Letters are posted as we receive them during the week, and before they are printed in the paper, so check back frequently to see new letters. If you'd like to send a letter to the editor, use this postmarks submission form, or email your letter directly to mail@austinchronicle.com. Thanks for your patience.

Dear Editor,
    In order for an organism to be healthy, it needs good circulation. Money is the blood of the corporate organism and the body is sick due in large part to poor circulation. There is a tight belt choking off this flow. All the nourishment is being collected at the top and the limbs are beginning to rot. I have a simple idea for the correction of this problem. Without hiring any new people or building any new buildings, all that is needed is for the computer in the payroll office to reverse the numbers on all the paychecks once every six months or so. The CEO gets entry-level pay and entry level gets CEO. The "blood" will flow into all the limbs and create a healthy organism.

Dear Editor,
    There are no philosophical discussions, no finger-pointing, no blame games; just a straightforward list that shows where Texas ranks when compared to other states in things like percentage of high school graduates, dollars spent per capita on teachers, teenage pregnancies, number of dollars going back to the taxpayers, crime statistics, the underemployed, income disparity, etc. Makes me hang my head in shame.

Dear Editor,
    I am writing to express my total dismay and near disgust with our current City Council's majority position on the Park PUD proposed at the site of the former Filling Station restaurant on Barton Springs Road. This project is opposed by an impressive list: city staff, the Planning Commission (unanimously), the Bouldin Creek Neighborhood Association in which it is located, the South River City Citizens Neighborhood Association next door to the east, the umbrella group Austin Neighborhoods Council, the Save Town Lake organization, and it violates the City Council-adopted Bouldin Creek Neighborhood Plan.
    Six of seven council members voted for this project on first reading and all seem poised to do the same on second and third readings. Thank you, Laura Morrison, for remembering whom you represent. As for the others, your arrogance with regard to this vote is absolutely overwhelming.
    I'm about ready for an Arab state-style peaceful protest.

Dear Editor,
    This is a coded message. Every time I hear the song “The Cave” by Mumford & Sons I think of Julian Assange, I don't know why. Maybe some of the phrases and the feel of the song betokens a kind of idealistic defiance or will to prevail. I feel guilty that Mr. Assange doesn't offend me (maybe it is the circles I run in) but the fact is, he doesn't. His face is not unkind, bitter, or brutal. I believe if he has done wrong it was not out of anything other than sincere idealism. While I am not anti-government, nor particularly sympathetic to libertarianism as I understand it, I must admit the establishment throughout history has always functioned and maintained power by control of information. Certainly those of us who were confronted by corrupt authority figures in our youth can sympathize with Mr. Assange's burning desire to expose hidden crimes and defeat the powerful wrongdoers who bully us. Assange is the boy who cried out the emperor has no clothes, and I hope society and the powers that be will spare him. In Matthew we read, "So do not be afraid of them. There is nothing concealed that will not be disclosed, or hidden that will not be made known." In the end, we will all know the truth. This has been a coded message.

Dear Editor,
    Here's an option for a solution to the problems with the education system. Pick a few of the "low-performing" schools, take all the teachers out of the classrooms, and fill their positions with all the board members, superintendents, and decision-makers in general. Have them totally and independently run the classroom, handle parent conferences, lesson planning, test preparing, meetings, and everything else usually expected from teachers for at least one report card period, maybe two. Don't forget to mention to them that they must love and care for the 20-odd students in their classroom. Be sure to pay them the regular teacher salary. Make sure the principals treat them as regular teachers, not supervisors. Then let them make suggestions, and include the teachers who were being replaced to decide how to handle things.
    Maybe this doesn't address the budget problem, you say? Maybe start by canceling any bonuses for people getting more salary than the front-line workers, not only teachers but custodians, bus drivers, cafeteria help, etc. Is there any chance that maybe 1% of the military budget in this country could help with education? How about the lottery? Were we told that money made from the Texas lottery was going to help education? What does it go to? And if Austin ISD is cutting a bunch of teacher jobs, how come there's still a billboard on I-35 in Downtown Austin that says "Wanna teach? When can you start?"

