Editor:

Our state will continue running out of money unless more sales taxes are implemented. The food tax needs to be brought back to the table. Internet and catalog sales need to be taxed. Some people have to pay it all and others very little. Sales taxes are fair taxes because they make everyone pay their fair share. It is not fair for small businesses and landowners to pick up the tab for everyone else. As severance taxes continue to decline due to more EPA regulations, our state will continue going millions in the red. The House of Delegates needs to step up to the plate for once and work with the Senate to get real change for West Virginia. Otherwise, the state will continue being 49th and 50th in every category.

Wilmoth Cooper

Harman

Be mad at criminals, not law abiders

Editor:

Anti-gun rhetoric is certainly filled with Christian love, joy, and understanding. It amazes me that Eva Knapp has such pure hatred for law-abiding Americans who need to own guns for protection. The elites of the political class are all heavily protected by professional protectors. The average American has a much smaller margin of error before they can be the victims of evil and crime. The real struggle here is whether Eva Knapp believes in individual freedom and the right to lawfully protect yourself against anyone who wishes to do harm to your person. The wrath of anti-freedom people should be against the savage criminals, not the peaceful law abiders.

All brutal dictators disarm their people. Hitler, Stalin, name your favorite gun confiscation control advocate.

Richard Hughes

Defiance, Ohio

Property taxes not good for fixed income

Editor:

I along with many others have received my letter letting me know about the increase in my real estate taxes. This is crazy. I have to agree with my son. In this state/county, you never own anything. You lease it from the county/state. My husband is retired and I hope to retire in the next several years. I was born in this state and it has been my home for over 59 years. I am not sure if I can afford to stay here once I retire. People on fixed incomes get no breaks. Taxes, utilities, groceries are rising, but our income remains the same. You should not have to pay any personal property taxes once you turn 65. Maybe our senators and legislators need to not get a raise for a while. Maybe then something might get done. But I seriously doubt it.

Kathy Sullivan

Marmet

U.S. Supreme Court interprets Constitution

Editor:

Several West Virginia county sheriffs have said that they would not enforce any federal ban on assault weapons in the hands of private individuals. Apparently such declination stems from their personal views of the meaning of the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

In our country of more than 300 million men and women, allowing each of us to interpret the Constitution, even with the utmost of good faith, and decide on the validity of laws created by people chosen by a majority of the voting electorate, could only result in the utmost chaos and the end of the accepted order that is the basis of civilization.

Fortunately, our Constitution has functioned for over two centuries by assigning to the U.S. Supreme Court the right to interpret its meaning. Over seven decades ago the Court considered the Second Amendment and ruled that it preserved the right of the separate states to maintain a militia (a role today taken by the National Guard) with which to preserve order, quell rebellions, repel foreign invaders, and the like. The Second Amendment confers no right on you or me to own machine guns, mortars, or anti-aircraft cannons. See United States v. Miller, 307 U.S. 174 (1939), available both in law libraries and through online research.

Thomas C. Damewood

Charleston