Features Rick Coates Sherman Poppen leaned back in his chair and a big smile came to his face as the Gold Medal was placed around the neck of Shaun White during the 2010 Winter Olympics. While the redheaded White is the international face of snowboarding today, Poppen is the grandfather of the snowboard.

Letters

Hold all acccountable

Benjamin Franklin was quoted as saying something like “Those who sacrifice liberty for security deserve neither.”

In 2001 after 9/11, Bush said more than once, paraphrased here because his actual statements are now obscured, “We will not change anything due to these attacks – doing so would be giving in to terrorists.”

Yet the so-called ‘Patriot’ Act and related laws say and do otherwise – see aclu.org/reform-patriot-act for details.

I recall a work manager saying who cares about electronic privacy – if you have nothing to hide then why worry about it!

Imagine the Nazis being able to use the snooping that we allow today – and remember our Declaration of Independence...

Letters

No politics needed

President Obama took a huge political risk when he authorized the successful removal of Osama bin Laden from this earth. Most Republicans have been strangely quiet about this until recently, when they now complain that the administration is attempting to politicize the killing of bin Laden.

Journey with me now to a fantasy land where Republicans would successfully resist the temptation to fully politicize the bin Laden mission had it failed.

Bob Ross • Pellston

Festivals tread lightly

I have read the news concerning the cancellation of two festivals that occur in late summer, the Schooner Festival and I believe the Epicurian classic....

Features Patrick Sullivan This is the first of two stories about an Elk Rapids couple who encountered a mortgage modification scam artist and wound up on the brink of losing their home. This week, the Express looks at how becoming victims of fraud caused Pablo and Guadalupe Bocardo to have their home foreclosed. Next week, we will look at the efforts of their attorney, Jason Jenkinson, to fight Fannie Mae to get their house back.

Features Erin Crowell From the time the leaves started to turn and drop to the rise in spring temperatures, Alan Newton sat down and spoke with 24 homeless people living in Traverse City. A few are on the street by choice; but all are there by circumstance. Some are drug addicts, others are alcoholics.

Letters

No hysteria in NRA

Trust a liberal to label his opposition as “hysterical” (re: “NRA hysteria unfounded,” Letters 8/27). All that libs can do is name-call.

Anyhow, the NRA was and is anything but hysterical in its warning about Obama and the Left being bitterly opposed to an armed citizenry. The fact that they spent their first-term political capital almost exclusively on getting Obamacare through does not mean that they have given up on the basic leftist goal of suppressing the people’s right (guns don’t have rights) to be armed. Also, Wayne LaPierre’s salary is closer to $600,000, after 35 years with the NRA.

Lastly, if you are going to call the NRA a branch of the Republican Party, which it most decidedly is not, why not point out, far more truthfully, that the Trial Lawyers Association, now laughably renamed the American Justice Association, is one of the biggest direct financial supporters of the Democratic Party...

Features Patrick Sullivan How many groups of friends get together, tell jokes, laugh really hard, and think, “Our lives should be a sitcom?” One bunch of friends who met years ago at Northwestern Michigan College decided to do something about it.

They’ve formed a sketch comedy troupe called Falling Down Stairs Productions and they produce short, funny videos that can be found on YouTube and Funny Or Die.

Dining Rick Coates are a lot of schools of thought when it comes to preparing the Thanksgiving turkey. Many food experts suggest preparing two medium size birds (10 to 12 lbs) versus one large 20-plus pound turkey. Then there is the great stuffing in the bird versus not stuffing the bird debate.