Viewpoints

To the Editor:

Addiction is a complicated brain disease. As it progresses, it can change the way an affected person thinks and makes decisions. A person in the throes of a full-blown addiction can’t choose whether they are going to use their drug of choice. No matter what else happens, the addiction always comes first.

Emotional barriers to addiction recovery occur because addiction is a chronic disease. When someone goes to treatment, they don’t emerge from the process magically cured. Instead, the goal of drug and alcohol treatment is to give people the tools they need to learn how to live in recovery one day at a time.

Here are several emotional barriers that get in the way of addiction treatment and/or recovery:

To the Editor:

This has been a very difficult and unusual year. Have you, or do you know of someone who has, become food insecure because of the pandemic? We at the food shelf can help.

All that is required is a photo ID. If you don’t have one, a bill with your name and address will do. This is to verify you are who you say you are.

If you are afraid of the COVID-19 virus, we follow all procedures. You stay in your vehicle and we bring out the food. You have some decisions on what you want, but a volunteer comes out to ask you for those choices. All volunteers wear a mask.

We are open every Thursday from 9 a.m. to 12:45 p.m. If you have more questions, come and ask them.

We are closed on holidays that fall on Thursday and when school is closed in the winter time because of weather. Our volunteers are retirees and we don’t feel they should be on the roads at that time, either. If school is delayed, we are there.

To the Editor:

The Iowa Senate recently passed SF 159, which some are referring to as the school voucher bill. This bill affects education in Iowa in a variety of ways. The main provisions are to expand charter schools, expand open enrollment, and create scholarships for students who wish to attend private schools rather than public schools (also known as vouchers).

This bill may seem like it would not have much effect on school districts in the area, especially because there are no private schools in the Eastern Allamakee Community School District. That assumption is incorrect, as it is anticipated that it will have a huge effect on the budget of all public schools in the state. The Legislative Services Agency, which is a nonpartisan agency that provides budget analysis for the Iowa legislature, shows increasing negative impacts to all public school district budgets in Iowa over the next four years. There are no budget projections beyond that point.

To the Editor:

You’ve heard that saying, “Silence is golden.” This may hold true in some cases, but today, more than ever, citizens need to stand up, speak up and tell the truth!

After reading the article in The Standard by Jodi Peake about her presence at the January 6 rally in Washington. D.C., we cannot, in good conscience, remain silent. Peake described her experience as “joyful and peaceful,” and also stated “the energy was filled with light and love.” That may describe her own experience, but we would be willing to bet that our elected leaders and their staff would disagree when they were forced to flee for their lives as insurrectionists stormed the Capitol.

To the Editor:

The new year is a great time to make positive changes in your life, as one of life’s chapters close, another begins. Lasting positive change doesn’t typically happen overnight. In fact, the most impactful resolutions often are a journey.

Quitting tobacco is undoubtedly a very rewarding resolution but can also be very challenging. One way to initiate this change and increase your chances of success is by creating a “quit plan”. Quit plans help assist you on your journey to becoming tobacco free by establishing your underlying motivation for change, identifying your support options, understanding factors that can lead to a relapse, and learning how to address them.

To the Editor:

Donald Trump was the most untruthful president in American history. Fact checkers have documented 30,573 false or misleading statements made by him during his term in office.

The lies ranged from unimportant ones - like the size of his inauguration crowd, to serious ones - like the COVID virus would simply disappear on its own and we need not worry about it. His pandemic lies and mismanagement contributed substantially to the more than 400,000 COVID deaths.

His most dangerous falsehood, however, was the Big Lie:  that our national election was not fairly conducted and that he, not Joe Biden, had won the election. This lie was the worst, because, if true, it would destroy our democratic system. Democracy only works if the voters decide who will lead us.

To the Editor:

Slime molds are fascinating creatures. They have no hands, no feet, no eyes, no ears, no voice. And no brain. And yet they move through nature with purpose. They make decisions, solve problems, move toward preferred foods and away from danger. Slime molds learn.

Human mobs are kind of like slime molds. Oh, they keep their hands, feet, eyes, ears and voices. What they surrender to the mob are their intellect, education, reason and conscience.

Mobs move forward as one being and on January 6, 2021 that mob moved, flowing into sacred ground, our Capitol building. But here’s where the mob differs from the slime mold, they were controlled by insurrectionists. Violent, mostly white men (and a few white women) who stormed our Capitol building, battering down doors, smashing windows, attacking the overwhelmed Capitol police.

A choice of direction

In Jeremiah 18, the prophet recorded how God sent him to watch a potter at work. As the potter worked, the first vessel was “marred in the hand of the potter.” So he crushed it down and shaped a new form to his pleasure.

Then God said to Jeremiah, “O house of Israel, cannot I do with you as this potter? saith the LORD. Behold, as the clay is in the potter’s hand, so are ye in mine hand, O house of Israel.

At what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to pluck up, and to pull down, and to destroy it; If that nation, against whom I have pronounced, turn from their evil, I will repent of the evil that I thought to do unto them. And at what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to build and to plant it; If it do evil in my sight, that it obey not my voice, then I will repent of the good, wherewith I said I would benefit them.” (Jeremiah 18:6-10)

To the Editor:

Dear Senators Grassley and Ernst,

Again, I urge you to consider the evidence against former President Trump and, based upon the legal precedents from President Grant’s administration (impeachment trial of Secretary of War William W. Belknap held after his tearful resignation), take the opportunity to convict Trump, strip him and his family of expensive Secret Service protection and a pension, and effectively purge him from the Republican party so it can return from sedition to the stance of a loyal opposition.

Sincerely,
Mary Jane White
Waukon
 

To the Editor:

The data is going in the wrong direction. While life expectancy has been on the rise since the 1960s, its sharp decline over the last several years is a sign that something is fundamentally broken in the United States.

It’s 2021, and we are losing more lives to preventable causes than ever before. Death due to drugs, alcohol and suicide are at an all-time high, and our country is hurting in ways that are multifaceted - attributable to overlapping issues and circumstances.

For some, it may be access to affordable health care. For others, it may have more to due to with social and economic factors. Loneliness, worry, isolation and issues of belonging are key drivers of despair, and we must be bold in our vision and courageous in our decision making if we are serious about making a difference in our country’s health.