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Opinion

Letters to the Editor — Thoughts on Lewis eulogizers, responding to police, money for airlines, giving plasma, teacher safety, Hiroshima anniversary

Readers ponders how other leaders would have responded to COVID-19, recognize cops' authority, reject helping out air carriers, lament restrictions on blood products, think we should test teachers for virus, and remember other victims in WWII.

Difference-maker

When I watched three presidents speak of U.S. Rep. John Lewis at his funeral on July 30, I was impressed by their empathy, sympathy and eloquent thoughts on why Lewis was so important to our country. They once again exhibited their skills as comforter-in-chief.

When Barack Obama spoke, it made me think of how different things would be today if COVID-19 had made its deadly appearance on his watch. He had the strategic foresight to have a pandemic plan ready to implement by a special team already appointed to take action when needed (a team disbanded and plans discarded by the current occupant of the White House long ago).

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He’d have used the guidance of medical experts to protect us and would have led us by personal example. He would have known that the virus doesn’t know the political party of its victims and would not have politicized the pandemic.

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If Obama or George W. Bush or Bill Clinton were still president, how many thousands of people who have died since March would still be enjoying summer with their families at home? How many more people would still be employed? How much longer can we tolerate no national leadership plan directed at our most serious challenge of this century?

Susan Giardina, Allen

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Stop talking and comply

A few years ago, I got taken down by the Dallas SWAT while watching the Andy Griffith Show. No joke.

Eight excited barrels pointed at my head in the front yard. I guarantee you I would have been shot, but I wasn’t. I stopped talking, stayed put and did what they said.

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We can save lives. Comply, don’t die. It works for everyone 99% of the time.

Mike Sundin, Dallas

No bailouts for poor service

Re: “Carriers quietly seek more aid to save jobs — American, Southwest, unions push for 2nd round of federal funds,” Wednesday Metro & Business news story.

Congress, come to your senses and represent the U.S. taxpayers. Do not give loans or grants to any of the major air carriers to continue bailing them out until the COVID-19 pandemic ends or air traffic returns to normal. Take a lesson from the Great Recession, which allowed market conditions, closures, consolidations and bankruptcies to correct excesses caused by poor management, poor balance sheets, and airline management focusing more on the corporate offices, not the customers.

Continued availability of free funds will just aggravate the airlines’ poor service, the a la carte pricing for bags, changes, food and even water. Airline companies should park the excess planes, reduce the flight crews, cut the management staffs and stop awarding the nonperforming top executives high salary increases and large annual bonuses.

James Sherrard, Plano

Plasma discrimination

Re: “North Texas, Roll Up Your Sleeves — If you think you’ve had COVID-19, donating plasma is your chance to give back,” July 30 Editorials.

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I cannot roll up my sleeves to donate plasma. The Food and Drug Administration prohibits gay men from donating blood and plasma unless they abstain from sex for three months.

This past week I watched as Andy Cohen, a Bravo host and gay man, talked about surviving the coronavirus and then being rejected as a plasma donor for simply being gay. Cohen might be the most famous example, but gay men across the country have encountered this same discrimination throughout the pandemic.

It was only a month ago that the Supreme Court overruled discrimination in the workplace based on LGBTQ status. It is time for the FDA to do the same: End the discriminatory ban on gay men donating blood.

Alex O’Donnell, Dallas/Uptown

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Test for the virus at schools

The National Football League is testing players every day for the first two weeks of training camp to mitigate the spread of COVID-19.

How often will teachers and students be tested, given that their season is considerably longer and features over 60 million active participants? Even under the most sterile conditions, COVID-19 cases in schools are inevitable, and a well-thought-out plan is paramount to maximize the safety of the students and faculty.

On the NFL’s website, it clearly states, “If a player tests positive but has no symptoms, he can return to the facility 10 days after the initial positive test or if he receives two consecutive negative tests within five days of the initial positive test.” Schools, on the other hand, have no such master plan.

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Even though teachers make a fraction of the salary a professional football player banks, their job this year is easily as dangerous and indisputably more important. Until schools have a proficient national strategy to protect teachers and students, their doors should remain shut.

Andrew Ginsburg, Southport, Conn.

Others to remember

Re: “A memory that mustn’t fade — 75 years after the U.S. dropped atomic bombs on Japan, my family represents a bridge between the former foes,” by Michael Judge, Sunday Opinion.

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While we continue to memorialize the victims of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, let’s take a moment to also remember the millions of people (men, women and children) slaughtered by the armed forces of the empire of Japan.

Mike Davis, Dallas

Never again

I have read articles like this before. The Japanese citizens suffered greatly when the bombs were dropped.

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What this writer and many others fail to mention is that the bombs were dropped due to the Japanese refusing to surrender and stop the war. The sneak attack on Pearl Harbor by the Japanese led to the attack on Japan by the U.S.

I visited the Pearl Harbor Memorial in Hawaii in the mid-1970s. Over 1,000 American sailors were buried in sunken ships. Many more thousands of U.S. soldiers died fighting Japan. The United States and our military are the ones that should be stating, “Never again.”

Manny Munoz, Duncanville

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