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Show DAILY H f ft A L D EDITOR EDITORIAL Craig BOAfft) rnn. preidtn A PuMishir Ranch' Wright. EawuJiV EJilor Jim Tynen. Iditnnul Pape Editor IN OUR VIEW Let highway plan proceed t's time include area residents who have pleaded for better roads. It's a need that can't be ignored any the longer. for Lehi's leaders to fate reality and accept a planned freeway through city. ILllITYoUBcRKOW v Some .more...-- f I'LL LET X0U ( Borrow some more.., I5NT THAT HOW WE GOT into tvus v ' In such a dispute, the people, the government and the professionals eventually have to reach a decision and act on it. It need not be a perfect decision. Building a highway will necessarily inconvenience some people more than others. In this case, it looks as though the 2100 North Freeway offers the most benefits with the fewest difficulties. Hearing the news Tuesday at a council meeting, Lehi council members were speechless. But the mayor, asked before the meeting about the 4800 North plan, told one of our reporters, "It's not dead. It is not dead." We take that as meaning that he believed the idea was only mostly dead, which is slightly alive. But the meeting pretty much ended the debate. The 4800 North plan moved from mostly dead to all dead. ; In the past, Lehi has kept the the connector requires a bridge notion of a lawsuit slightly alive as much as 2,300 feet long and as well. It's time to kill that no2X0 feet high. The link to tion as well. We urge the city's leaders to publicly announce their would be 12 lanes that would have vehicles weaving through willingness to move ahead with a spaghetti maze of ramps. The the freeway now that the alternatives have been properly vetted. agencies estimated the 4800 Such a move would have a North plan would cost $1.2 billion, compared to $540 million for salutary effect on relations with the freeway. UDOT officials say neighboring communities, whose residents also have an interest in they can no longer consider the 4800 North concept. a new freeway. You don't have to be a rocket We appreciate the difficulties involved in creating a major scientist, or even a highway entransportation corridor. Perhaps gineer, to know that UDOT and FHWA have a strong case. All it's easy to say, but it seems that the freeway will be a benefit you have to do is look at a map. to Lehi in the long run. It could The 2100 North plan is the most ease traffic congestion and draw direct route, would affect few homes and businesses to the relapeople, avoids most wetlands and runs where a new highway tively undeveloped part of that is needed now, not where one city. In any case, the Mountain View Corridor should benefit the might be needed later. In public controversies, the region as a whole, including Lehi. voice of the people needs to be With that in mind, we urge all the cities to work on making heard. In Lehi, it has. Our obserthis plan succeed. Each day that vation is that UDOT has taken passes raises the project's cost pains to talk to people in the afand increases the difficulties fected areas and to assess how involved. Signing on now is the highway plans will affect the best way to ease the pain and community. The people who must be heard move forward. Utah County badly needs . t he proposed M ountain View Corridor, which must include a link with Interstate 15. After a long process, the Utah Department of Transportation says 2100 North its proposed Freeway through Iehi is the best option. But Mayor Howard Johnson and other civic leaders say the road would cut Ijehi in two, hreaten groundwater supplies and lower property values. They came up with an alternative, an expensive Connector in the vicinity of 4800 North. Johnson said it would disrupt Lehi less, save drivers time and gas, and link better with the thriving Point of the Mountain area. But UDOT and the Federal Highway Administration have released an analysis of the 4800 plan that shatters the hopes of its advocates. Engineers concluded ( e I ' HSit Hi; . mi . m i a.. iff .u LETTERS Thanks to a hero The U.S. must find more oil How to comment Headlines scream, "Oil hits $105 per As a member of this community, I d like barrel!" Fuel costs head am happy and grateful to know there are people who will step in and help a rocket on the 4th of July! And to top when situations require. Eric Baker it, OPEC blames it on the U.S. of A.l President G.W. Bush dared to mention truly is a hero, putting his own life that we, the U.S. of A., ought to open on the line to help others. I know that oil exploration! I about had a heart Renee Faulring and her children are for joy. grateful, as well as our community. It is true, yep, it's true! We AmeriThis story could've been a tragic one. It's nice to know that there are people cans are to blame. Why? Simply, for 30 years, no new oil