Thankful for opportunity to honor veterans
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In My Humble Opinion
Jodi McDade
Thank you to the Town of Rockford for again sponsoring the event honoring our veterans in Coosa County. There was a good turnout even with the threat of rain, but there were faces that were missing from previous events.
It’s always so heartwarming to spend time with all of the wonderful people from our county who served our country during both war and peace. Of course, the highlight of the night is always recognizing the World War II veterans we are still fortunate to have in our midst – Joe Collins and Thomas Cleveland thankfully were able to attend. We missed Pete Phillips because of health issues, but I still want to acknowledge his service during World War II.
If you or a family member is a veteran of any of our branches of military please contact Town Hall and let them know so the list can be updated by next year. We have so many retired veterans who have returned or relocated to Coosa County, and they do not want to leave anyone out.
Starting next year all Korean War veterans will move to the spotlight so please be SURE to get all those names on the list that you know of. I’d like to see the veterans of each war/conflict seated together – not only to be better able to recognize them, but also for them to recognize each other. Our veterans are special people who have a shared history that the rest of us will never be able to understand.
These individuals are all part of the reason we still have open elections in our country. Unfortunately, it is looking like we don’t necessarily have well handled elections anymore. I’m writing this on Monday, and there are still races where either the ballots are still being counted and/or the results are too close to call.
I understand the close races, but I just do NOT understand why all of a sudden all the votes cannot be counted in every state on election night. Granted, the different laws governing the elections in each state may play into some of this, but obviously the procedures for counting the votes have not been reviewed and improved to make the counting more efficient.
I have heard some discussion about making election day a national holiday to enable everyone to go in person to the polls on that day. There would obviously still be alternate voting options for absentee ballots for people who would not be in their voting district on that day, but maybe it would stop some of the discussion about people not being able to vote.
I really don’t understand why anyone this day and age cannot get to the polls on voting day – unless you are confined to bed at home, in a hospital, or in a nursing home. People seem to be able to get to church, the doctor, the grocery store, and anywhere else they want to go, but then they claim there are roadblocks for them to get to the election polls. This makes absolutely NO sense to me.
The same goes for the complaints about having to show a valid identification to vote. If you do not have a driver’s license, non-drivers ID, or other government form of identification how do you function in the everyday activities of life? I have to show my identification at the doctor’s office, a hospital, at the bank, when cashing a check, to turn on utilities, if I’m stopped for speeding, to get a car tag, and just about anything else I do. So, why do people claim they can’t get an ID? There should not be many people who do not have a birth certificate and other documentation of their existence and citizenship.
At any rate, thank you to all of you who did take the time to exercise your right and responsibility to vote last week. It’s obvious from the results that we have a very divided country. I just wish I knew if people actually voted their values or if they were still influenced by the media and political parties. I’m afraid it’s the latter.
While the polls were very off of which party would come out ahead, other polls showed the most important issues to people – the economy, inflation, crime. But I guess most of those people didn’t bother to vote! OR, maybe they did and they thought those things were doing fine! After all, polls start out by asking the questions in a manner to get the answers each pollster wants to get.
The sad thing is that the 2024 election cycle will be starting almost immediately. I wish we were like our English cousins and set a short time frame to have campaigns for elections. I’d vote to change it to a 6-month campaign season with debates held for all races and no votes allowed until after the debates had been held.
Enjoy a little peace and quiet while you can. God bless you all!