Posted: Wednesday, July 29, 2009 8:01 pm

Moral direction in US disturbing
To The Editor:
As a Christian, are you as worried about our country and its morals? I cannot just sit and not say a word about the news media and the attention they have given a certain person who is not an example for young men to follow.
I cannot believe the attention given an immoral young man recently in the paper and on TV.
He was not a person for young people to use as an example to aim for in a good life. He certainly did not have a happy life.
What has America come to?
Is satan using the news media to influence what a young person should aim for in life?
It’s time for Christians to pray for America and voice our opinions on such evil things.
God bless America.
Satan has plans to ruin our country and some of our Washington leaders are helping.
Our country was founded on God blessing us and we need to ask God for help in doing something about the morals of some of the celebrities being displayed.
Carolyn Clark
South Fulton

Humane Society
treated poorly

To The Editor:
I am embarrassed for our city because the Ken-Tenn Humane Society has been treated so badly. Rather than thanking them for coming to Union City to house and care for our animals, sometimes at their own expense, they have been badgered and harassed. I don’t understand it.
Did you know?
The Ken-Tenn Humane Society chose to come to Union City and to give Union City an animal shelter.
The Ken-Tenn Humane Society is paid exactly the same amount of money each month as the dog pound owner was and they began caring for the animals while he was still being paid to do so.
The Ken-Tenn Humane Society has saved the city a great deal of money in euthanasia fees; adoptable animals are held for an indeterminate amount of time until a home can be found for them. The cost of keeping the animals is paid by the KTHS.
The Ken-Tenn Humane Society has saved the lives of hundreds of lost, abused, etc., animals by providing food, housing and medical care until they are, hopefully, adopted.
The Ken-Tenn Humane Society has spent thousands of dollars on temporary facilities before beginning to construct a permanent building.
The Ken-Tenn Humane Society has been investigated by ASPCA, PETA and Don Thornton and was found to be giving excellent care to the animals. On July 21st, the city council basically told a detractor that they were tired of hearing about imagined problems at the shelter, “and that she should take her complaints elsewhere.” A number of council members have visited the shelter and found it not deficient. Did the newspaper reporter miss that part of the meeting?
So — why are we not loudly defending KTHS? We need our local paper to support those of us who want Ann’s Place in Union City and appreciate the work of the Ken-Tenn Humane Society. Let us try and help Lois Birk, KTHS president, to make continued progress and build a shelter we can all be proud of. Our alternatives are dismal.
Do we want to go back to the days of the Union City dog pound, where the dogs and cats are kept in a cold, wet, concrete building, only to be killed on Thursdays?
Mary Lynn Reithel
Union City
Animal shelter
a gift to our city

To The Editor:
Maya Angelou said, “One must know not just how to accept a gift, but with what grace to share it.” The Ken-Tenn Humane Society has been given a gift, and they have the grace to share it with our city.
Ann’s Place, the animal shelter located at 311 North Fifth Street in Union City, is a gift from Ann Covington and the Ken-Tenn Humane Society to the City of Union City. When completed, the shelter will cost well over $100,000. While the Humane Society will hold fund-raising activities to enable the completion of the shelter, the gift to the city is far from insignificant.
Ann Covington was a lifelong resident of South Fulton. She loved animals and spent most of her adult life caring for them. She worked closely with the Ken-Tenn Humane Society and its president, Lois Birk. She felt that one of the great needs of our area was an animal shelter, and she began talking to Lois about leaving her estate to the humane society to help build one. Ann wanted her estate to be used as a gift to northwest Tennessee. She had Lois promise to stay involved with the Humane Society until the shelter was a reality.
After Ann’s death, the humane society began looking for a place to put the shelter. Following considerable discussion and investigation, it was decided that Union City had the need and the population to support an animal shelter. The Humane Society began talking to officials long before the incident that closed the Union City pound. However, when it became apparent that the city needed a humane place to house its homeless animals, the board of directors met with the mayor and city manager and made arrangements for the current set-up. The Humane Society decided to name the shelter “Ann’s Place” as a memorial to her.
Ann’s estate consists of three homes, jewelry and furniture. She also left money to the Humane Society that was not part of her estate. The money, roughly $45,000, has been used to purchase the equipment now in Union City and to help care for the animals. The Humane Society is readying the homes for sale. One should be placed on the market this month. The money from the sale of that home will go directly to the proposed shelter building. It is hoped that construction on the permanent building can begin soon.
Do we want to go back to the days when Union City’s homeless animals were summarily euthanized every Thursday? Or, do we want to move forward and support a group of people who have come to our town with a gift for us and our animals? Do we want to support a group who chose our town when they could take their gift elsewhere? Do we have the grace to accept a gift so generously offered? I certainly hope so.
Sue Jackson
Union City
Council’s gun
vote off target

