Letters: KC readers discuss unfair treatment of KCPD, nuclear weapons and Ike Skelton
Fine to attend
Is The Kansas City Star turning into the National Enquirer? So what if a Kansas City Police Department member attended Donald Trump’s Jan. 6 rally in Washington, D.C.? (Jan. 20, 1A, “Member of KCPD attended Jan. 6 rally, chief tells mayor”)
If this person did not participate with the group that invaded the U.S. Capitol, then this is a non-story, and The Star should be ashamed for trying to sensationalize it. If this person only attended the rally, then he or she has every right as an American citizen to do so.
- Gerry Weston, Kansas City
No-nuke future
PeaceWorks Kansas City celebrates the Jan. 22 enactment of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. The 51 countries that have ratified the TPNW are prohibited from developing, testing, producing, manufacturing, transferring, possessing, stockpiling, using or threatening to use nuclear weapons, or allowing them in their territories.
The preamble to the TPNW states that signatories are “deeply concerned about the catastrophic humanitarian consequences that would result from any use of nuclear weapons” and that they recognize “the consequent need to completely eliminate such weapons.”
Nuclear weapons are a local issue. The Kansas City National Security Campus is a plant that makes or procures 85% of the non-nuclear parts for U.S. nuclear weapons.
A 2019 Congressional Budget Office report projects nuclear weapons spending at an astronomical $494 billion between 2019 and 2028. Will that expenditure stop a future pandemic from killing more than 400,000 Americans? Will that expenditure reduce the threat that climate change poses to our country?
Celebrate the reality that nuclear weapons are banned in 51 countries. That number will grow, given that 122 countries voted for the TPNW in 2017. We look forward to every country on earth saying no to weapons that can extinguish all human life.
- Dave Pack, PeaceWorks Kansas City, Lenexa
No big mystery
The Sunday Star reported on views from residents of Lexington, Missouri, regarding the insurrection in the nation’s Capitol on Jan 6. (1A, “Lexington divided over hometown Senator Josh Hawley, Capitol riot”)
Mention was made of Lexington native Ike Skelton, who represented Missouri’s 4th Congressional District and Lexington for 34 years.
Skelton died in 2013, so he cannot now speak for himself. But he was a true patriot. All who knew him know what he would say about the rebellion in the sacred shrine of American democracy, and about those who incited it.
- Larry McMullen, Mission Hills
It’s too real
Am I the only one who feels this way? Back in the early 1950s, I had to take a series of treatments for rabies. This was back when it consisted of a series of 21 shots that had to be given by a doctor.
The shots were given in my stomach. They caused the area to swell and were very painful. My dad would hold my arms over my head and a nurse would lie across my legs to keep me from kicking.
I was truly traumatized by those shots. Now, I see on TV people getting shots of COVID-19 vaccines — close-ups of needles entering people’s skin. I turn my head and grimace when this comes on. It’s not just one shot; they go on and on.
How many others are traumatized by these scenes? TV news won’t show a bullet entering a body or a knife slashing through skin, so why show this repeatedly? I call on all the networks to warn their viewers and to show this scene sparingly so others will not be traumatized by seeing needle after needle piercing the skin.
I am not against the inoculation, just against showing it up close on TV.
- Paul Smith, Liberty
Original intent
Should I assume that the Jan. 6 visitors to the U.S. Capitol are what the authors of the Second Amendment had in mind by a “well regulated militia”?
- Larry F. Glennemeier, Overland Park
What, me worry?
Typically, many of us remark how much the time in office has aged a president at the end of his term. We comment that it must be because of the stress and worry of the office, and how much they affect our president.
Strange thing is, though, former President Donald Trump doesn’t appear to have aged over the past four years. Sadly, we have.
- Toni A. Collins, Raytown
This story was originally published January 21, 2021 at 5:00 AM with the headline "Letters: KC readers discuss unfair treatment of KCPD, nuclear weapons and Ike Skelton."