ustxtxb_obs_2010_06_11_50_00001-00000_000.pdf

A JOURNAL OF FREE VOICES SINCE 1954 Falk * fp 1-7.10 I-7111 AP OBSERVER IALOGUE THE WAR OF NORTHERN AGGRESSION IS PURELY A PRO-paganda label. The reason the Civil Rights Act was necessary is that Southerners and some Northern cohorts managed to sabotage the post-Civil War civilrights movement in Congress. Michael Cosper AUSTIN YOU ARE TOO YOUNG TO REMEMBER THAT THE LONG-term economic conflict among industrialists in the Northeast, farmers in the Midwest and planters in the South was taught as the cause of the Civil War before political correctness within the academic community discredited it in favor of a more simplistic sound bite. People votedand foughtfor their economic selfinterest, even back then. Ed Palmer DALLAS THE TEXANS’ LETTER OF SECESSION EXPLAINS IN THEIR own words why they seceded without any Northern spin. Slavery is mentioned several times as well as “the debasing doctrine of equality” Rich Vazquez ROUND ROCK THE DECLARATION OF SECESSION IS ONE OF THOSE THINGS we don’t talk about much in middle-school Texas history classes. Don Richardson LUFKIN IF THE MUSLIM ON THE BOARD CANNOT HANDLE THE historical truth that the United States is a Christian nation, then his ass needs to get off the board! Marie Day HOUSTON THIS NATION IS A DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC, NOT A theocracy. School boards need to be comprised of educators, not religious fanatics. Quentin Atkinson ODESSA WE ARE NOT A CHRISTIAN NATION \(OR A CHRISTIAN STATE, of the Christian tradition, they are also part of the Jewish, Muslim and other non-Christian traditions. They are universal values for a civil society and need not be tied to religious fundamentalism. Shedrick Pittman-Hassett DENTON PERHAPS EVERYONE SHOULD AGREE THIS IS A CHRISTIAN nation in order to bolster the argument that universal health care is a moral imperative. Hey, Christian nation, to whom would Jesus deny health care? David Hawkins NEWARK, NEW JERSEY Troubles at TCEQ I WANT TO EXPRESS MY APPRECIATION FOR THE “AGENCY fies many issues that were consistent with the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality’s support of a paper mill waste-water permit that is detrimental to the recreational and economic value of the Sam Rayburn Reservoir. Even though the paper mill ceased operations for economic reasons in 2003, the waste-water permitting process was a travesty. In addition to waste-water issues, multiple mill owners deposited toxic materials for approximately 60 years in an on-site landfill that is directly over the Carizzo-Wilcox aquifer. However, monitoring has never been implemented. Wafter West ZAVAL LA A Sound Off editors@texasobserver. org VOLUME 102, NO. 11 FOUNDING EDITOR Ronnie Dugger EDITOR Bob Moser MANAGING EDITOR Chris Tomlinson ASSOCIATE EDITOR Dave Mann CULTURE EDITOR Michael May MULTIMEDIA EDITOR Jen Reel INVESTIGATIVE REPORTER Melissa del Bosque STAFF WRITERS Abby Rapoport, Forrest Wilder ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER Julia Austin CIRCULATION/OFFICE MANAGER Candace Carpenter ART DIRECTION EmDash LLC WEBMASTER Shane Pearson COPY EDITOR Rusty Todd POETRY EDITOR Naomi Shihab Nye INTERNS Laura Burke, Robert Green, Ana McKenzie CONTRIBUTING WRITERS Emily DePrang, Lou Dubose, James K. Galbraith, Steven G. Kellman, Joe R. Lansdale, Robert Leleux, James E. McWilliams, Char Miller, Bill Minutaglio, Ruth Pennebaker, Josh Rosenblatt, Kevin Sieff, Brad Tyer, Andrew Wheat CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS Jana Birchum, Alan Pogue, Steve Satterwhite CONTRIBUTING ARTISTS Michael Krone, Alex Eben Meyer, Ben Sargent TEXAS DEMOCRACY FOUNDATION BOARD Lisa Blue Baron, Carlton Carl, Melissa Jones, Susan Longley, Jim Marston, Mary Nell Mathis, Gilberto Ocarias, Jesse Oliver, Bernard Rapoport, Geoffrey Rips, Geronimo Rodriguez, Sharron Rush, Kelly White, Ronnie OUR MISSION We will serve no group or party but will hew hard to the truth as we find it and the right as we see it. We are dedicated to the whole truth, to human values above all interests, to the rights of humankind as the foundation of democracy. We will take orders from none but our own conscience, and never will we overlook or misrepresent the truth to serve the interests of the powerful or cater to the ignoble in the human spirit. Slaves and Christians Slavery was the excuse the federal government used to escalate the fundamental conflict over states rights into the War of Northern Aggressionkind of like the WMDs in Iraq, except that slavery actually existed \(State Board of Education coverage online, have been unnecessary. But the fact is that people in the Northern states treated the blacks as badly as, or even worse than, those in the Southern states \(not to mention Charles Wright AUSTIN JUNE 11, 2010 THE TEXAS OBSERVER 11