Moving forward

I would like to thank everyone who came out to vote on Nov. 3. I would also like to thank my supporters, who generously donated their time and financial support in our attempt to unseat a popular incumbent. While we may not have prevailed in the vote count, my campaign stood up for our common commitment to making this city the kind of place where our kids and grandkids can grow and prosper. My hope is that the campaign's themes of conservative financial management and regulatory reform are not lost on the Winston-Salem City Council. These principles are extremely important in these tough economic times and I know that our message resonated with a number of voters.

While we have our political differences, I believe that Councilman Dan Besse is going to continue to work hard for the citizens of the Southwest Ward and I wish him the best as our representative. He was a formidable opponent, due in part to his ability to connect with and respond to the needs of individual constituents.

Let's move forward as a community and support our elected representatives' efforts to promote job growth. This is a city with a rich history of entrepreneurial successes and I believe that our brightest economic times are yet to come.

TED SHIPLEY

Winston-Salem

Checking the records

If President Obama's hand-picked attorney general Eric Holder had been doing as much checking on the records of the possible terrorists in our military as he has been trying to bring charges and punishment to those brave individuals in the CIA who were just carrying out their assignments in trying to find out more about the future plans of America's enemies, then this terrible tragedy at Fort Hood, Texas, may have been prevented.

MAC GRAHAM

Kernersville

Heads out of the sand

It appears that Congress (both Democrats and Republicans) is not going to be satisfied until we have a totalitarian society in America. We as the American public had better get our heads out of the sand and vote the entire group out of office in 2010. It is time for us to take this country back and restore the constitutional principles that made this country great.

DONALD R. CREWS

Winston-Salem

Denied care

When I worked as a health-insurance agent, I met literally hundreds of people in North Carolina who could not qualify for health insurance and who did not qualify for disability or Medicare or Medicaid. I had the extreme misfortune of writing health applications for countless people who appeared healthy and denied pre-existing exclusions to being qualified, but the underwriters for the insurance turned them down for coverage or gave them such extremely expensive health insurance that they could not afford it at all.

I also spent many hours each week talking to people who could not afford any insurance with any of the companies I represented, even though they worked full time. Needless to say, the insurance industry is a multi-trillion dollar for-profit industry that does not want a public option.

We must join the rest of the modern world in providing all of our taxpaying citizens with health care. Contrary to the propaganda intended to block the public option, the public option will stop people from dying unnecessarily because they could not afford preventative health care or because they waited until there was no medical intervention to save their lives.

BONNIE D. CLARK

Winston-Salem

Promoting religious views

Since Article VI of the Constitution of the United States says, " … no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States," it is not necessary for our elected or appointed government officials to make a public display of their piety. And since our courts at all levels have time and time again ruled that the First Amendment to that same Constitution means that no government can show or permit a bias for any religion, it seems to me that the people who want a government meeting to promote their religious views would mount a campaign for a constitutional amendment (as set forth in Article V) allowing for a government-sponsored religion.

I would support such a campaign … as long as I was assured that I would be the person who decides which religious views would be sponsored.

PAUL D. WHITSON

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