Letters to the Editor

Use surplus well

There is a lot of controversy about what the state of Montana should do with the surplus in the budget at this time. Let's hope we don't give another tax break to the wealthy just to eliminate the surplus. President Bush's tenure in Washington has proved that policy only helps the wealthy and has left his budget drowning in red ink. Montana is getting to a position where having excess money in the budget allows us to possibly move toward more wind power and further explore other renewable energy, etc. Underfunded projects also can be re-energized. I would think that most other states must be envious of our fiscal responsibility. Let's all be proud of that responsibility.

Bob Holle

2614 Clark Avenue

Billings

Hypocrisy

We now learn that 95 percent of us have had premarital sex (IR, Dec. 20). Compare that with the roughly 27 percent of us that self-identify as evangelical Christians and one detects an obvious overlap.

Not long ago I read that Oklahoma -- a prominent "Bible Belt" state -- has the highest divorce rate in America.

In just the past year, two conservative culture warriors were "outed" by their own behavior -- one a publicly anti-gay "Family Values" Republican congressman caught soliciting underage boys; the other the president of the National Association of Evangelicals, the epitome of institutional homophobia in America, now undergoing spirituality-based homosexual "deprogramming."

It all makes you wonder how many "pro-life" women have surreptitiously had abortions.

So then, why do conservative evangelicals still feel entitled to legislate morality for the rest of us vis-Ã -vis South Dakota's recently defeated abortion criminalization statute, Kansas' and Pennsylvania's attempts to outlaw science in science classrooms, proposed "defense of marriage" (whose marriage was under attack?) constitutional amendments, and provably inadequate "abstinence-only" federal educational edicts.

I, for one, think it's about time these folks get their own house in order before trying to legislate their morality on the rest of us.

W. Craig Heymann

1618 Lyndale

A helping shovel

I got stuck in a snowbank at the top of Macdonald Pass!

It was Dec. 29 at 8:30 a.m. Some kind woman and what appeared to be her teenage daughter stopped to lend a necessary helping hand and badly needed shovel.

In no time I was rescued. I was so happy I thanked them profusely but failed to get their names.

I hope they read this and know how deeply their act of kindness was appreciated.

Paul W. Turley

6558 Big Rock Road