Daily Newspaper and Travel Guide for Reeves County, Trans Pecos, Big Bend of West Texas

OPINION

Opinion

Friday, January 9, 1998

OBSERVATIONS

Society needs to clean up its act

This is a nasty column. Actually it's about filth! The human
race is and has always been rather trashy and it's
disgusting. We need to clean up our act.
What is amazing that some "third world countries" are
cleaner than we are in the United States, a so-called
civilized and advanced society.

I'm sure everbody can readily identify what I am discussing.
How about finding used baby diapers thrown out on shopping
center parking lots? How about trash thrown on the floors of
rest rooms? And excuse this indelicate reference, but
finding commodes that have not been flushed in public
toilets.

Litter lines the roadways of our country. We have become a
society of the disposables and unfortunately, too many
things are disposed out the car window.

We all pay for this litter as crews are hired by the state
and cities to go along and clean up this mess. The same
thing is true at stores where people are hired to clean up
parking lots. Somebody has to pay for all this and who do
you think it is? If I have to answer that question, there's
no point in trying to get your attention.

This is probably a topic that won't be discussed in "polite"
society but it needs to be. People need to be shamed into
cleaning up their act. Some people will blame such
uncleanliness on poverty but I'm here to tell you that those
who are impoverished can't afford to throw things away and
many of them have more pride than do the so-called "upper
crust".

I've been to the homes of the upper income and some are so
filthy you don't even want to ask for a glass of water. By
the same token, I've been in the little homes where the
people are as poor as the proverbial church mouse and the
house is impeccable. Soap, water, elbow grease and pride
don't cost much.

I've also been to big homes where the people drive nice
cars, only to find the house is only partly furnished
because the people are concerned with making a big splash
and put up a false front for their so-called friends and
neighbors. In Midland, those are called $300 a week
millionaires.

I'm really appalled at the filth I see almost everywhere I
go in public. I guess my disgust is apparent but it gets
that way when you walk around piles of rubbish in the
bathroom and smell the stench because of the lack of decency
by some people.

Most animals don't even live that way, but humans are
considered intelligent?
I'm sure some people will find humor in this column but we
should call attention to people who mess up our world.
Police need to write tickets to people who are caught
littering and the fines for those tickets should be large.
Other countries don't stand for this kind of behaviour. I'm
reminded of a story told by a friend of mine - a person who
had impeccable personal habits. He was in Australia and when
he finished his cigarette, he tossed the butt on the ground.
He quickly felt a tap on his shoulder and was told "he
forgot something." You just don't litter in Australia and
most other "civilized" countries. It makes you wonder about
our own country, doesn't it?

EDITOR'S NOTE: Mac McKinnon is an Editor and Publisher of
the Pecos Enterprise whose column appears each Friday. He
can be e-mailed at: bigmac@bitstreet.com

Your View

Former Pecosite enjoys reading local news

I moved from Pecos in June of 1994. I subscribed to the
Pecos Enterprise for a year after I moved but then got
involved in my new home and did not keep receiving the paper.

A week ago I met a friend in Austin who also moved from
Pecos and she told me that she has been reading the paper on
the internet. I have been reading it and thoroughly
enjoying playing catch up. Thanks for the archives!

Kathryn Roberts
Giddings, Texas

Our View

Government spending should be curtailed

Surprise, surprise!
The federal government has a surplus. This has not happened
since the early 1970s. The reasons for the surplus rather
than the deficit that had been projected is a great economy
and government spending cuts.

Of course, in the days of deficit spending, everybody in
government has an idea of what to do with what some call a
"windfall." There are those who want to spend the money to
avoid future surpluses by providing more services and/or
cutting taxes.

Can't we leave well enough alone?

A country that has a $5 trillion debt cannot afford to add
to that debt. It has come time to make payments on that
debt. Isn't that the way we run our own households? If we
have unexpected income, don't we, if we are fiscally
responsible, try to pay down on our debts?

This country is ours and shouldn't we run it like we run or
own lives?
Any kind of tinkering with the economy the way it is could
easily set off a round of inflation and put the economy in a
tailspin. We certainly don't need another decade like the
1970s when inflation was out of control.

There's an old saying out here in the country that people in
the big capitol city need to live by - If It Ain't Broke,
Don't Fix It!

Government leadership under marching orders from the public
has done a good job in cutting spending and the size of
government this decade. More of the same needs to be done.

We've become fiscally responsible as a country in our world
leadership role and that needs to continue.

Critic's Corner

Book hels women learn assertiveness

The Assertive Woman has been around for two decades, but its
authors have updated the best-seller for the 21st Century.

Stanlee Phelps and Nancy Austin say their book has helped
thousands of women find and use their voices in this
fast-moving world of ours.

"If it weren't for women with guts and brains, the Family
and Medical Leave Act would never have passed, 81 percent of
Fortune 500 companies would not have at least one female
director, and Congress would never have agreed to move the
monument to early suffragists out of the Capitol basement
and into the Rotunda," they assert.

No question there are still plenty of launch windows for
change, they say.
So, women who identify with Dorrie Doormat or Augusta
Aggressive may want to read up on ways they can be more like
Allison Assertive.

While assertive is good, aggressive is spelled with a
capital "B" in this book. And indirect aggression is just as
bad as the head-on kind, the authors believe.

They provide a workbook section for individual guidance.

Published in paperback by Impact Publishers, the 229-page
book is available in bookstores for $11.95 or at a discount
through the Pecos Enterprise online bookstore,
http://www.pecos/net/news/ads/pegpicks.htm.
Peggy McCracken

Critic's Corner

Cholst psyches readers out

Sheldon Cholst, author of The Psychology of the Artist,
wants you to understand two things: that artists are the
most unblemished, morally-advanced creatures produced by
evolution and he himself is such an artist. Lest we doubt
Cholst's elevated status, the author includes - in this
300-odd page book written under seemingly conflictive
impulses - 73 pages of his own debatably junior league
poetry.

Cholst states in the opening lines of his preface that the
book's purpose is to "correlate the psychology of the artist
to the evolution of the human being from a primitive ape . .
. according to Aquatic Ape Theory, and to show how the
various mechanisms of change can explain and offer new ways
to treat human disease."

He also wants to market the book as a self-help number by
offering advice to artists on how to find love (keep trying)
and how to succeed in the world without selling out (work
harder).

Another breakthrough in modern thought is Cholst's advice on
avoiding disappointment and depression: don't get your hopes
up and you won't be let down. Gosh, deep. Thanks Sheldon.

Of course I'm oversimplifying his arguments but only to
expose what lies at their core.

Ever wonder about your fingerprints? Well, Cholst has, and
he's decided that primitive man developed these extremely
individualistic markings to tell one member of the tribe
apart from another. Watch out for those cavemen passing
inkpads - checking loops and swirls to determine the pecking
order. This could get messy.

Greg Harman

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