www.roanoke.com

Gay marriage threatens our culture
Jim Ludington
Ludington is the executive director of Arise America Ministries and an adjunct professor of history at Liberty University. He lives in Roanoke.
The question has been asked whether Virginia will honor homosexual "marriages" performed elsewhere. I hope and pray that our legislature will have the common sense and decency to prevent that from happening. But no matter what judges and legislatures decide -- there will never be a "marriage" between two men or two women.
Read more.

Read Sunday's letters here.

Read New River Forum letters here.

Short takes
Quick views on some of the week's news.
Oops, next time check the goodie bag
There are lots of red faces in Bedford County over a hygiene packet sent home with Otter River Elementary School's fifth-grade boys. A pamphlet by Old Spice was tucked in along with the toothpaste and deodorant. It talked about body changes that adolescent boys could expect. The school said it didn't know the pamphlet with what it deemed "age inappropriate" material was included until an upset parent fired off letters to the school board.
Read more.

What the pageant's really about
Betty G. Price
Price, of Roanoke, was a member of the Valley Junior Women's Club and worked with the Miss Virginia Pageant in the early years.
The caustic tone of Amy Roberson's letter ("Pageant contenders are hardly role models," June 25) makes me wonder if she knows anything at all about the Miss Virginia Pageant itself or state satellites that comprise the Miss America Pageant. I, for one, am grateful to the thousands of intelligent, beautiful and charming "well-bred fillies" who have graced the runway year after year as they "strut their bodies and gleaming smiles, thanks to orthodontia and pricey stylists."
Read more.

Read Saturday's letters here.

What do you want to talk about this weekend?

Frequent-flier hassle No. 5 billion, 800 million, 799 thousand ... well, you get the point.

From The New York Times:

"In the latest fee to hit the airline industry, Delta Air Lines said Friday that it planned to begin charging a fuel surcharge of up to $50 for booking frequent-flier tickets under its awards program.

"Delta is not the first airline to charge a fee for previously free tickets, but it is specifically attributing the step to the soaring cost of jet fuel."

At least this time I can feel their pain.

Next week, we'll write about a New York Times report that the White House refused to open an e-mail containing EPA findings that don't jibe with the administration's resistance to enforcing the Clean Air Act.

Some of you may be wondering why we're writing about the Supreme Court decision on the so-called millionaire's amendment rather than the one everyone else is talking about: the landmark Heller decision affirming that the Second Amendment guarantees an individual right to keep and bear arms. The fact is we disagreed about what to say. This editorial, which argues that the Supreme Court should recognize only a collective right to keep and bear arms in the context of "a well-regulated militia," reflects the opinion of the board in March. But we found ourselves fractured in our discussion this morning.

After poring through the opinion this morning, I find myself uncharacteristically agreeing with Justice Scalia and questioning the Second Amendment argument I've been making for at least 25 years.

Oddly enough, a footnote in the dissent is what clarified things for me. On page 8 of Justice Stevens' dissent (page 75 of this pdf), Stevens attempts to counter the majority's notion that only some "logical connection" between the prefatory clause of the amendment - “A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state" - and the rest of the amendment is necessary to justify its preferred reading of the entire amendment. Stevens quotes a legal treatise that asserts, “the settled principle of law is that the preamble cannot control the enacting part of the statute in cases where the enacting part is expressed in clear, unambiguous terms.” (Stevens' emphasis) Stevens then claimed that the enacting clause of the Second Amendment is not clear and ambiguous.

I'm sorry if I'm betraying my liberal roots here, this seems pretty clear and unambiguous to me: "The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed."

If it is settled law in the United States that a prefatory clause is not controlling unless there is something unclear or ambiguous in the enacting clause, then I cannot argue with the decision reached by the majority in this case.

On Monday we'll have an editorial about the Supreme Court's decision to strike the Millionaire's Amendment to campaign finance law. We think it's a bad decision that ultimately harms the electoral process in America. See this previous entry for details about the decision.

How's this for a really bad idea? Washington state Democrats want to run an attack ad against the Republican candidate for guv, Dino Rossi. So naturally, they use the theme music from "The Sopranos." The Italian Club of Seattle called the ad "racist" and "beyond offensive."

The ad does make me miss the great HBO show about a family of New Jersey mobsters, though.

CHIP's legacy is healthier children
The nonprofit is marking a milestone: 20 years of devotion to making the area's youngest residents healthier. It has a lot to celebrate.
Think of holistic health care on a community scale, brought to needy children in their homes, and you've got CHIP. The Roanoke Valley has it, rather, and it has been of immeasurable service. Twenty years ago, the father of CHIP -- given name, the Child Health Investment Partnership of Roanoke Valley -- conceived a notion for getting poor children good health care from birth through their preschool years, thereby dramatically improving their lives.
Read more.

Gas tax increase wouldn't have to hurt
State taxes are a very small factor in the price that consumers pay at the pump.
You have to admire the tenacity of Virginia's Senate Democrats, who have passed yet another proposal to increase the state gasoline tax, knowing full well that House Republicans will almost certainly kill it. That tenacity is all the more admirable because Senate Democrats are absolutely right: A gas tax increase is the best, fairest and most efficient method of bringing new money to fund Virginia's increasingly dire transportation needs.
Read more.