Readers react to the air show, eating contests and legislative interns
Air show problems
I took my two young grandchildren (ages 5 and 8) to their first airshow Saturday, and they never want to go to another one (8-23, A4, “Spirits soar watching planes perform at the KC air show”). I have attended at least 25 air shows, including several in Kansas City, and this was the worst.
It started with a one-hour wait to get a bus at Briarcliff and then an additional 20-minute wait to get through the gate. We then stood around for an hour while some band played before Sean Tucker did his great show.
A P51 Mustang performed, and then we waited another hour before the incredible Blue Angels performed. We left 10 minutes before the end of the Blue Angels’ act because I knew the bus wait would be terrible — two hours in the heat with no water available.
The static displays were very poor, and visibility was impaired by the stage, tents and trucks.
I am very disappointed in Kansas City for putting on such a subpar event. It is clear to me now why there was no published schedule, because it was such a poor program, the Blue Angels being the exception.
We should have stood on a hillside and saved money and aggravation.
George Lange
Kansas City
Vulgar contests
Will someone please explain why anyone would participate in the foolish gluttony of eating contests. The most famous is the annual hot dog-eating contest in New York, but The Star’s FYI section for Aug. 24, “To eat, to win,” glorifies a local man who claims that competitive eating is his “passion.”
The winners of these contests receive acclaim and financial rewards. Nowhere in the article is there any suggestion that funding from entry fees, spectator tickets or sponsors goes to charities or food banks.
Folks, I just don’t get it. Locally and all over the world, millions of people go hungry. Babies and children starve in Africa. Middle Eastern refugee camps beg for minimum sustenance.
What must they think of Americans so rich, so greedy and so callously indifferent to the problem of world hunger that we applaud the vulgar wolfing down of excessive amounts of food? How does that contribute to the needs of humanity?
Please rededicate that “passion” to some activity, local, national or global, that benefits other human beings and doesn’t make Americans look like idiots.
Rowena Unger Turk
Overland Park
Legislative interns
The Missouri General Assembly wants to establish policies to prevent sexual harassment of interns by legislators.
Some of its proposed guidelines include “establishment of a minimum number of credit hours and grade-point average for participation,” “approval of all institutional programs that seek to place an intern in the House,” “the right to reject a specific intern/member placement,” “mandatory sexual-harassment training protocols for members, staff and interns,” “a process for handling interns that are not affiliated with a college or university or, specifically, are not participating through their college or university program,” “adoption of a formal code of ethics for members, staff and interns.”
Grade-point average? Credit hours? Are these guidelines supposed to keep the lecherous legislators at bay?
Of the 12 guidelines, none points only to the legislators. That implies the problem is with the interns.
I guess interns need to be smart to be able to ward off the “lecherlators.”
Suzanne Conaway
Kansas City
KCI badly outdated
On a recent vacation trip, I had the pleasure of spending time in the environments of LaGuardia, Charlotte and Reagan airport terminals, with their modern, comfortable seating, multiple quality dining options, bright lighting, computer-charging stations and scores of stores for shopping.
These airports are a striking contrast to the aging, tired, dated and woefully inadequate Kansas City International Airport.
Aside from the curbside convenience of accessing the terminals, there is not one good thing to be said about KCI, with its long security lines, woeful seating areas, shortage of restaurants, lack of charging stations, dreary decor, absence of shops and a general sense of malaise.
It is time not for an update, but for an all-out replacement of KCI. We’re a first-rate city that deserves a first-rate airport.
Bruce W. Morgan
Kansas City
Smoke-free plan
Based on the vote held Aug. 4, the majority of Kearney residents want a smoke-free ordinance for all work and public places.
Clean Air Kearney has been working for the last year and half on raising awareness of the hazards of secondhand smoke. The group collected 621 signatures in support of the ordinance at the mayor’s request.
Because of the large number of supporters, the board agreed to put it on the ballot. The people voted yes, 64.4 percent in support of the ordinance.
We are looking forward to the board supporting a smoke-free ordinance Aug. 31 for the health of Kearney workers and citizens.
Julie Golden
Kearney
Gerson column
Critics see Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump either as a narcissistic circus hawker or a bothersome spoiler who is damaging the Republican primary competition. Few take him seriously.
But as a retired professor of European history, I appreciate the Aug. 21 column by Michael Gerson, “Trump is playing with ideological nitroglycerin,” warning of the dangers of his “ethno-nationalist,” “conspiracy-minded” appeal.
By ethnic stereotyping and making Mexicans responsible for our failures and national decline, he echoes in many ways the manner in which Adolf Hitler came to power by directing public frustration against the Jews as the cause of Germany’s problems.
Of course, few took Hitler seriously. He reminded many of the comic, Charlie Chaplin. But he appealed to the baser instincts of the country, just as Trump is appealing to our baser instincts and directing them against an ethnic target.
Vote for me, and I will take action against these criminal people. He promises a mass roundup and expulsion of these treacherous foreigners.
I keep looking for presidential candidates who call him out for his reckless ad hominem attacks. We would be a vastly different and mean-spirited America if he is ever in a position to carry out his un-American values.
Harold J. Schultz
Kansas City
School funding woes
As I read the Aug. 25 article, “Area schools get disappointment,” reporting the decision by Gov. Sam Brownback and the State Finance Committee, denying requests by Kansas school districts for emergency funding, I actually got tears in my eyes, a knot in the pit of my stomach and an ache in my heart.
What is the matter with these people? It’s hard for me to believe that Kansas authorities could be so uneducated or cold-hearted to deny state school districts their requests for additional funding.
If you are a parent in Kansas, you need to read this article and related reports and stand up for your children’s future.
For years, I was proud to live in Kansas, an education state. But the current administration leaves me so sad and disappointed.
My personal feelings do not matter, however. What matters is the education and care of our children.
Next election we must make a change. It’s our duty. Unless, of course, people are satisfied with the status quo.
Betty J. Clark
Prairie Village
A Summer Day
Maybe I’ll ride my bike, today
If it doesn’t rain
Or, take a walk in some quaint park;
Or, watch birds through a windowpane.
Somehow, brisk aerobics
Leave much to desire.
I’d rather read a classic
Or, poems that inspire!
A swim would cool me down
And yet, I’d really rather not
Be bothered to get soaking wet;
Although, it’s awfully, hot!
The hammock’s most inviting
Between the old, oak trees ...
A summer day
Seems better spent, doing as I please!
Dee Ann Foley Doxsee
Kansas City
This story was originally published August 26, 2015 at 10:00 AM with the headline "Readers react to the air show, eating contests and legislative interns."