Opinion

Dear Editor:

Memorial Day is fast approaching, I hope it will not slip by with many forgetting the importance of this day. It is not just another day off to maybe shop for sales and enjoy back yard barbecuing. Memorial Day is a time to remember all those who gave their lives to protect the freedoms we enjoy today.

I find myself thinking what it means to be an American. The answer is crystal clear, and that is the pride to live in a county that allows us our personal freedom to express ourselves and speak our minds. These freedoms come with great personal sacrifice for those who leave family, friends and jobs to serve the greater good. I myself had served during the Vietnam era. Although I never saw combat, I had friends who did and who died serving their country.

So, please honor Memorial Day by honoring those who gave their lives for what we all hold most dear. You can do this by attending parades in your local communities and saluting those who served our country so well. I also ask the many who can to display the flag of our country from homes and businesses You can also call those veterans you know and tell them thanks for serving and keeping us free from tyranny.

Dear Editor:

I was in the supermarket the other day and the young person in front of me was speaking to the cashier in Spanish, and I noticed that he was buying four one-quart ice cream boxes. The total price was about $15 and he gave the cashier a “blue” Benefits/Medicaid card — with a picture of a woman on it. The cashier didn’t say anything about the picture on the card being a woman; she just processed the purchase. I noticed that the total amount he had to pay was zero.

My questions are:

1. Why did the cashier accept a card from a young man (in his twenties) when there is a picture of a woman on it?

2. I thought the “blue” Benefits/Medicaid card was for impoverished people and could only be used for food. Is ice cream now considered food?

3. Why are my tax dollars being used to pay for people to buy ice cream?

4. Why are “illegal” aliens allowed to get a ‘blue’ Benefits/Medicaid card and get food, prescriptions, hospital/doctor visits, hearing aids, glasses, etc. for free? While I, a person who is 80 years old and has been paying taxes all my life, must pay for all these things? Wh

y are my taxes being used to pay for all these free benefits (including ice cream)?

Can anyone answer these questions? No wonder the United States is in such a financial mess!

Dear Editor:

Walking along the six blocks encompassing Windsor Park and Bell Boulevard with my aide, I meet and greet beautiful people who smile and offer their services well beyond the norm. This neighborhood offers everything for rich and poor alike. Windsor Park, you are the sunshine in my life — next to my family.

What does the First Amendment mean to you?

Not since 1971 have we seen the government so blatantly attack the freedom of the press. Working for local news organizations most of my life, I have a strong affiliation to the principles that should guide the news. I also hold in equal regard the freedoms that must be upheld for our democracy to flourish.

It took about 15 hours for the first fallout from the Nets’ disappointing Game 7 loss to the undermanned Chicago Bulls in the first round of the NBA playoffs to be felt. Nets general manager Billy King announced that interim head coach PJ Carlesimo would not be offered a contract.

Given the way the Nets choked away a 14-point lead with three minutes to go in the fourth quarter, combined with their putrid performance in the decisive Game 7 — trailing by 17 points at the half before making a too little, too late run — it was inevitable that Carlesimo would get his walking papers.

Dear Editor:

The city’s executive budget plan has been released. It proposes a cut to Queens Library of $29.6 million, part of a proposed cut to libraries citywide of $100 million. If that proposal were to become reality, the impact on library service hours and the number of job layoffs are unthinkable.

Our representatives in City Hall and the City Council value libraries. They have demonstrated that in the past. Elected officials have limited revenue resources and tough choices to make. Nevertheless, the proposed cut is enormous.

It is up to the people of Queens to show the City Council and City Hall that library hours and library jobs are critical to this city. Libraries in Queens urgently need your help. Go to savequeenslibrary.org. You will be able to sign our electronic petition and send an email to your elected representatives. Or, stop in to any library and sign the paper petition or write a postcard.

Speak up for Queens Library! Tens of millions of our neighbors use free library resources or attend free library programs. They enjoy quiet reading time, sharpen their skills for their next big job, use the computers, prepare for an important exam for work or school, find out more about a health con

dition or email a friend far away. To allow that, libraries must remain open for service at least five days a week, or more.

As we speak with our elected officials, we will also be talking about how critical a stable funding stream is for libraries in the future. We need to be able to better plan for the library services you need from year to year and be assured of being able to buy books for the shelves.