refineries have who have the heart to step in' and do everything they can for the benefit of been built. Oil exploration in our na-- , tion is carried on with wild trepidation others. as we look over our shoulders at the Whether the situation is critical or Environmentalists. Suggestions about hardly significant, the community is there to help. For example, when it opening up oil drilling is passed under snows, our entire neighborhood comes the desks from one Congressman to out early in the morning to shovel another with a shake of the head. Sisnow. They don't just clear their own lently our elected officials mouth the walk and driveways, but everyone's is word "environment!" Who in blazes elected the Environcleared. I am grateful to be fortunate enough mentalists to run our country? Did to live in a community that cares about we elect men to guide this country to speak for the public or for themselves? everyone. I live in a community filled The rumble you hear each time with heroes. Heroes like Eric Baker, who are willing to climb a building and oil is brought up in Congress is our Founding Fathers turning over in their possible death to help another. I supgraves at the cowardice of most of our port and thank you for the way you present political leaders. portrayed and publicized this story. I Leo J Lee, I Danielle Ball, ' Orem Springville sky-war- letters to dhlettersheraldextra.com 5 Fax to Mail to P.O. Box 717, 344-298- Provo, UT 84603. at-ta- ) Letters must include the author's full name, address and daytime phone number. I We prefer shorter letters, 100 to 200 words. Letters may be edited for length. Writers are encouraged to include their occupation and other personal information. .' . ' Because of the volume of let- ters, we cannot acknowledge unpublished letters. I Letters become the property of the Daily Herald. GEORGE F. WILL MEDIA VOICES Home schoolers slammed From the Los Angeles Times, Wednesday, March 12, 2008: There is plenty to debate home schooling, but a court ruling managed to avoid all reasonable disagreements and instead used a single example of possible child abuse to throw the book at tens of thousands of home schoolersthrough-ou- t California. The 2nd District Court of Appeal was asked to require the parents of eight children to send them to a regular public or private school, where their welfare could be monitored. A lower court had ruled that the parents had a constitutional right to home school their children. The appellate court correctly ruled that no such right exists. Further, it noted that the state Education Code appears to express distaste for home schooling by requiring children to attend a public or private school or to be taught at home by a credentialed tutor. Without a teaching credential, the court ruled, the parents could not educate their children. What the justices ignored is that, for decades, even the giant bureaucracy of the California Department of Education has allowed parents to teach at home if they file an affidavit stating that they operate a small private .school. Private school teachers do not need a credential to instruct a class of 20 or 30 students. Why should parents need one to teach a few children at home? Public and private schools have developed programs to help home schoolers, employing credentialed teachers to provide curricula, materials and advice. "Homeschool-in- g is a wonderful way to individualize your child's learning," reads the Web site of one such program offered by the Orange County Department of Education. Yet the panel tossed out this option as well. There are rare cases of parents who use home schooling to hide abuse or neglect. Far more common are the stories of responsible parents providing a good education. A home- - schooled teenager wrote the best seller "Eragon," something a public school homework load alone wouldn't have allowed. The court's overreaching decision failed to address the main point of the case. A parental teaching credential would in no way reduce the need, if there is one, for these children to be more closely monitored. Credentialed teachers can also be bad parents, or, for that matter, bad teachers. That said, compulsory education is a basic of modern society, and it should be enforced. It's time for the Legislature to formally recognize home schooling as an education option and to impose reasonable regulations such as a yearly lesson plan or that portfolio of student work -- encourage these schools' indi- viduality andensure that children aren't home all day watching reruns of "The Andy Griffith Show." Candidates in need of strong running mates electoral votes, that is. A person who captures a presidential nomination gives (sometimes perfunctory) thought to whether or not this or that potential running mate might make a crackerjack president (John Nance Garner? Henry