Letters

Vet Parade – Hell No

As a nation we have been “smitten with the madness – blindness – and astonishment of heart” – passionately in love with war.

Rather than hold a ticker tape parade, let’s have President Bush apologize to Americans for starting a war based on lies – apologize to Iraqis for the death of 117,000 innocent civilians killed, for the destruction of its infrastructure, and for leaving a nation at civil war – apologize to veterans and families – apologize to America for squandering its resources.

Let’s have President Obama apologize for the needless escalation of the war in Afghanistan – apologize to Afghan citizens for the reckless death of 66,000 innocent civilians – for fueling corruption – return his Nobel Peace Prize as unearned – and end the war today...

Features Patrick Sullivan

He left to go to college and law school and begin a career and when he decided to move back to his hometown in the mid- 1990s, he was worried about what he was getting himself into. Would this be the same backward place he remembered from his youth? Or was Northern Michigan somehow getting more progressive?

Soon after he moved back there was a news story about a cross burning in Grawn and Ringsmuth thought his worst fears about coming home were coming true...

Features Patrick Sullivan

The last time Ernest Hemingway came to Northern Michigan, as far as anyone knows, was in 1947, when he visited a friend in Petoskey and checked on his cottage on Walloon Lake, on his way from Florida to Idaho.

That visit was commemorated in a small news item in the Sept. 27 edition of the Petoskey Evening News, which was reprinted in Michael Federspiel’s book, Picturing Hemingway’s Michigan.

Features Patrick Sullivan Environmentalist alleges Antrim County official looked the other way as wetlands were destroyed

Features Mike Terrell Wildwood Rush lives up to its name

Perched on the edge of a platform 40-some feet in the air wrapped around a sturdy pine tree, my 69-year-old knees were quivering as much as nearby aspen trees.

Letters

Panning the panhandlers

I have noticed a disturbing trend in downtown Traverse City. I have observed more and more public intoxication by street people, as well as blatant panhandling for spare change, and was even asked, no, told, to give one certain individual $2 one day, “for beer.”

Just yesterday afternoon, I was approached by three people within 10 minutes in the 200 block of E. Front St. for spare change, 50 cents, and one dollar. Another person has even begun to step out in front of passing motorists, and stop them to do his panhandling.

Where is law enforcement? Has anybody driven by Lay Park in the late mornings, and most of the afternoon lately? There’s a group of at least 10 persons consuming alcohol, and some appear to be passed out lying on the ground. Does this look good to folks who visit the region...