Masks, like seatbelts and other rules, save South Carolina lives

Where is common sense?

Don’t like mandates designed to protect you? Then don’t wear a seatbelt, expect waiters and cooks to wash their hands after using the bathroom, wear shoes in a restaurant, cross at a crosswalk, get a driver’s license, follow safety protocols at work, stop at stoplights, learn gun safety, drive anywhere near the speed limit, require your surgical team to be licensed and wear masks, expect groceries to be disease free, or worry about a couple of extra beers “for the road.”

Americans never liked mandates. Every one of the above mandates was designed to solve a problem that was injuring or killing the population, was contentious when first passed, and still has folks who will not follow it. But every one has done what it was designed to do: save lives and reduce injury to you and others when you follow it.

No politics or spin, just common sense.

- Thomas Balliet, Bluffton

Biden’s leadership lacking

President Joe Biden celebrating the Kabul airlift is like the captain of the Titanic celebrating the lifeboats.

- Blair Lee, Hilton Head

COVID-19 is the enemy

The front page of the Gazette, Aug. 25, reported 1,300 local students in quarantine the first week of school; and it covered a lawsuit by disability rights groups over the governor’s ban on school mask mandates. Brian Symmes, spokesman for the Governor’s Office, is quoted saying: “the only truly inclusive option is to allow every parent to decide whether their child will wear a mask at school.” Nonsense. “Every parent” does not have the right to determine school curriculum, or hours. Every parent does not have the right to let his child endanger my child. The majority of South Carolina residents have indicated their desire to protect their children and keep them in school. But, a small, vocal, anti-mask minority, for political reasons, has been given way too much say. It is time to expose this phony rhetoric of “freedom” for what it is, an excuse for the minority to bully the majority. Our nation has an enemy, COVID-19. Most of us are trying to fight that enemy with the best weapons we have. We want to keep ourselves, and our neighbors, safe. But some of us are harboring that enemy and calling it “freedom.”

- Palmira Brummett, Beaufort

Skeptical of regional energy organization

Senator Tom Davis is participating in a study committee that will explore the implications and consequences of South Carolina joining a Regional Transmission Organization (RTO). This means uprooting our current energy system and turning it on its head. Joining an RTO means South Carolinians are at risk for higher energy rates that studies show is not greener or more reliable.

If we join an RTO, federal control over South Carolinians’ decisions increases. With federal control, comes greater expense and loss of state autonomy. Many South Carolinians, especially those in Beaufort County, cannot afford a rate hike, especially those who live on fixed incomes. We just witnessed the catastrophe in Texas that left many in the dark and cold without food and shelter for their families. With hurricane season in full swing, why would we want to bring that risk to South Carolina?

Senator Tom Davis is a co-chair on the committee and one of the biggest proponents for joining an RTO. Senator Davis has proven to be fair and honest. I hope that he will objectively study this issue and reach a conclusion that puts the best interest of South Carolina and our district first.

- Connie Smith, Hilton Head

This story was originally published August 29, 2021 at 6:00 AM.