Wallace? Alben Bark-ley- ? John Sparkman? Estes Kefauver? Bill Miller? Spiro Agnew?). Then the presidential nominee gives serious thought to whether this or that running mate might contribute a winning edge in a closely contested state with a significant number of electoral votes. tion's otherwise farsighted Framers, So, speaking of Ohio. ... In 2000, George W. Bush beat Al was crystallizing, Thomas Jefferson 6 in electoral votes. Had Gore and Aaron Burr each received the Bush not carried Ohio, which he did same number of electoral votes. This with 50 percent of the popular vote, he made a hash of the Framers' plan for electing presidents without having vice would have lost. In 2004, he beat Kerry Without Ohio's 20 electoral presidential candidates. Under their plan, which worked fine for three elec- votes, which Bush won Kerry would be president. By various scantions, the presidential candidate with the second highest number of electoral dals and ineptitudes, Ohio's Republican votes John Adams twice, then JefParty made such a mess that in 2006 Sherrod Brown, a congressman, defeatferson became vice president. , ed an incumbent Republican senator, It took the House of RepresentaMike DeWine, and another congresstives until Feb. 17, 1801, and 36 ballots, tie and to break the Jefferson-Bur- r man, Ted Strickland, became governor. Obama needs a running mate who make Jefferson president. Which is why, before the 1804 election, the 12th is older than he is (46), who is not in Amendment was written to require Washington, who has executive exthat electoral votes shall be cast "for perience and national security experipresident and vice president" with the ence, who comes from a swing state and from a demographic cohort that expectation that the candidates would run on a party ticket and why Barack Democratic presidential candidates have lost in every election since 1964 Obama or Hillary Clinton will need a white males. Strickland, who will mate. running be 67 in August, is the son of a They both might need the same white man. Or perhaps Obama will and the first Democrat elected need a different one. In any case, to Ohio's governorship since 1986. consider the probable logic of their He is an ordained Methodist minister choices. who was born and raised in, and repPresidential politics, like football, resented in Congress, conservative is simple in objective but complex in southeastern Appalachian Ohio. He even execution. The game is Get to 270 has everything Obama needs it not for the 12th Amendment, ratified on June 15, 1804, presidential nominees could, and probably would prefer to, run alone, without being saddled with pesky vice presidential running mates, who can be embarrassments. Unfortunately, the presidential election of 1800 happened. It was "a magnificent catastrophe" (that is the title of a splendid new book on it, by Edward J. Larson of y University). As the system, unanticipated by the Constitu- ere Pep-perdi- two-part- 271-26- 286-25- 51-4- 9, steel-work- D00NESBURY Garry Trudeau " 1 H II a way Am vat WHAT? MUST KNOW HAEWU lAOflON j OF JOB' v-- I've 0FN RUNNING A mew i WP.ANP TMTHfS tit cwsero SUCCttP-ING- MALLARD FILLMORE SUPPOSE? an A rating from the National Rifle Association except national security experience. Clinton, too, needs Ohio, and owes Strickland, who helped her win in the primary. In politics, gratitude is optional, but a pleasant surprise. Where would McCain make up for losing Ohio's electoral votes? Perhaps . he could turn New Hampshire back to red: He has twice won its primary, and it was one of only three states the others were Iowa and New Mexico which changed partisan alignment between 2000 and 2004 (when Kerry won with 50 percent). But New Hampshire has just four electoral votes. Perhaps another 16 can be found somewhere, but going into the fall with Ohio out of reach would put McCain in a deep hole. If, however, McCain, whose stron- gest feelings and only competence concern national security, succeeds in making this a national security election if he does not, he almost cerObama could consider tainly loses ' a different running mate: Sam Nunn, senator from 69, the former four-terGeorgia. Winning the state's 15 electoral votes in November would be difficult even with Nunn on the ticket. Still, the value of running with Nunn, who chaired the Senate Armed Services Committee, would be substantial. """But not more substantial than the benefits from putting Ohio, in August, out of McCain's November reach. That would free Obama's or Clinton's time and money for use elsewhere and compel McCain to wager time and money on other, and problematic, states. The choice of Strickland would be, in military terminology, a force multiplier. I George Will is a columnist for Washington Post Writers Group. 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