Injustice Pervasive in the Justice System
Michelle Alexander, author of The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness, made a rare public appearance at Bradley University Feb. 12. It was standing room only in the Michel Student Center Ballroom, but I fear that many of the people who could benefit from her message were not in the room. Professor Alexander has almost single-handedly brought attention to the injustice of the War on Drugs, which is responsible for the imprisonment of millions of black and brown people. It is time for concerned members of the community to understand what is really happening in this country in regard to our justice system. Ms. Alexander’s book debunks many of the myths about people of color, who are no more likely to use or to sell drugs than members of the white population; however, minorities are given harsher sentences for the same offenses. Black people are more likely to be targeted – when did you last read of a swat team raiding a fraternity house on a college campus?
Ms. Alexander asks us to question the unfairness of policies that are decimating minority families and neighborhoods. Prisons are becoming big business in the private sector, banking on the presumption that there will be a continuous supply of human beings to meet their demand for profit. Ms. Alexander said that “. . . we need to challenge the belief that some lives don’t matter.” Much of this is hard to digest, but as concerned, fair-minded citizens, it is our duty and responsibility to know what is happening within our communities and to work toward change.
REV. LYNNDA WHITE, PEORIA
“Drill Baby Drill” Mentality:
Privatize Profit; Socialize Environmental Costs
Interesting article by Clare Howard in the February CW (Under the Radar: Tar Sands Oil Pipeline Here; Central Illinois Volume Greater Than Keystone XL).
America has the creativity and know-how to be a world leader in producing clean energy and taking better care of our world, and yet here we are stuck in “drill baby drill” mentality. 
The plutocrats are steering energy policy in a totally wrong direction based not on realities of atmospheric quality, integrity of the northern boreal forest, potential for ecological disasters along the pipeline, or clean energy alternatives … but solely on wealth that enriches a few. This peculiar type of “socialism” privatizes profits for a very small group while socializing the substantial ecological risks and environmental costs which are borne by the rest of us.
Our children and grandchildren should not have to look forward to a petrified 19th century fossil based economy. The shenanigans involved in this filthy tar sands oil business should finally convince our leaders there is an urgent need to act NOW. We must face the catastrophic potentials of global warming and create a clean and vibrant future … before it’s too late.
DALE GOODNER, Wisconsin
Lutheran Hillside Village “Pen Souls” Writing Group
In April, my wife and I will have lived at Lutheran Hillside Village for six years. For most of that time, I have met monthly with a creative writing group here known as “Pen Souls.” Last September, as my deadline approached, I had written nothing. Weather being pleasant, I sat in a folding chair in our driveway pondering “What shall I write?” I looked up and “Dialogue With Cloud” came to me.
HAROLD L. DOWELL, Peoria

Dialogue With a Cloud
I see you as the white up high,
A vaporous shape while you float by.
You may not choose which way to go
Nor when to go nor why to go.

Have you of Brownian bits a soul?
You’re broken up and made new whole.
The who that’s you keeps changing form.
I know you’re real, but what’s the norm?

But I the watcher moves as well.
So Coriolis tried to tell
How we should say just how you go,
If anybody cares to know.

Your silence makes you seem so mild.
Yet there are times when you shout wild
With lightning flash and thundering roar
You speak to us like ne’re before.

And pelting us with balls of ice
Makes you seem not always nice.
But I forgive and like to view
Your placid forming, white on blue.

From airplane window I see you
As something I could walk onto.
But common sense says otherwise.
I’d fall to earth down from the skies.

My friend, I thank you for you’ve made
In summer’s heat your gift of shade.
But, Oh, I wish I better knew
The really real of who are you.
Poll Results on Pro-Choice Questioned
Community Word does not, as a rule, publish anonymous submissions. An exception has been made for the following letter:
I read your Community Word because of Roger Monroe. I love his writing. He is a responsible journalist. I am wondering where Ms. (Clare) Howard gets her statistics about over 75 percent of people in the U.S. are pro-choice? (“Deceptive or Informative: Pro-Choice and Anti-Choice People Go Toe-to-Toe on North University” September 2014)
I don’t mind hearing “the truth” but is it? The latest Gallup Polls show 58 percent of all Americans are calling themselves pro-life; 42 percent pro-choice.
I accept the truth whatever that is but everything on the Internet, study after study, states pro-choicers are behind. I challenge her to tell us where she found that. It’s never been 75 percent pro-choice. Whether to the left or to the Right – Let’s keep responsible journalism.
Editor’s response: The article included a quote: “Over 70 percent of Americans believe women should have a legal right to an abortion.” The person quoted was referencing a poll reported by Politico (August 2014) by Greenberg Quinlan Rosner research firm conducted for NARAL that reported 70 percent of Americans think abortion should remain legal. Gallup Poll, reported in May 2014, showed 47 percent of respondents pro-choice and 46 percent against choice.