Guns kill

I agree with the first paragraph of Bob Roth’s letter of March 11 about gun control. However, it also can be said that if we place 50 American schoolchildren in a classroom in Australia, or in a classroom in Israel, their chance of not being shot, or shot at, would be greatly improved. With respect to his second paragraph, the facts are a little different than stated. Although I could not find data for 2017, research indicates that during 2010 through 2014, according to the FBI, there were 43,002 murders with firearms, while there were 8,109 murders using a knife or cutting instrument. The numbers for 2016 are: guns — 10,182; knives — 1,604. Information is available at ucr.fbi.gov.

Michael O’Leary

Redmond

Fight Alzheimer’s

At an estimated cost of $259 billion annually — including $175 billion in Medicare and Medicaid payments — Alzheimer’s is the most expensive disease in the country, and is the only leading cause of death in the United States that cannot be prevented, cured or slowed.

Congress has a chance to take decisive action by passing the Building Our Largest Dementia Infrastructure for Alzheimer’s Act (S. 2076/H.R. 4256). The BOLD Infrastructure for Alzheimer’s Act would improve the nationwide response to this public health crisis by advancing effective public health interventions across the country and in Oregon. The legislation would provide resources to state and local public health officials to increase early detection and diagnosis, reduce risk, prevent avoidable hospitalizations, reduce health disparities, support the needs of caregivers and support care planning for people living with the disease.

Alzheimer’s disease has affected my life. After living with Alzheimer’s for many years, my grandmother passed away in 2013. Striving to honor her, I worked in long-term care, providing meaningful activities for individuals living in a memory care community. My experience has fueled my passion of advocating for those affected by Alzheimer’s.

Join me in asking Sens. Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley and Rep. Greg Walden to fight for the millions of Americans affected by Alzheimer’s by sponsoring the BOLD Infrastructure for Alzheimer’s Act. Learn more at www.alz.org.

Kaithlyn Bertholet

Bend

Letter made specious argument

Jerry Wright’s attempt to conflate First and Second Amendment rights (March 24 guest column) devolved into a defense of AR-15s. He is however, partially correct about war weaponry that evolved into civilian arms.

When I turned 16, my father bought me a WWII surplus .30-06 for deer hunting with his NRA discount. He would not, however, been able to buy a .50-caliber Browning machine gun like the one he was using when wounded as a Marine in the Battle of Tinian. He could not buy hand grenades, mortar tubes or a flamethrower. These weapons were designed solely to kill humans and not protected by the “right to bear arms.”

The argument that civilians buy AR-15s for hunting rodents (dangerous, and messy at best), protection against invasion by foreign forces or U.S. government tyranny, is specious. To state that free citizens are protected by the Second Amendment to have access to all “current and future” forms of weaponry is ludicrous.

And yes, I am a gun owner.

Larry Cole

Redmond

What does Walden think?

I may be missing something from Rep. Greg Walden, but I am assuming he is following along with the president in making changes to the Republican principles and beliefs. I believe the party is very different than it has been in the past. Some key Democratic party beliefs are adopted as Republican, and the party is growing close to the labor unions, which contain much of the president’s base. The latest budget that was signed by the president is off base with prior Republican plans and is more like a Democratic party deficit budget. Maybe he is expressing his disagreement privately among his colleagues in the House and not to his constituents.

Allen Wright

Bend