Dear Editor,
    I can't believe that we're still fighting about the South Texas Nuclear Project [“AE's Nuclear Option,” News, Jan. 21]. (I refuse to buy into the PR campaign to drop the word "nuclear." Otherwise, it could be confused with the Alan Parsons Project.)
    Forget for a moment that nuclear power is inherently unsafe and that it's a Rube Goldberg scheme to boil water in the least efficient manner possible. Let's just look at what we're going to do with the waste.
    We have no national repository for high-level nuclear waste, and any proposal to make more waste before we figure out what to do with what's already backed up is somewhat akin to buying a house with no plumbing and assuming we'll come up with a solution before the buckets fill up.
    Nuclear power also makes no sense economically. In 2003, the Congressional Budget Office estimated that the chances of a new nuclear reactor defaulting was better than 50/50. The CBO assumed that new nukes would have a hefty federal loan guarantee and would cost about $2.5 billion. To give you a comparison, San Antonio bailed out on the South Texas [nuclear] Project expansion (and sued NRG Energy) when cost estimates reached $18 billion for two new units.
    So why are we still talking about this? The City Council tried to sell our share of the STNP a couple of years ago and couldn't find a buyer.
    On the other hand, prices for renewables are falling. Wind and solar are cost-effective, scalable, and create jobs in Texas. And that's not to mention energy conservation and efficiency. (Who could possibly argue that we need to waste energy or use it inefficiently? Well, other than NRG.)

Dear Editor,
    Re: “The Single-Member Situation” [News, Feb 25]. While considering single-member districts for Austin City Council, why not also consider Austin school district budget woes and efficiencies in local governing (and taxpayer savings) that can be achieved by consolidation? Consolidating city and county government, and adding even the current school district function, into one combined city/county government offers the opportunity for enormous efficiencies – and the incredible opportunity to combine the planning and growth efforts for all three, currently separate, into one coordinated effort. There is the argument that the school district is a separate entity from city government so that "politics" are kept out of providing pubic education, but does anyone believe that politics do not enter into school district board or district superintendent decisions? So, why not consider consolidating the city of Austin and Travis County governments and folding in the public education function (perhaps as an independent division if possible, perhaps even still with a superintendent and elected or appointed board, reporting directly to the city manager) – with only one human resources department, one payroll, one police department (among others)? So I'd propose revising the 6-2-1 single-member district proposal of Mayor Leffingwell's to a 10-2-1 model, with the additional four seats going to the current Travis County commissioners – and letting those four represent Travis County constituents outside the Austin city limit boundaries (and insuring county resident representation). Worth considering?

Dear Editor,
    We are not born of animals, yet at the slightest hint of gun control, we send out our death threats; at the slightest hint of gayness, we maintain our manhood; at the slightest reason for contention, we applaud our baseballers storming the field. The majority of people still believe the solution is to pummel, yet in my humble mumble, I suggest perhaps there’s a better way, an evolutionary way, that perhaps – and take me to court if I’m mistaken – but perhaps we should have so many years ago learned to live together. You know it’s true, you effing know it’s effing true, yet you keep finding ways, excuses, for not living in peace. What is your reason for not living in peace? Because the other guy doesn’t? I know it’s hard to keep trying, but tell me true, do you want to live in peace or would you rather not? Would you rather not just so you’ll have a ready and constant reason to present your argument? God, don’t let this world come to peace before I have my say, before I show my intellectual prowess, for I do not want peace before I myself bring it about. On the other hand, you don’t accept that we are born of animals, yet you want all laws to allow for the legal elimination of those you consider animals, to be hunted down at your discretion. You do not accept that we are born of animals, yet keep in your scope those with whom you disagree. Tell me I’m a liar.