson
Dayton, Tenn.
We need leadership against tuberculosis
With partisan divides in the news, we wonder how Congress can accomplish anything. But I want to thank GOP Rep. Chuck Fleischmann and Democratic Rep. Steve Cohen from Memphis for their foresight to join 106 other representatives on a letter asking the administration to "demonstrate bold U.S. leadership against" tuberculosis at the upcoming United Nations meeting on the disease.
Five years ago, at the first such meeting, world leaders agreed to goals to defeat this disease that sickened 10.6 million and killed 1.6 million people in 2021. These plans were derailed when COVID hit. This resulted in the first increases in cases of TB in years. Historically, TB has been neglected since 98% of the cases occur in low- and middle-income countries which shoulder most of the cost. At the upcoming meeting, the U.S. must lead the world to set goals to research new treatments and diagnostics, build stronger health systems, and get back on track to defeat this treatable and curable disease.
Why is this important to Tennessee, with few cases of TB? First, TB is a killer disease. Like COVID, TB can be transmitted with a cough and is just a plane ride away. Like COVID, TB mutates, often producing more expensive drug-resistant variants. Second, improving health systems and training medical personnel for TB will also help stop the next pandemic, not "if" but "when" it emerges. Eradicating TB and being prepared for the next pandemic are just smart.
It is up to the Biden administration to lead.
Anne Child
Oak Ridge, Tenn.
Should columnist have dementia test?
Chattanooga Free Press syndicated columnist Cal Thomas is 12 days younger than President Biden.
Either he has not been tested for dementia and he is not willing to tell us that, or he is not willing to share those results.
Jim Rice
Delete, don't add more to high court
The writer of a recent letter to the editor, "We must pass a law to balance high court," recommends that the Supreme Court be expanded by "... adding four more seats." Apparently she feels that this would somehow serve to balance the court.
But why would it? The same powers-that-be would be in charge of adding the additional seats, and would no doubt again nominate justices that they approved of. So the only thing that would be accomplished is that the taxpayers would be paying for four more justices — a rather hefty price.
I would actually prefer deleting two seats. Surely seven justices could have the same diversity as nine.
Doris Rausch
Tullahoma, Tenn.
Political vitriol worst in lifetime
I have never seen such political vitriol in my 72 years. Democrats label Republicans as Ku Klux Klansmen when, in fact, some Southern Democrats were members of the KKK.
We are under one-party rule — the Democratic Party. Let's be vigilant and aware.
Linda Hampton Higden
Harrison
War on woke is phony weapon
Gov. Ron DeSantis, who insists that Florida is where "woke goes to die," recently announced a plan to "rip wokeness from the military" to ensure more enlistments.
Since there's scant evidence that is causing fewer men and women to enlist in the armed forces, DeSantis told CNN's Jake Tapper that "not everyone really knows what wokeness is." (Woke: "Aware of and actively attentive to important facts and issues, especially of racial and social injustice." Merriam-Webster dictionary.)
The definition aside, the word has been hijacked and redefined as a political weapon. DeSantis has appropriated it as a weapon in his faltering campaign, an obsession that descended into farce in a recent Iowa speech: "I recognize that the woke mind virus represents a war on the truth, so we will wage a war on the woke. We will fight the woke in education, we will fight the woke in the corporations, we will fight the woke in the halls of Congress."
If that syntax seems familiar, think of Winston Churchill's 1940 speech to boost England's morale after British troops were evacuated from Dunkirk: "We shall go on to the end ... we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength, ... we shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, ... in the fields and in the streets, ... we shall never surrender."
That was the speech of a true national leader — unlike a pedant whose presidential campaign seems to be on life support.
Michael Loftin