" Our dog Max " - Your Turn - Cranston

 Sorry to read about Colleen Hutchin's dog Max - a hit and run

    victim somewhere on Cranston St. ( page C 5 Jan. 29 )

          Colleen needed $250.00 right away just to bring Max for X-rays

    at a veterinary emergency room . She says Max will need expensive

    surgery for an injured pelvic bone.

         I recall my heartbroken sister in law and my niece, Sue and Tara of

    Scituate , R.I. going through a similar ordeal when their Alaskan huskie

    Megan was hit by a car and required hip surgery. I recall that an animal

    humane society was kind enough to help with the bill. ( I'll get the name )

             Giving the guilty driver the benefit of the doubt, let me ask :

    Just what should one do when do after injuring a dog in the street or on

    a highway ? How soon will the police or the animal rescue league respond

    to a call for help ? Most people might assume that only the luckiest of

    animals is not doomed after being seriously injured on the street .

            Also I must ask why animal emergency rooms must be so mercenary.

    Can't they offer the pet's family a reasonable installment plan ?

          Care FIRST, bill later ! Hospitals for people might also heed this

    suggestion .

Too Much Homework ?

I just read " Too Much Homework " ( Time, Jan.25 ). The

    mindless drudgery of school " work " was at the very top of

    the list of things the 60s kids rebelled against. I remember

    agreeing with British philosopher Bertrand Russell who thought

    that most schools were designed to crush the human spirit and

    destroy the ability and the will to think independently - to

    be CREATIVE . He said that school destroys CURIOSITY in all

    but the most gifted and above all reinforces social hierarchy

    values.

        School mass produces the stultified , repressed personality

    in the interest of the capitalist social order.

            Above all what our society still needs is millions

    of breeding  drudges conditioned to DELAYED SATISFACTION .

         Happiness postponed ...FOREVER !

         No wonder we reward with lifelong job security teachers

    with the deadly " gift " of breathing boredom on every

    subject .

             I still cherish the GREAT REBELLION of 1960s .

Let teens vote !

I just heard on the radio that interest in politics is at an all

    time low among the nation's youth. It is hard to imagine 60s kids

    being indifferent to the impending " crisis of legitimacy " in our

    government.

        Should seedy and reactionary old men like Henry Hyde decide the

    fate of the nation behind august but CLOSED Senate doors ?

       But we must face this bleak truth : too often the MAJORITY

    prefers to just sleep through a political crisis. Millions of

    citizens never bother to vote.

        I think there is a sound argument for making voting compulsory

    in a society that strives to be democratic.

         And I also think there is no sound argument for denying teenagers

    the right to vote. I recall nervously following the Cuban missile crisis

    in 1962 -when I was only 15.

         The experience of my life tells me that the virtue of CONCERN -

    and intellectual alertness -hardly improve with age.

       Should teenagers have the right to vote ? What do THEY think ?

Carothers cons the brothers

           I just read U.R.I. president Robert L. Carother's column in

    the Jan. 25 Providence Journal : " A college education is within

    reach " . I am not impressed with this bureaucrat's mind. Most

    kids who apply for college want that degree badly but only a

    passionate minority actually want EDUCATION.

          They kids see the college degree as a passport to higher

    position in the social pecking order. Can the blue collar working

    class -as a whole -  " degree " itself out of wage slavery ? Who

    would do society's dirty work ? Who will empty bed pans in

    nursing homes and take out our garbage and move the furniture

    of the socially mobile ?

          Carothers is in reality selling a daydream to thousands of

    poor kids. If they should get that bachelor degree, is a good

    job then " within reach " ?

          As long as society is stratified, the majority of working

    class people will be living on daydreams AND buying lottery tickets.

          Kids who value an education as end in itself ( knowledge may

    not lead to SUCCESS but ignorance guarantees failure ) will be

    less bitter when REALITY hits them . Their most likely future :

    a spouse, a family, a mortgage, and a rather humdrum job -whatever

    their academic credentials.

              But nevertheless I wish higher education in Rhode Island

    and Robert Carothers great success !