To The Editor:
The Tennessee constitution plainly says, “the legislature has the power to regulate the wearing of arms with a view toward preventing crime.” Last week I witnessed (thanks to WOBT-TV) a city council regulating the wearing of arms. There is no question that is contrary to the constitution. I believe the courts will settle this rather quickly.
What I found most intriguing is that there are at least two councilmen, based on their arguments in favor of banning legally carried handguns in city parks, who are members of the “cultural elite.” Those well meaning, “enlightened,” if somewhat arrogant, individuals whom, because of divine providence or their superior intellect etc., have attained a station of power, regardless how miniscule that station. Their life’s mission is to protect you and me, the ignorant masses, from ourselves. Our nation’s capitol is full of their kind. They honestly believe that we are incapable of knowing what is best for us. I teach that if you are too ignorant to be trusted with your own defense, how can you be trusted to govern yourself? Their answer is simple. You can’t. Those in the “cultural elite” forget that we are the boss. We loan power to the government to do its job. If it ceases to do its job, we have the right and the obligation to take that power back.
Fifteen years ago the people of Tennessee, like others across the country, reclaimed the right to go armed for our defense because the government was failing miserably in this regard. Studies showed that in counties where the law abiding could go armed, violent crime was significantly lower than in counties that severely restricted the rights of armed citizens. Justice Deparatment studies showed that armed citizens kill three times as many criminals per year as the police do. This study also showed that, in shooting incidents involving armed citizens, innocent parties were harmed 2 percent of the time. “Not good” you say? The same study showed that, in shooting incidents involving police, innocent parties were harmed 11 percent of the time. Ask any cop and he’ll tell you it’s true. If I am being beaten, robbed, stabbed or shot at, there is no question in my mind who is the perpetrator. The police don’t have that luxury. Unless they, too, are the victim. No one can protect you or your family better than you. It’s that simple. Over two and a half million times a year, a private citizen uses a gun to stop a crime. That’s once every 13 seconds.
Lastly, Mr. Cranford and Mr. Harrison, I don’t carry a handgun because I expect trouble. I carry a handgun because I realize trouble can come when I least expect it. If I thought I needed a gun to go to your park, I wouldn’t go. Can you both promise me I won’t need it? I sincerely hope so, because that’s exactly what you are doing. Patrick Henry asked, “Are we at last brought to such a humiliating and debasing degradation that we cannot be trusted with arms for our defense? If our defense be the real object of having those arms, in whose hands can they be trusted with more propriety and equal justice to us, than in our own hands?...” Thomas Jefferson said, “...let your firearm be the constant companion of your walks...” Sorry, Mr. Jefferson, not in Union City.
I invite the Union City city council to take one of my classes. You may find, as I have, that the people who obtain carry permits are the best informed and the most responsible of all our citizens. They are the greatest resource this country has. All the ingenuity, wealth, charity and goodness of which our country can boast is because of these uncommonly, common folk. They are the true sons and daughters of liberty. They continue to confound the “cultural elite.”
Jamie Spaulding
Armed Response Training Academy
Troy
Published in The Messenger 7.29.09