I’m a Texas 8th-grader. I’m afraid the police won’t be there for me, like in Uvalde

Officers didn’t save the kids

I am 12 and will be an eighth-grader at Renner Middle School in Plano. I have strong feelings about the school shooting in Uvalde.

The police arrived as soon as possible, but I believe the officers should have gone into the classroom and protected the students. Although the officers didn’t know about the conditions inside, parents were worried. A 10-year-old girl even called 911 to beg for help.

I also think that the school should have been monitoring the entrance and exit of everyone. School shootings in Texas aren’t common, and I thank the officers for doing so much for our community, but I think they should be trained better for such an occasion.

- Alyssa Sheu, Dallas

No comparison between the two

Mac Engel got it wrong again. His comparison of coach Joe Kennedy praying while kneeling and Colin Kaepernick protesting while taking a knee is flawed. (June 28, 1B, “If you back praying coach, then you must support Kaepernick”) The only commonality is that both acted on football fields.

Kennedy was respectfully praying. Kaepernick was disrespectfully protesting. Kennedy lost his job for his conduct. He was praying alone and was voluntarily joined by students in public on state property, without media promotion. Kaepernick was politically protesting in the company of his team in public on private property, assisted by television.

No, supporting Kennedy does not equate with support for Kaepernick.

- Mark Swanson, Mansfield

Faulty reasoning about support

The author of a June 28 letter to the editor (9A) complains that men should have to pay for their part in a pregnancy. News flash: Child support is already required by law, and it often punishes decent, loving fathers and their children.

The writer fantasizes about the consequences “if men were the ones who get pregnant.” If a man got pregnant and wanted a child, could he force a woman to become a mother? If a husband wanted an abortion, could the wife stop him? If an unwed father wanted to put the child up for adoption, what could the mother do?

Child-support recipients enjoy tax breaks for dependents. They don’t pay tax on child support yet can claim it as income when applying for a loan.

What if men got pregnant? It would not be as this letter writer and others would believe.

- Don Mathis, San Antonio

Let us choose our own states

When do we decide that states’ rights should be more separated from big government as opposed to the throttled control we now face? It seems every day we identify actions of big government that limit states’ ability to be individual entities within this country. Every state has its claim to fame: California has Hollywood, Florida has its coastlines and Texas has its guns.

We choose states to live in because of the values they promote and the opportunities they provide. This government should not be able to implement blanket laws that dictate to individuals all over the country. Let states make the decisions, and people will decide where they belong and find their peace.

- Nicholas Lynch, Argyle

I don’t believe Jan. 6 witness

The Jan. 6 committee is a joke. So they let this publicity-hungry Cassidy Hutchinson testify to things she had no direct knowledge of. It’s nothing but hearsay.

It shows the left’s mentality to get Donald Trump at any cost. Liberals are still so scared of him, even after he’s been out of office a year and half. Our democracy was never in trouble, but another two and a half years of Joe Biden being lost in space may really do us in.

- Mark Gattis, Springtown