For now, I hope I can count on everyone to Speak Up for Queens Library. Go to savequeenslibrary.org on your computer or smartphone, or stop at the library and sign the petition. You need your library. Right now, your library needs you.

Dear Editor:

Queens Chronicle Asst. Managing/Online Editor Joseph Orovic's article — actually expose would be a more accurate description — about an Abu Dhabi oil multibillionaire prince who would appear to be Mayor Bloomberg’ s choice for a Major Soccer League stadium, where else but in Flushing Meadows Corona Park, represents excellent journalism (“UAE’s Sheikh Monsour to be FMCP’s MLS king,” May 2).

Equally worthy of applause is the Chronicle’s editorial condemnation of not just giving away parkland, but giving it to someone whose wealth is directly related to a repressive government whose policies “are not ones that most Americans would find tolerable” (“No park giveaway to an oil billionaire for soccer,” May 2).

With apologies to William Shakespeare, the fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but at the feet of the current occupant of the office of mayor of New York City, Michael Bloomberg. In the almost 12 years he has held the office, he not only never lifted a finger to reverse the neglect inflicted on

FMCP, the second-most used park in our municipal park system (primarily by the less privileged), but has actively participated in giving up FMCP land, a nonrenewable resource, to private interests.

The expansion of the United States Tennis Association complex in the park; on the horizon a 1.4 million-square-foot shopping mall on the Citi Field parking lots, which were built on FMCP land; and a Major League Soccer stadium capable of seating up to 35,000 people are all part of Bloomberg’s romance with the wealthy and indifference to the little people. He fails to understand parks are the lifeblood of an urban society, or if he does understand, he is contemptuous of the people who need and use the park.

I believe if Frederick Law Olmstead, the genius who created Central and Prospect parks in this city and important parks elsewhere, was still alive, he would not break bread with Bloomberg, and justifiably so.

Dear Editor:

To the owner of a black Honda who hit my car parked on 62nd Drive and 69th Place, on April 21-22, causing extensive damage: I wonder if your conscience lets you sleep since then while I’ve been without a car.

Dear Editor:

At a recent press conference, President Obama renewed his 2009 pledge to close the Gitmo military prison in Cuba. His executive order to do that was blocked by the GOP House.

I agree with all the reasons Obama explained to the reporters. These alleged terrorists, serving years in Gitmo, deserve to have a trial — not in a military court but in a federal court. We all agree justice should be served. If found guilty, they should serve their time, like many other guilty terrorists are doing, in a federal prison.

Dear Editor:

The Queens Chronicle has done a great job in covering the recent local news items related to tobacco control and smokefree issues. However, I have to disagree with the April 25 editorial stating that the City Council proposal to raise the minimum purchase age to buy cigarettes in New York City to 21 should be dropped (“At 18, smoking is your call”).

There are a number of tobacco-control proposals that have been introduced into the City Council, all of them worthy of passage and signed by Mayor Bloomberg, but the proposal in question could be the decisive turning point in finally reducing the number of our high school-age students from being the next replacement smoker generation.

Let’s not fool ourselves to think that teens wait until they have reached the magic age of 18 before they try their first smoke. It’s very clear that kids start to experiment with tobacco as early as age 14 and most start at age 16 or 17. This unfortunate dilemma was verified by the previously secret tobacco industry documents that uncovered their research and subsequent marketing strategy to target mid teens to become new tobacco users.

The key point that the Queens Chronicle is missing here is teens who are not legally able to buy their smokes rely on their friends aged 18-20 to buy cigarettes for them. A 2001 published report indicates that 90 percent of persons buying cigarettes for minors are in this age group. If the minimum age is raised to 21, then, there will be a paradigm shift of how teens, especially the 16-18 year olds, will be able to get their cigarettes. Their sources will no longer exist. Those who are 21 years old are in different social circles and are young adults who either are in their junior year of college or have been working for a living for three years and generally don’t hang with 16-18 year olds and are wise enough by then not to buy them cigarettes.

New York City would not be the first venue to raise the purchase age of cigarettes above 18. Two Massachusetts towns have raised the bar to 21 and New Jersey and neighboring Nassau and Suffolk counties have a minimum purchase age of 19. According to a New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene survey conducted last year, two-thirds of New Yorkers favor raising the minimum age for sale of cigarettes from 18 to 21, with 69 percent of nonsmokers and 60 percent of smokers supporting this policy.