December 26, 2003

Dear Sir,

I find it curious to compare the strident clamour of the Government and the unions over the appointment of a non-Bermudian as Chief Justice to the deafening silence of those same parties when it came to the appointment of a non-Bermudian as Director of Marine and Ports Services over a fully qualified and competent Bermudian applicant.

Am I missing something here?

December 31, 2003

Dear Sir,

The Bermuda Health Department's failure to protect Bermudians' health by not banning US beef is deplorable.

Bermuda should add its voice to those of other nations in the call for a safer global food supply. Suggesting that our beef comes from the East Coast and is therefore safer reflects poorly on the Department of Health's understanding of the causes of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), USDA practices, and Creutzfeldt Jakob Disease (vCJD).

These native-born cases of Mad Cow Disease in the US and Canada are alarming as they indicate feeding practices are to blame, suggesting more cattle have the disease. The North American beef industry continues to feed calves with the blood and fat from cattle slaughterhouses, and cows regularly feed on poultry manure, which in turn were fed on slaughterhouse wastes.

NAFTA has enabled an integrated, open border between Canada and the US for the cattle trade; this trade coupled with inadequate testing and controls in both countries suggest many North American mad cow cases haven't been detected, yet.

Dr. Prusiner, who won the Nobel Prize in Medicine for his discovery of prions (the infectious agents thought to cause BSE) decries the US Government's efforts to protect the food supply against vCJD as "terrible".

Every cow is being tested in Japan. In Europe, 100 percent of all adult downer cattle are tested (cows too sick to stand and at high risk for carrying BSE) as well as 100 percent of all healthy cows over a certain age that are slaughtered for human consumption ? if the animal isn't tested, then by law, the animal must be destroyed.

Testing of cattle in the US is sporadic at best, with only two percent of cows who cannot stand and appear sick being tested, all other beef appears on our tables without any testing. Meanwhile, the US Centers for Disease Control has not made vCJD a reportable disease so no reliable statistics on the incidence of disease in the US are available. The USDA and US Government continue to flaunt international standards when it comes to BSE and vCJD and instead relies on public relations propaganda in the face of crisis to protect industrial agriculture's interests and ill-conceived policies and practices.

Consumers (and diligent Health Department employees) can visit Friends of the Earth at www.foe.org/factoryfarms/feedregviolators.htm to confirm that beef production on the Eastern Seaboard of the US is not free of companies violating Mad Cow regulations according to the USDA itself.

The Health Department has an important mission to fulfil on behalf of the community; more demonstrable leadership and effort in analysis would prove they are equal to the task instead of parrots of US propaganda.

December 19, 2003

Dear Sir,

As a Christian mother, I assumed after reviewing the title 'Goldilocks and the Three Bears' that we could attend, clearly thinking it would be innocent enough for a family outing, right?

Wrong!

I was appalled at the role reversals. In one part there was a man playing a woman. Also Goldilocks had a new twist this time! She got married to a prince who was a woman playing the man's part, undisguised!

My child couldn't believe it! I am teaching Christian values in my home and she knew that it was not right.

Shame on you producers! Someone told me this was typical English humour and it was not meant to be offensive but these attempts to help convince the world that homosexuality is okay is wrong!

The world has become obsessed with the subject of homosexuality. Targeting young impressionable minds is not humour! Who was the play for, adults or children? The world may becoming brainwashed into believing that this lifestyle is the 'British norm' but the Bible teaches otherwise!

The Bible says in the book of Romans Chapter 1 26-32(NIV):

Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshipped and served created things rather than the Creator ? who is forever praised. Amen.

Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural. In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another.

Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion. Furthermore, since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, he gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done. They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed, and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice.

They are gossips, slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant, and boastful; they invent ways to do evil; they disobey their parents; they are senseless, faithless,heartless, ruthless. Although they know God's righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.

Does what the Bible have to say sound like what is happening today? It must raise a question or two? Who cares what the Bible says? I do. What is the Bible? One analogy is: B-I-B-L-E Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth.