Dear Clay Chastain

Like you, I, too, once lived in Kansas City. I lived there all my life, but at retirement age, I moved away.

We enjoyed living there and still like to drive into town to enjoy its amenities. But, not being a resident, I no longer have a vote in its operations.

I sacrificed that when I moved away. You also moved away from Kansas City and no longer have a vote there.

Why don’t you just leave the city alone and let Kansas City’s elected officials make the decisions? If you don’t, it’s only a matter of time until some wise citizen organizes a campaign and gets a petition to stop your meddling.

Give it up.

Joe Magerl

Raymore

Mr. Clay Chastain, a couple thoughts:

1) Give it a rest.

2) Leave us alone.

Bob Buxbaum

Lee’s Summit

Republican abuses

Republican members of Congress for the last four years have blocked everything they could in an effort to make President Barack Obama fail. Instead, they should tax the rich who have helped them win re-election year after year.

America knows what is going on. The middle class and working poor carry the mistakes on their backs and wallets. Enough is enough.

It’s unacceptable that lawmakers give themselves raises for doing nothing. They should be replaced.

No more outsourcing American jobs and no more union-busting. Sen. Mitch McConnell, you said your job was to make Obama a one-term president.

Republicans’ campaign money is from super political action committees, Karl Rove, the Koch brothers and the casino owners. Your hatred for our first black president is sickening to Americans.

Your party blew taxpayers’ money for eight years and the millions of surplus dollars that President Bill Clinton left. We are tired of your greed and abuse of power to make yourselves millionaires.

Florentino Camacho Jr.

Kansas City

Weakening family fabric

Rockhurst High School’s recently announced program to test all students for drugs and alcohol may be well-intentioned, but it’s misguided (1-4, A1, “Rockhurst High School to drug test all students”). I am sure this approach was sanctioned by all the stakeholders in focus groups and consulting experts.

The net effect, however, will be to transfer an important parental responsibility to the school. Yes, both parents are working and students are stressed and overly programmed, but Rockhurst would be better advised to search for ways to enhance parental engagement and involvement with their teenagers’ lives.

This new approach will contribute to parents abdicating even further their responsibility for raising their children. Why bother to address your teenager’s problems when the school will cover it in the next drug test?

Sure, the equation is different today, but substance abuse and teenage growing pains are not new phenomena.

The focus should be to help youths make better decisions with the support of their parents.

Ultimately that youth needs to grow into a self-reliant adult capable of negotiating the world effectively. Rockhurst’s drug-testing policy detracts from that goal and weakens the fabric of the family at the same time.

Tom Owens

Kansas City

Respect and admiration

As a longtime subscriber to The Star, I have enjoyed and respected the opinions of my two favorite conservative columnists, Kathleen Parker and David Brooks.

While I tend to disagree with their politics, their opinions never come off as hate-filled, racially mean-spirited or uncompromising.

With some right-wing opinion writers, both in The Star and other newspapers, one can almost see the hatred and disdain oozing from the pages when they write about President Barack Obama or the Democratic Party.

But none of that exists with Brooks or Parker.

My parents often reminded me that “it’s not always what you say that matters, but how you say it.”

David Brooks and Kathleen Parker “say it” in a manner that commands both respect and admiration.

Eddie L. Clay

Grandview

Government openness

Congratulations to House Speaker John Boehner. It is my understanding that he finally came to his senses and stated that there would be no more one-on-one meetings with President Barack Obama or Obama’s Democratic minions.

It would be advantageous for all of the hearings and bantering taking place to be viewed by the American public so we all could know who the real problem children are in these meetings and who said what to whom. This would eliminate all the ridicule, dishonesty and fabrication being told by a few who only want their views to be known and reap all of the photo shoots afterward.

If my memory serves me right, wasn’t it Obama who promised all bills would be posted 72 hours before being voted on and said how transparency would be his newest theme? According to PolitiFact.com, Obama has made more than 500 promises, and as of Friday 23 percent had been broken, with 25 percent compromised, 3 percent stalled and 26 percent still in the works.

I believe our Native Americans said it best: the man speaks with a forked tongue.

DeWayne Steele

Kansas City

Golden Rule missing

In times of national disaster, the people of the United States have always helped one another. We knew that we were stronger as a nation, and a local example would be the federal relief during the Dust Bowl years.

However, the representatives from Kansas shamed every Kansan when they voted against the Hurricane Sandy relief bill. They should impeach Reps. Kevin Yoder, Mike Pompeo, Lynn Jenkins and Tim Huelskamp as embarrassments.

All voted against aiding our fellow Americans when they were most vulnerable and in great need. Kansas is not an island, and these ultra-right-wing people are viewed on our national stage as the mean-spirited, worst examples of legislators we could have ever been saddled with. How do you teach care and concern for your fellow man when amateurs like these hold power?

Start with the Golden Rule: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”

John Kovelan

Lenexa

Sportsmen and firearms

I think it would be embarrassing for anyone who thinks of himself as a good hunter to attack a deer with a semi-automatic weapon. If you can’t take the deer out with one to two shots, go home and do something else.

I had relatives who hunted, but they used a single-shot long rifle or a bow and arrow. I do realize that when you blow the buck into pieces it will be easier to carry.

Be a sportsman. Give the animal a chance.

Unless you were planning on taking on the Army or police, you just don’t need semi-automatic weapons.

You were not planning that, were you?

Richard C. Lumpkin

Prairie Village

Dark days of crime

Back in the gangster era, which was a subchapter of the Great Depression, highly publicized kidnappings for ransom by social misfits such as Machine Gun Kelly, “Creepy” Alvin Karpis and Bruno Hauptmann (convicted of murdering the Lindbergh baby he stole from his crib) sprang up.

It was a fearsome mini-crime wave leading The New York Times to run a periodic feature with label heads like “Progress of Kidnap War,” “The Drive on Crime” and “The Kidnapping Situation.”

Today’s mass-shooting tragedies, unstopped, could push us back to something like those dark, forgettable days.

Stanley Hamilton

Lawrence

Intelligent video games

Video games aren’t the best use of your time, but they have lots of purpose. Some people may say video games serve no purpose.

Well, this is not true. Have you ever even thought what they are designed for?

They are here to let kids get away from things and relax. Just like watching TV or texting on the phone or surfing the World Wide Web.

They also can teach you facts about things in history or specific items in modern times. Most games are based on real people and facts about them.

Some people might also say that you are wasting valuable time. But with modern technology, while playing a game you are also communicating with the outside world and meeting people you would have never met otherwise. Video games aren’t a waste of time and do serve a purpose.

Tanner Richardson

Blue Springs

Obama’s war on women

So far, it’s an ol’ boys’ club in the new cabinet of President Barack Obama. Where’s the left with the cries of the war on women?

Where’s NOW? Can you imagine the backlash if Mitt Romney didn’t consult his “binders” for one of these leadership positions?

Kate O’Neill Rauber

Kansas City