World remembers 1915 genocide
Kids running carelessly by the pond …
Men in fancy moustaches playing backgammon and sipping coffee …
Ladies chatting as they prepare mouthwatering vegetables and kebabs to grill …
A happy Armenian community thriving in the peaceful Armenian city of Urfa and neighboring Armenian cities until … the Ottoman Turks invade and commit the first horrendous act of the 20th century: the Armenian Genocide.
"The Turks have traversed there, all is ruin and mourning."
— Victor Hugo, "Les Orientales" (1828)
April 24, 1915: My maternal grandmother was a 4-year-old when the mass killings of Armenians by the Ottoman Turks began. When the Turks invaded her city of Urfa, they separated the men from the women.
The last image my grandmother had of her father was him extending his hand through steel bars where he was detained with many others, caressing her golden locks with a faint smile and smuggling a candy he saved for her into her pocket. That was the last she saw of him and other family members.
All the males of the family were brutally killed, the women and children were forced to leave their properties and flee to other countries and continents, which welcomed them with open arms.
More than 200 Armenian intellectuals were massacred and deported by the Turks.
Back in the 1920s Juneau played an important role in aiding starving Armenian orphan babies and raising funds via the American Committee for Relief in the Near East.
The world witnessed the annihilation and deportation of the Armenians; and many lent a helping hand.
100 years later …
The centennial of the Armenian Genocide:
100 years of survival, perseverance, and relentless faith as a nation.
Armenians, scattered all over the world, light a candle and march in memory of their slain ancestors.
Almost every single Armenian home has a story to tell from the Armenian genocide.
Today, the bells of many churches around the world will ring 100 times to pay homage to the genocide victims.
Today, the Alaska state flower, the forget-me-not, will be blooming during all the commemorative services around the globe expressing eternal remembrance and preservation of a legacy.
The world will continue witnessing the survival of the Armenian nation.
A special memorial service will be held at 6 p.m. today (Friday, the 24th) at the Holy Transfiguration Greek Orthodox Church, 2800 O'Malley Road to mark the 100-year anniversary of the Armenian genocide and to pray for the lost souls.
May the memory of all genocide victims be eternal!
— Nanor Bouladian
Anchorage
Legislature is cutting muscle, not fat, using funds to buy its luxury LIO
The Republicans say we need to make sacrifices. Their idea of sacrifice is on the backs of hardworking Alaskans and their children. The Republicans have cut education, broken financial agreements to state workers, decimated the Alaska Marine Highway System, cut funding for the WWAMI program, and are denying Medicaid expansion to 40,000 Alaskans that would save Alaska $6.1 million.
The Republicans are refusing to claw back the $20 million for the Bragaw to Elmore extension project, a project that is currently budgeted at $35 million for 7/10th of a mile of road ($20 million from the Legislature and another $15 million in land from the university.) This is a project that nine community councils from around Anchorage have passed resolutions against, a project that is projected to increase traffic by 50 percent along Bragaw Road within 15 years, if it is built. Bragaw is currently at or over capacity.
The only way to widen Bragaw is by taking land, homes, and businesses. This is at least $52 million worth of tax-assessed land. That is $14 dollars per $100,000 of tax assessed value added to our property taxes.
Republicans refuse to break their $4 million a year lease on their over the top LIO in Anchorage and that is after they spent $7.4 million to renovate the building. The Republicans are now considering purchasing the building for $70 million and they have just stuck another $25 million back in the budget for the Juneau Access road. The Republicans need to stop cutting the muscle that keeps Alaska going and learn to cut the fat they keep forcing hardworking Alaskans to pay for.
— Carolyn Ramsey
Anchorage
Alaskans are ready to pitch in with taxes to meet states challenges
It's been a nice ride, enjoying the oil boom in Alaska, but sadly, all fun rides have to end. As such, we should diversify our state's revenue stream and ask ourselves to step up and shoulder some of the financial responsibility. We should fully fund education, and an education tax would be a start.
We could ask every household to contribute a modest sum of $100 and raise about $25 million. And, wealthier households could contribute more to increase that amount. It's a far cry from what we spend on education, but it's a start.
Then there is the notion of an income tax.
I find it rather ironic that as an Alaskan I pay 5 percent taxes on part of my income to Illinois, so I am supporting the state of Illinois' budget, but not Alaska's. And, if I understand it correctly, a decent percentage of Alaska employees live Outside, which means they pay taxes to those states and not to Alaska. (And, presumably they spend the bulk of their income in those states as well.)
So, let do our part and pitch in during this new challenging time.
— Margaret Eagleton
Fairbanks
Medicaid needs in-depth look at costs
Brent Fisher in his Monday ADN commentary talks about such things as "cost-shifting" and "Medicaid capping." He seems to show very little if any concern for the thousands of uninsured Alaskans living at or below the poverty level. He is sadly mistaken if he believes the Neighborhood Health Center and Anchorage Project Access provide the uninsured adequate access to health care. Instead of not expanding Medicaid, how about focusing on ways to correct the problems associated with current medical payment practices.
Possibly the best response to Foster's "hard questions" would be for the Alaska Dispatch News to do an in-depth article describing the range of costs for the 10-20 most common medical procedures and tests in Alaska, and what Medicaid and various insurance companies wind up paying for such services — plus the associated state and federal laws and oversight procedures.
— Jim Lieb
Palmer
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