Letters, March 4: Let's be practical

When I was training as an apprentice mechanic, our tutor presented us with a problem whereby a bus had become firmly wedged under an overpass.

Our task was to figure out a way that the bus could be moved. The answer was quite simple: let the air out of the tyres on the bus which lowered it and allowed the bus to be moved.

The object of this exercise was to teach us to look at a situation in a practical manner and identify a simple solution.

Judging by your article and picture in the Waikato Times (February 23), I can't help but wonder if this lesson would have helped the council staff who wedged a truck under the sign at the entrance to Innes Common, then took five hours with a crane to dislodge it.

Nowadays I think we over-complicate far too many things when we could achieve so much more by taking a more practical view of life.

CHRIS J MANGAN

Hamilton

 

Inform on drugs

With the release of the Law Commission's discussion paper Controlling and Regulating Drugs, John Key has categorically ruled out relaxing drug laws.

He simplistically tells young New Zealanders don't engage with drugs.

He could instead inform people why they would be better off abstaining or at least waiting until they are older.

For instance, starting cannabis use in your teens can have significant detrimental impact on brain development.

Using cannabis can aggravate or exacerbate mental health problems. (Young people should be wary of cannabis if there is history of mental illness in their family.)

Not including alcohol, the findings of the NZ Alcohol and Drug Use Survey 2007/08 found the prevalence of New Zealanders aged 16-64 having ever used drugs for recreational purposes was highest for the following drugs: cannabis (46.4 per cent), BZP pills (13.5 per cent), LSD and synthetic hallucinogens (7.3 per cent), and amphetamines (7.2 per cent).

Highest prevalence of substances used for recreational purposes in the 12 months before the survey was as follows: cannabis (14.6 per cent), BZP pills (5.6 per cent), ecstasy (2.6 per cent), and amphetamines (2.1 per cent).

We need to keep an open mind about the well-considered options put forward by the Law Commission.

R DUNCAN

Health Action Trust

Nelson

 

Roading funds

What is the full and complete information regarding unused and unallocated roading funding?

The funds went where? Why did nobody apply for this funding?

Jobs could result, improved roads, the options are endless. Somebody dropped the ball on this matter. Who? Why? Did they get punished for this screw-up?

BOB MORTON

Hamilton

 

What's next?

Henry the V is credited with inventing the first passport and there are numerous different types of passports in use today.

Some limited form of passport did exist around 450 BC in the Persian Empire for travellers throughout its empire.

But today's styles and types of passports have been very much influenced by air travel with large numbers of passengers.

But what next? It won't be long before parts of the body are tattooed in some form or other to authenticate the passport holder.

Photographs and the miss-use of passports for illegal means have crept into fraudulent passport use so it won't be too far ahead before passports will have identification with infrared or some other matching body marks.

This brings to mind the Bible which foretells the marks on the forehead ... frightening to realise that it was all foretold 2000 years ago.

It is almost here – supermarkets and banks want more and more proof of identity. Credit card theft, stolen passports, false ID, misuse and so on show that life is heading in this direction – matching passport with body identification.

KEN WELDON

Matangi

 

The `f' word

People tend to get both unnecessarily and illogically uptight when hearing so-called "bad language" – far more so than the subject warrants (as discussed in the Waikato Times, January 22). Mostly these words are of good Anglo-Saxon origin, Chaucerian, blunt but colourful.

To take an obvious example: if the word "faeces" were substituted for "shit", I doubt that anyone apart from the hyper-prudish would turn a hair if they heard it uttered.

Further, it would be quite comical to hear a builder yell "sexual intercourse" when accidentally hitting the wrong nail with his hammer – but the meaning would be only too clear.

The old aphorism "other times, other manners" is born out in the way that the word "bugger" has become socially acceptable in the past few years when in fact it is a synonym for sodomy and in the same league as the previous two examples.

Perhaps it is time for us to lighten up, but the conservative element will most certainly see it as a further lowering of standards.

FRANK BAILEY

Hamilton

 

Not our whales

In reply to "Trade relations" (Waikato Times, February 25): Sorry Olive, I believe you have everything wrong with respect to Peter Bethune being held as a hostage.

This person, along with the rest of his crew, chose to put himself at risk.

He chose to board the whaling ship on the high seas without permission or invitation and therefore placed himself in a position of probable arrest for attempted hijack.

Furthermore they are not our whales as you claim, and I am tired of being approached on the street by canvassers asking for either donations or signatures to one petition or escapade associated with their movement.

I say let them spend their own funds through the international courts, and abide by whatever verdict is delivered.

Our Government is not responsible for the actions of these people and should not therefore waste taxpayer money on these people.

TONY TATLER

Hamilton

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