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Start playing on an even pasture

Debi and R.B. Anderson
The Andersons own Anderson Grass-Fed Custom Beef in Bland County.

Great news! Big Fat Food is attacking our small lean farm. We receive four monthly farming magazines. About six months ago, we noticed a trend. Sprinkled among articles and ads for feeds, seeds, semen and sprays were articles and ads opposing non-industrial food. "They" are even making false claims that "we" are making false claims. It's as if talking points are being released. When Michael Pollan, author of "The Omnivore's Dilemma," spoke in Wisconsin, the Farm Bureau bused in several hundred industrial farmers to protest. How cool is that?
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Let's work to build a rail system

William E. Baker Sr.
Baker was president of Solar Systems of Virginia Inc. in the early '70s when our need to alter our national energy priorities became apparent. He is a retired U.S. Naval Air Reserve captain.

"Rail passengers travel back in time" (Nov. 9 news story) took me back to 1942 when, as a wide-eyed 6-year-old, I rode the Norfolk & Western passenger train to Washington. My dad worked for the streetcar company here in Roanoke, and was a representative on the Federal Transportation Board. He had to attend a major conference in D.C. and decided to take me along.
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Health information for Virginians

John S. Edwards
Edwards, of Roanoke, is the state senator for the 21st District.

The rising cost of health care is a major driver in the move to reform health care. Less understood, but also a concern, is the pricing of health care procedures by particular health care providers. The wide variance in prices charged for the same procedure from one hospital to another is as inexplicable as it is unknowable beforehand. As Princeton health care economist Uwe Reinhardt has noted, the pricing of hospital procedures is "opaque" to the public.
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Don't blame all for the stupidity of a few

Gibson Brown
Brown, of Salem, is a Coast Guard aviation veteran and writes for the Voices of the Valley editorial panel in The Roanoke Times.

I'm not much on stereotyping. One particular stereotype making the rounds lately is the constant bashing directed at those choosing to smoke. Not all smokers have the exact flick-a-butt mentality, same zero respect for people and nature, same disrespect for anything resembling manners, or smoke the same amount, at the same places, or for the same reasons.
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Kaine saw much progress in his four years

Dan Radmacher
Radmacher is the editorial page editor of The Roanoke Times.

Gov. Tim Kaine would have every right to some disappointment, maybe even a little bitterness, as he prepares to leave office. His four-year term was far more difficult than anyone had reason to suspect when he won election in 2005, and it was capped by a turnover of the governor's mansion to Republicans after eight years in Democratic hands. But in an interview last week with The Roanoke Times editorial board, Kaine seemed positively chipper. Breaking the goals for his term into three broad categories of executive, legislative and political, he enumerated the successes he saw in all three.
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A theater rises between town and campus

Christian Trejbal
Trejbal is a Roanoke Times editorial writer based in the New River.

Virginia Tech is a science and engineering school. It is an agricultural school. It is where the commonwealth's young people go to learn about physics, drafting and cows. If they want to learn about philosophy, literature or the arts, they should head to William & Mary or the University of Virginia. Tech is all about labs and experiments. That is the myth. The truth is that Tech loves its laboratories, but not all labs are for science.
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Marking a difficult anniversary

Luanne Traud
Traud is a member of The Roanoke Times editorial board.

In 2006, the General Assembly launched the Virginia Sesquicentennial of the American Civil War Commission to mark the 150th year of Virginia's entry into the Civil War. That commission has since placed the onus on localities to host and market events, beginning in 2011, that tell the story of a time that divided the nation and to this day still inflames passion and pain. In the Roanoke Valley, the Historical Society of Western Virginia has taken the lead role in organizing agencies to meet the commission's challenge.
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All he is asking is give youth a chance

Thomas Wright
Wright, of Roanoke, is a recent graduate from the University of South Carolina and a 2005 graduate of North Cross School.

Most cover letters start with one's accolades and then progress to why the individual is qualified for a certain job, using the same language and technique for the most part. As a writer, reader and individual, I personally find the same recipe or technique of anything to be utterly mundane and boring when repeated again and again. No one wants to read the same babble over and over unto the brink of cataleptic shock. In many respects it was this concept of mindless repetition that drove America into the 2008-09 recession.
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The public's land is already protected

Steven Higgs
Higgs is a local practicing attorney in Roanoke.

Conservation easements are a poor choice for public land management and preservation. They are wonderful tools for private landowners, because people can limit the development of their land long after they are gone, and state and federal governments offer economic incentives for donating easements. Governments, though, can actively manage and preserve their own lands forever, and because cities and counties do not pay state or federal taxes, there is usually no economic incentive for them to donate easements.
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Hunting teaches a reverence for life

Chuck White

White, of Roanoke, is a general contractor and lifelong outdoorsman.

Every year about this time, we hear from the anti-hunting brigades telling us how cruel we are because of our hunting of poor defenseless animals ("Hunting does more harm than good," Nov. 5 letter). What planet does Rita Ross live on where young hunters are taught to kill anything that moves? I can only assume she was instructed in hunting by an idiot mentor.

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