Republicans aiming to eliminate voters

Editor:

CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- Today, as I watch the news, I am afraid. I am not afraid of gun control, as so many around me, but of the steadfast move by many state governments to disenfranchise the majority of voters.

Virginia is in the lead with Wisconsin, Florida, Ohio and Pennsylvania standing in line to use or redefine Congressional districts to nullify the majority of voters.

By moving the majority of voters into one or two districts and spreading the rest of the voters in districts throughout the state, control of state government is in the hands of just a few residents. The states listed above have begun to look at ways to carry this disproportionate representation into national elections.

These steps to disenfranchise voters are NOT being done by the president or even by the liberal Democrats, but by Republican state governments.

We take for granted that our representatives will work for us. They are working for something, but not necessarily for the people.

As governments go, ours is young. When we allow elected officials to undermine the very fiber of democracy, equal representation, we are not being stewards of our precious country. Pay attention. Our apathy can destroy our future. 

Martha Starkey

Valley Grove

Godless Democrats have their own church

Editor:

Commenting on the editorial "Social change" from Saturday's Gazette-Mail, dated Feb. 2, I was a bit surprised but certainly not shocked with the editor's pleasure in the substantial growth of the non-believing "religiously unaffiliated" in the Democratic Party. Proudly claiming that six in 10 are educated, progressive Democrats. Hopeful that this demographic would become more decisive in the future elections, while claiming more and more Americans drift away from conservative religion.

Ann Coulter made what I first thought to be excessive, but now a more convincing point in her book Godless, about the liberal progressives in the Democratic Party. She said "they generally reject the idea of God," which your editorial statistically verifies, "and revile people of faith. While establishing their own Church of Liberalism, complete with sacraments (abortion), its holy rite (Roe v. Wade), its clergy (unionized public school teachers), and its churches (government schools where prayer is prohibited and mass murders are escalating). One would think that a progressive, well-educated person might recognize that correlation in our public schools. These are the proud pillars of the godless Democratic Party.

The editor continues by asserting that these progressive liberals are solid majorities in support of legal abortions. Is anybody surprised by that statement?

Two thousand years ago, Roman law allowed unwanted children to be left to die on a trash dump. It was a practice called "exposure." In the fourth century a Roman Christian emperor outlawed this practice. Over time, people began to leave unwanted babies outside of monasteries or churches. This was the beginning of what we know as orphanages. What a beautiful reflection of God's love, rising from a desperate situation. Today we sanitize "exposure" behind the walls of abortion clinics. While liberals celebrate this as progress, it seems just the opposite; we have regressed two thousand years.

Secular (godless) grounds for moral positions are no less controversial than religious grounds, and a strong case can be made that most moral positions originated from religion. Faith is an innate part of the human condition because true faith is based in God's love. That is not something an editor could ever vanquish, nor should he try.

Clairmont L. Smith

Charleston