Guns, schools, victims

OK, liberal politicians, know-nothing pundits and elitists, we have tried it your way for 30-plus years. We have put our children in schools, unarmed, unprotected and ripe to be slaughtered because of your agenda and laws.

Let’s try it our way now. Train and arm teachers with a mandate to protect our children and themselves. You can put up all the locking doors and bulletproof glass that you want, and someone will go around.

Israel has had to protect its children from terrorists for more than 50 years, and it does it with armed teachers.

You had your turn, and the body count is still rising. Time to try a new strategy.

Calvin Oyler

Lenexa

Missourians for idiocy

Missourians discouraged by their failure to send Todd Akin to the Senate can at least take solace in Sen. Roy Blunt’s recent defense of assault weapons.

Repeating the tired mantra of the right that “guns don’t kill people ... ” he blames the lack of adequate mental health services as the culprit for the slaughter of children in Connecticut, blithely disregarding his own hypocrisy in voting repeatedly to cut funds for increased availability of healthcare services.

Implicit in Blunt’s defense of the gun lobby is the notion that the Second Amendment protects the ownership of AR-15s (why not bazookas and cruise missiles?), thus ensuring America’s reputation as the world leader in efficient killing capability.

Blunt has shown himself to be as stubborn, if not as smart, as a Missouri mule in refusing to acknowledge the fact that the murder of innocents would not be a less gruesome specter, but certainly a less likely occurrence, if assailants were forced to rely on deer rifles and single-action pistols to effect their carnage.

It is not an exaggeration to note the obvious, that our continuing national nightmare is aided and abetted by accomplices like Blunt, representing Missouri’s Akin-inspired stupidities.

Martin Zehr

Kansas City

Thanks to utility crews

After Hurricane Sandy’s massive devastation of homes, businesses and utility infrastructure on the East Coast, our nation was reminded again of how fragile our utility infrastructure is and how dependent we all are on the utility workers who make our water, natural gas and electricity flow.

As millions of households and vulnerable individuals lost electricity, linemen from Missouri utilities packed their supplies and headed to the worst of the devastation to assist local utilities in repairing the grid and returning electric service to their residents.

In total, more than 350 utility employees, including linemen, support personnel and supervisors have assisted in the restoration.

I write to call Missouri’s attention to the bravery and selflessness of these men and women who gave, and continue to give, to help fellow Americans in a time of dire need. Without their expertise, determination and, most of all, their compassion, the disaster would have been far worse for Sandy’s victims.

Please join me in thanking these dedicated professionals.

Kevin D. Gunn

Chairman

Missouri Public

Service Commission

St. Louis

Helping less fortunate

Recently there was a story on CBS News about the secret Santa here in Missouri who traveled to the East Coast to help those affected by Superstorm Sandy. As he gave out the $100 bills, each recipient’s face brightened as that person thanked the secret Santa over and over again for his generosity.

This is something that we all can learn from during this holiday season.

If more people volunteered their time or donated a little bit of money, it would make all the difference to those less fortunate.

Grace Doran

Kansas City

Secession move?

Recent comments about states seceding from the United States because of the outcome in the last election are intriguing. Based on their lousy presidential voting records, I think Kansas, Missouri, Oklahoma and Texas would be the best choices to tow out to sea. Unfortunately for them, they would have to attach their sky hook to Mexico and take it with them. I don’t think that’s what they have in mind.

Richard Adams

Kansas City

Pleasing billionaires

There is only one sticking point in the fiscal cliff negotiations, and that is higher taxes on billionaires. The Republicans will not allow higher tax rates on the very rich because the very rich do not want to pay their fair share, and President Barack Obama will not agree to any arrangement that doesn’t include a more fair tax rate on the top 2 percent.

There was a lot of polling during the presidential campaign, and it showed that a large majority of Americans favored higher taxes on the very rich, and Obama has based his position on what the American people want.

The GOP gets a lot of money from the very rich, and it has based its position on that. You would think that pleasing the billionaires is more important to Republicans than working to promote the good of all Americans.

Don Anderson

Topeka

McCaskill’s victory

As a strong supporter of Planned Parenthood and women’s health, I am so grateful that President Barack Obama and Sen. Claire McCaskill were re-elected last month.

It’s clear to me that women across the country rejected the dangerous anti-women’s health agenda that some politicians have pursued for the last few years.

I’ve heard from so many women who were motivated to go to the polls by those relentless attacks.

In Missouri, voters stood firm against the misinformation and verbal assaults on women’s reproductive rights by re-electing McCaskill because of her strong positions on women’s health and prominence of these issues.

Simply put, the election was an overwhelming rejection of an anti-women’s health agenda that some in Congress have pursued. I look forward to another six years of Sen. McCaskill working for women’s rights and congratulate her on her win.

Jessica Patterson

Overland Park

Apocalypse countdown

There are a lot of conspiracy theories regarding the upcoming “end of the world,” and they just keep coming. With an abundance of rumors, what should you believe? Or should you believe any at all?

One theory claims that the world will end on Dec. 21 because that’s when the Mayan calendar ends, but are there facts behind this?

Who’s to say that the Mayans didn’t just decide they had gone far enough and simply stopped on this date? If there are no solid facts to back this up, why are so many people anticipating this event?

Recently, I heard about the Illuminati having to do with the end of the world. According to some, a multimillion-dollar mansion being constructed in the Ozarks will serve as a safe house for members of the Illuminati to be protected during the event of the apocalypse.

Apparently, those fortunate enough to be shielded in this fortress will be used to start a new world after the end of our world.

I agree with the suspicion of these events, but this sounds absurd.

In the end, it’s not likely that we can change the fate of our world.

Nico Mundo

Lee’s Summit

Sen. John McCain:

When you first ran for president, I had positive feelings about you. I, too, am a wounded Vietnam veteran. However, your “maverick” approach to GOP policies has disappeared, and you’ve become little more than a rubber stamp for Republican talking points.

Your recent pre-emptive strike against Susan Rice as secretary of state signaled a new low.

Remember your support of another Rice for that same position even after she repeated administration assertions regarding weapons of mass destruction in Iraq that were false.

Until she withdrew herself from consideration, we had a newer Rice who also repeated intelligence provided to her by the CIA, intelligence subsequently shown to be incomplete and not entirely accurate.

The hypocrisy of your position in opposing Susan Rice was glaringly evident in light of your prior support for Condoleezza Rice.

Susan Rice’s statements — based on information provided to her by the CIA and not on any failure of hers to understand events — were irrelevant to her qualifications, and you know it.

You opposed her for no other reason than that she was in the president’s favor, that she was a member of the “wrong” party and in order to further your own agenda.

Douglas B. McGaw

Emporia, Kan.

Republican hypocrisy

I find it very strange that Republican senators questioned President Barack Obama about what happened in Benghazi based on the information that the CIA gave him. But the senators fully supported President George W. Bush when he took the United States to war in Iraq based on supposedly what the CIA told him.

I guess it all depends on what you want to believe.

Donald R. Ludy

Kansas City