Sen. Ted Budd offers prayers after Charlotte police shooting but that’s not enough | Opinion
Budd and guns
Sen. Ted Budd’s office issued a statement after the police shooting in Charlotte. While offering prayers for those who were killed, it also said: “Senator Budd believes that we should keep firearms out of the hands of dangerous individuals without violating the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding gun owners.”
Individuals may have the right to own a hand gun to protect their home and family and a rifle to hunt, but do individuals have the Second Amendment right to own and possess a weapon that was designed to be a weapon of war to kill multiple individuals in seconds?
Budd’s prayers are welcome, but his statement is without merit. Let’s bring some sense to our interpretation of the Second Amendment. If someone owns a weapon of war, let them secure them in a National Guard Armory where they belong. This is the only way for them to be “well regulated” as the Second Amendment demands.
Michael Rakouskas, Burlington
Campus protests
Shortly after I arrived as a freshman at UNC in 1972, Palestinian terrorists murdered Israeli athletes at the Olympics. I remember feeling a sense of solidarity and support when the entire campus turned out for a candlelight vigil for the murdered Israelis.
Today I look at what is happening on the UNC campus and at other campuses across the U.S. and I am profoundly sad, disappointed, and confused.
Where are the protests rallying for the release of the hostages? Where are the protests rallying against the depravity and sexual violence committed by Palestinian terrorists on Oct.7?
I support political protest and I support free speech, but it’s very apparent that some of the pro-Palestinian protests frequently have morphed into anti-Jewish hate speech, as well as acts of violence and intimidation directed at Jewish students.
Stef Mendell, Raleigh
School vouchers
Regarding “NC Senate backs private school vouchers for all. Democrats call it ‘welfare’ for wealthy,” (May 2):
The writer is communications director at Public Schools First NC.
It was extremely disheartening to hear state Sen. Ralph Hise, who co-chairs the Senate Appropriations Committee, misrepresent the legislature’s responsibility for education Wednesday as the committee voted to increase private school voucher funding.
Hise said: “The right of providing the education for a child is the state’s responsibility, and we are using private centers to do that.”
In fact, according to the N.C. Constitution, it is the state’s responsibility to provide a free, public education. There is no state responsibility to provide for private education.
If our legislative leaders have such a poor grasp of the state constitution that they don’t comprehend one of the most important responsibilities of their job, then they have no business being in state government.
Heather Koons, Raleigh
Special ed dollars
The writer is a retired NC child advocate.
Paige Masten’s April 30 Opinion column did a good job of describing how the “Opportunity Scholarship” vouchers do not provide school choice for many, many families. However, she omitted one group: the roughly 10% of students who need and benefit from special education. Private schools are not required to provide special education, and very few do. This means that families with such children do not have the option of using vouchers.
Moreover, the money the voucher system drains from the public schools makes it harder for them to provide the enriched services that special education students need. So, using our taxes to support a voucher system makes it harder for the most vulnerable children to get the education they deserve. There’s something very wrong with this picture.
Tom Vitaglione, Cary
Voucher whining
Instead of whining and complaining that the school voucher system doesn’t help 100% of N.C. students, why not celebrate the fact that so many students now have a choice when they and their parents didn’t before? If a plan has to be perfect or not at all, it will never be done. Listen to some of the students and parents who have benefited from the voucher program and you will hear how much it helped the students achieve a higher level of success.
Bill Mannheim, Cary
