Speakout 8/10

I am looking for someone who could haul gravel. I just need a pickup load for my driveway. If anyone can do this for me, please leave your number in SpeakOut. I have located a place where I can buy the pickup load, but I don't have a truck to haul it in. I live in Miner.

I am replying as chief of police in Parma to the person who spoke out about the drugs and drug dealers in the city of Parma. The drug business is indeed trafficking in Parma, as it is other towns in Missouri. We are aware of some of this crime and every possible effort is being made to employ the people to stop it. There are numerous reasons why arrests and convictions are so difficult: lack of trained manpower, lack of resources (is No. 1), lack of help from the Task Force and sheriff's department. They, too, have a full plate in relation to drugs. Parma is located in what we call "no man's land" as far as law enforcement zones are set up, and it's seldom when we ever see a state officer here. The sheriff's department is also on demand. Many requests for help have been summoned; so far, little or no help has been forthcoming. Funding full time officers is not available, so we continue to persevere with the resources we have at hand. The writer who complained has no real knowledge about how difficult it is to get a search warrant, to execute those warrants, to get convictions, and many times to see our efforts out the door with a slap on the hand or nothing at all. Nevertheless, we as dedicated police officers, continue to do everything we can for our town and for America. To the person who wrote in and complained, I invite them to please call me personally. That would help a lot.

The Republicans tell us everything is good and rosy. Truth is, instead of 9 percent unemployment it is actually closer to 20 percent. Businesses are boarded up all over this country. The states are all in trouble financially and crying. The environment has suffered terrifically under this administration, many, many cutbacks. Our national parks now have little funding and don't look like they did in 2000. We are farther in debt than ever before in U.S. history and our troops are spread out all over the world. We need a change.

I've been hearing sports announcers saying Barry Bond is the greatest baseball player who ever lived. Babe Ruth has got to be the greatest player who ever lived, and probably Ted Williams was the best hitter. The reason leagues are breaking all the records, home runs, RBIs, batting averages and everything is because you don't have the pitchers to bring up from the Minor today that you had 60 years ago. You put some of these super stars from the '30s, '40s and '50s in pitching, and see what kind of batting averages and records they would have. Some of the pitchers in baseball today aren't qualified to pitch for a college team. But they're in the Majors, because there are so many teams in the Majors they've got to bring up anybody and everybody. I can recall when to come from the Minors several years ago, you had to be a super-star to get into the Majors. That's why so many records have been broken today. You haven't got pitchers qualified to pitch to these hitters. There's no way that Barry Bond was the greatest ball player who ever lived. I hope you will print this. We haven't got enough time when we call SpeakOut to call in our opinions.

The machine is set for exactly two minutes. If you write your comment down and read it into the machine, in most cases, you would finish reading before the two minutes is up. Thank you, again, for speaking out.

Why can dogs run up and down the second block of Ruth Street when the owners are drug dealers and don't pay their rent (I know the landlord). My dog goes out on a leash. The police tell me to keep my dog inside when she's in heat. She is a house dog and I don't understand this. Can someone please tell me this? I have called animal control and I have called the police. Can someone please answer my questions about this?