Danger

More than 70,000 Maryland women become victims of domestic violence each year, but only a fraction of these women seek protective orders from our state's courts. If we want to do more to protect women, we need to make it easier and safer for them to get such orders. Alarmingly, sometimes women actually put themselves at risk just by going to court. Consider the case of a Montgomery County resident whose estranged boyfriend had repeatedly beaten and threatened her. When this woman finished her court hearing and had received her protective order, she began walking to her car alone.

A Baltimore high school student was arrested Thursday after bringing an unloaded handgun to Carver Vocational Technical High School, school officials said. An investigation into the incident is under way, according to Edie House Foster, spokeswoman for Baltimore schools. The school did not release the student's identity or information on how he or she obtained the gun, what charges the student faces or how the incident unfolded. "The situation was under control promptly, without danger to any member of the school community," Foster said in an email.

It has been 50 years this month since the Cuban missile crisis, but I remember the terror of it. We were hours away from six missiles, each with the strength of eighty Hiroshima bombs, being launched against the eastern seaboard before Nikita Khrushchev called them back to Russia. Jack Kennedy was our President, and we will evermore be grateful for his handling of it. If there were ever again a crisis of such magnitude, which of the two presidential candidates would we want to make decisions: Barack Obama, who seems to carefully deliberate in his decision making ("leading from behind")

I can appreciate that when discussing the "When Thunder Roars, Go Indoors" policy, Donna Franklin, Lightning Safety Program Lead for the National Weather Service, would expound on the dangers associated with lightning (letter, Sept. 20). After all, that is her government job. However, she totally missed the point of the need for a cost/benefit and effectiveness analysis of the "cure" versus the cost. I do not begrudge the cost of putting up a few signs as long as they do not add to sign pollution nor overload.

Soon after President Barack Obama's inauguration, "I want my country back!" became the shrill battle cry of the tea party. Garrett Epps, a legal scholar based at the University of Baltimore, has a battle cry of his own: "I want my Constitution back!" Epps believes the tea party and the politicians it supports are among the collaborators in extravagant myth-making about the law of the land, and the movement has gone from the fringe to the conservative mainstream to the Supreme Court.

Cortly "C.D. " Witherspoon, a Baltimore minister and activist, has been scoping out convenience stores that sell products such as "Scooby Snax. " The glossy package features a picture of a dazed-looking cartoon character, Scooby Doo. A sticker advises that the contents have a blueberry flavor, though the package contains dried herbs, not candy. The minister's mission has been to get such products out of the hands of Baltimore's youth, who are smoking the stuff in hopes of getting high.

As a rookie last year, A.J. Green paced the Cincinnati Bengals in receptions (65), yards (1,057) and touchdowns (seven). The offense also got sizable contributions from wide receivers Jerome Simpson (50 catches for 725 yards and four touchdowns) and Andre Caldwell (37-317-three). But in the offseason, Cincinnati declined to retain Simpson and Caldwell. That leaves a crowd that includes Andrew Hawkins, Brandon Tate, Armon Binns and a pair of rookies to try to emerge as the team's No. 2 wideout.

A program discussing the growing use of synthetic drugs will be held Wednesday, Sept. 12, at 7 p.m., at the Westminster Library, 50 E. Main St., Westminster The program is for adults, and will discuss the dangers of bath salts, Spice, K2, and other synthetic drugs. Charles Bosley, addictions coordinator at Carroll Hospital Center, will discuss the effects of synthetic drugs on the body, the warning signs of use, and how to talk to teens about these and other drugs. The talk is free.

Distracted driving such as texting can results in thousands of lost lives each year. To prove that point the Shock Trauma Center for Injury Prevention and Policy at the University of Maryland in partnership with the Maryland Motor Vehicle Administration has released this  dramatic video to show how someone's life can change in seconds. The “GET THE MESSAGE” video will now be included as part of the Maryland driver education curriculum. About 152,000 people were injured in distracted driving crashes in Maryland from 2007 to 2011 and 1,100 died.

The drivers don't like to talk about it. IndyCar isn't crazy about the subject, either. But there's no getting around the danger of open-wheel racing. You don't have to be a genius to figure out why. Take Sunday's Grand Prix of Baltimore. For openers, you'll have 25 cars racing at ridiculously high speeds around a tight 2.04-mile course in the heart of a city. Throw 25 super-competitive drivers into the mix. Now add road surface changes from concrete to asphalt, 300 manhole covers, blind turns and light-rail tracks and the potential for disaster is everywhere.