On ‘Rillito park a ‘‘small but important”” piece of Tucson,’ Feb. 23

You know, I have been reading Wildlife for three years now, and this is one of the best writings you’ve had in a very long time. He (Joe Dusbabek) lends a personal perspective on things that I haven’t seen in the Wildcat in quite some time, and honestly it’s gotten me picking up the paper every Wednesday again before class in Harvill. Truly refreshing to see some feeling in your content and not just hard nosed journalism all the time. Congratulations to this semester’s Wildlife staff for the repertoire of strong content and even stronger writing team. Kudos

— Jason Scott

On ‘Thou shalt not mix religion and government,’Feb. 25

And I quote “”the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion,”” Article 11, The Treaty of Tripoli, written in 1797 by George Washington’s administration with Thomas Jefferson’s help. According to Article 6 of the U.S. Constitution (Federal Power), the Constitution, and the laws and treaties of the United States made according to it, to be the supreme law of the land, and that “”the judges in every state shall be bound thereby, any thing in the laws or constitutions of any state notwithstanding.””

The government of the United States was intended to be religiously neutral. Jefferson is not the only Founding Father who wrote of “”separation of church and state,”” Madison (who drafted the Bill of Rights) wrote of “”total separation of the church from the state”” (in 1918 in a letter to Robert Walsh). America’s founders took notice of religious wars and believed that the nation’s cohesion rested in its refusal to adopt or promote one religion over another, or religion over non-religion.

Current leaders should take a lesson from Jefferson, Washington, Madison, etc., who put their personal beliefs (regarding religion) aside and took action to separate church from government. How can state legislatures, unable to pass a balanced budget, justify spending time on SB 1213? Regardless of any person’s religious beliefs, it’s offensive to all Arizonans that the state wastes our tax dollars on this BS while we struggle to maintain social services and jobs in a state void of a budget or leaders willing (or perhaps able) to do their jobs.

— Ariel Tinney

The supreme law of the land, and the only supreme law of the land states: “”Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.””

What that means has been danced around by theocrats for decades. “”No law respecting an establishment of religion”” means you as an individual may pursue whatever religious, philosophical belief you wish to without the interference of government.

The people who founded this nation were very aware of their rather recent history of religious wars that went on century after century. What they made was a country based on your liberty to pursue happiness, which means you and only you decide what you will believe.

Separation of church and state is key as to what they meant by that. You should realize then that, without separation of church and state, the church is the state, and the state is the church, and your freedom to worship as you will or not worship as you will would mean nothing!

— Timbo

On ‘America: A nation divided,’ Feb. 24

OK, after re-reading the article, it’s clear I came to an extremely wrong conclusion, and I apologize for my earlier comment. I don’t know why I did that, as I usually don’t. You have my most sincere apologies.

However, I must disagree with the assessment of the Tea Party protests. The incidents you cited (the “”Nazi”” remarks) are definitely isolated incidents, and you have to remember that there are idiots of every political stripe. There were countless anti-Bush protests that included more rhetoric calling for Bush’s death than there are threats against Obama.

— Kevin W.

There was some clear hypocrisy in this article that some commenters have already pointed out. First: It’s OK to protest against the status quo as long as the status quo was Bush and the protesters were liberal, but now that conservatives want to speak out against Obama’s complete disregard of our founding documents, they are a threat to social order. Second: that media malpractice is a terrible thing when it’s FOX News, but it is insignificant when it is the heavily left-leaning MSNBC.

Holding conservatives responsible is fine, as long as you turn the same critical eye on liberals.

Also, the heated debates that Americans take part in are what makes our civic process lively and healthy. As soon as we stop disagreeing with each other, our civic engagement, and therefore the American experiment, can be effectively pronounced dead.

— Bobby