Ugly secrets of animal breeding

Re: Feb. 21 letter "Poodle person fights back."

Perhaps it's unfortunate that Lindsey Pollard-Post used the word "inbred" in her excellent column on the Westminster Dog Show. It gave the reader something to nitpick so that she very carefully didn't address the widely acknowledged facts of animal mutilation and suffering as well as the overpopulation of unwanted animals contributed to by breeders.

Contrary to the reader's statement, most People for the Ethical Teatment of Animals members know a great deal about breeding and showing dogs. These ugly secrets need to be exposed to the public.

Whitney Miller


Our future is in jeopardy

Re: Feb. 18 article "Though Watson triumphed on ` Jeopardy!,' don't count humans out."

"Watson is incapable of coming up with fresh ideas. … Its ability is simply to make sense of questions and scour a trove of date for the most likely answers."

This is, to date, the most accurate description of what teaching to the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills is doing to our children. Welcome to the future.

Melodie Greider

Dripping Springs

Beer here!

What a front page Feb. 15.

"Trustees weigh cutting 1,000 jobs" - because of Gov. Rick Perry's mismanagement of taxpayer funds. "Officials mull tax for F1 projects" - how many teachers, schools and state employees could we keep for the $10 million annual taxpayer dollars recently committed for the Formula One racetrack being built for Perry donor Red McCombs and his billionaire friends? Now they want to up the local hotel tax to the third highest in the nation to pay for roads to this billionaire playground.

Maybe Perry and state Comptroller Susan Combs didn't know we were $27 billion in the hole while this deal was being cooked up in the back rooms (and on European trips).

Well, it could turn out OK. Maybe those unemployed teachers and state employees can snag one of those jobs hawking hot dogs and beer.

P.M. Ray


School budget cuts

If the Austin school district can consider closing 13 schools and laying off more than 1,000 workers to meet its budget and still provide an education to all of its students, doesn't that indicate that money has been spent unnecessarily for the past decade or two? No wonder our school taxes are so high.

Tom Sweatman


Cornyn's balanced budget plan

Re: Feb. 16 commentary "Call a constitutional convention."

After reading U.S. Sen. John Cornyn's column regarding a call for a balanced budget convention, I have to ask: Where was he when a Republican-controlled federal government in the first decade of this century lowered taxes for the wealthy, waged two wars on credit, squandered our surplus, deregulated important economic safeguards and basically got us in the mess we now are in?

I can answer that. He was very much part of that group. Now please don't forget that.

Sam Yeates


Cornyn's comments on the need for a balanced budget amendment are not only well written and comprehensible, they are just plain common sense.

I have known for many years and done my best to pass on to my children that you can not constantly spend more than you make or you will end up with a big mess and a lot of trouble. It doesn't matter whether you are an individual, a family, a business or the federal government. You eventually will pay the price, and it will hurt a lot.

We must take steps to stop spending money we don't have.

Bill J. Parks


Cornyn made a good pitch for a balanced budget amendment in his column and seemed to lay the blame for needing it at the feet of President Barack Obama. But when did Cornyn become a fiscal conservative?

The senator went to Washington in 2003, and since then our national debt has gone up on average $500 billion a year and in 2008 it went up $1 trillion, and all the while he was voting for tax cuts. The senator should be aware that we have spent more than $3 trillion just in interest payments on the national debt since he has been in office, yet he voted to extend the tax cuts for two more years.

Where are the jobs that the tax cuts were supposed to create? Why not fiddle with creating jobs instead of a constitutional amendment?

Ray Helm

San Marcos

Cornyn's is a bad idea. Congress has all the authority it needs to balance the budget right now. It simply won't do it.

The defense budget, for instance, is huge and untouchable. The war on drugs and the Justice Department continue to grow. Federal intervention in elementary education will continue to expand in years to come.

He wants to cut millions from programs that help the little guy but won't cut billions from the military-industrial complex. It just shows how out of touch he is.

Dave Howard


Round Rock