I applaud the Lexington County Council for not eliminating Veterans Day from the county holiday schedule.

Veterans wrote a blank check to the United States of America for an amount up to and including their lives. Lexington County is the home to almost 25,000 veterans with many more having served in all our wars.

It is appropriate that the citizens and public employees of Lexington County take this day each year to stop and reflect on their sacrifice and commitment that insured the freedoms all of us enjoy.

Thank you, veterans and County Council for preserving this hallowed holiday.

Gary Baker, Lexington

There’s still hope for nuclear

Nuclear power is clean, there’s enough fuel to last forever and it could be cheap.

The problem is no nuclear plant has ever been built under market conditions.

Nearly 500 plants have been built with more in development. All are subsidized by government ownership or subsidized and protected by government officials.

Had free enterprise been at work in the US power business, their cost would be going down instead of ever more expensive.

Now when we need clean nuclear power, we are stuck with a regulated utility system that encourages boondoggles, maximizes costs and allocates all risk to consumers.

It is not too late to turn the nuclear industry over to private enterprise, allowing innovative entrepreneurs to work in an atmosphere where politicians have no say.

Our economy is the most efficient user of energy in the world. We are 5% of the world population and consume 25% of the energy. That’s good. The world economy is better off when the most efficient user of energy is the biggest producer.

Jim Clarkson, Columbia