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Reading Wednesday's front-page story about Clarks Bridge Road, we also need to look at the bigger picture in Georgia and probably in our country.
Our respect of law has dwindled significantly. Traffic laws, noise laws, littering laws — these and others are regularly discarded by a large portion of our population.
One can see it every day in our community: trash along the roads, people speeding, especially in construction and school zones (yep, I'm one of the few doing 50 mph on I-985 where required), drivers thinking turn indicators are optional equipment, cars and homes assaulting our ears and overall health with noise, violations of no wake zones, etc.
To help curb all the Earnhardt wannabes, we need to look at what is in use in parts of Europe: traffic boxes. These cameras will automatically take your vehicles photo if you are speeding. Your ticket comes in the mail.
We need these at all school and construction zones, at a minimum, and perhaps along stretches of roads such as Clarks Bridge.
And why stop at the road? These wonderful devices to protect our safety can be used in no wake zones such as the heavily violated one at Clarks Bridge.
The high-speed lenses and shutter speeds should be able to capture the numbers of those who ignore this and other laws.
Without law there is anarchy. Without speed and safety laws designed to keep us and others safer from harm, the consequences go beyond someone getting hurt (and that is tragic enough). How about our insurance rates increasing across the board because we have to pay for someone's inconsiderate actions?
I am amused when people fly by me in the marked 35 mph school zone in front of South Hall Middle School as I travel at 35, only to catch up with them at the next stoplight. Even better, when we arrive at the same destination within a minute of each other, I think of all the fuel they wasted gunning it off the line.
Speed limits and no wake zones, to name a couple, are there for our protection, and the protection of others. Law enforcement has my sincere gratitude for upholding these and other laws of the land, as they protect and serve us.
Hopefully budgets will increase and we can get some cutting-edge technology to reign in those who choose to ignore laws. That would help keep our insurance rates down.
Jim O'Dell
Flowery Branch
Founding fathers intended faith to be our guiding light
Many people have abused the American system. Not all of them have been what we call Americans. But people of all races, nationalities and creeds from around the world who have settled here to find a better life for themselves and their families can share some of the blame.
In as much as one wants to have a better life or receive the good part of something, they ought to share in what it takes to keep it as good or better. It takes blood, sweat and tears and some prayers to accomplish a dream. It just doesn't fall out of the sky.
America was founded by people from other countries and nations who wanted to be free to serve their creator. They believed that there was a greater power than man. They wanted the right to worship and serve Him and their fellow man in the way that they believed that God intended it from the beginning.
Our founding fathers, no doubt, believed that what had happened in the past to others who didn't believe would happen to them if they didn't heed the voice of the Lord.
I feel that the founding fathers realized that this day also could come to us if we had sat idly by and done nothing, even when the enemy is making headway, as he is today. I believe they hoped that enough people of faith would stand up for what is right and fight the enemy with the word of God.
We must realize that freedom is not to be abused to cause the decay of society. That was not the intent of our creator.
Whether we believe it or not, these perilous times we are experiencing are not by accident. Our creator would like to get our attention. It is left up to us. He knows how to separate the good from the bad and evil.
Jesse Jenkins
Gainesville
Lakeview baseball team, fans proved to be a class act
I was there this week for the state baseball playoff battle between Lakeview Academy and Bremen High School. And what a battle it was!
Even more important than the games is how impressed many of us were with the courtesy and hospitality shown us by the Lakeview Academy baseball players, coaches and fans while we were there. You all are a class act.
Marian Chriswell
Bremen