Letters: KC readers discuss border facilities, antifa antecedents, filibuster reform
In a name
The same buildings built during the Obama-Biden administration as “immigration facilities” were later dubbed “cages” during the Trump years. They used chain-link fencing as dividers within their walls.
Until now, they hadn’t been given a label under President Joe Biden’s administration because the media hadn’t been allowed inside. Finally this week, reporters were allowed inside a Texas facility. Vastly overcrowded, with people sleeping on floors with the all-to-familiar silver blankets, conditions are terrible, but the fenced dividers have been replaced by plexiglass. Now the units, which can be found in any pet store, are called “pods.”
Isn’t semantic renovation wonderful? It’s easy, cheap and politically correct.
- Tony Bradley, Kansas City
From out west
I’m a broken-down old novelist who lives in Henderson, Nevada, a suburb of Sin City. I saw The Star’s stories about Kansas Senate Majority Leader Gene Suellentrop’s arrest and the convoluted, labyrinthine maze that the Kansas Highway Patrol and its lawyers have set up for your reporters in their search of fact and truth. (March 31, 10A, “DUI death should be a wake-up call for Suellentrop, Kansas GOP”)
In the midst of my astonished laughter, I recalled Dorothy, who famously said, “Toto, I’ve a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore.”
- Roy Hayes, Henderson, Nevada
Not our voices
The Kansas City Star Editorial Board said what we already know: Members of Missouri’s Republican legislature “hate the poor.” (March 26, 12A, “Medicaid vote in Missouri rejects reason, law, voters”) They’re refusing to implement Medicaid expansion, a powerful voter initiative that would give thousands of poor Missourians health insurance. Our Republican-dominated legislature eliminates voter initiatives with impunity.
Remember the Clean Missouri act, the ethics and redistricting reform bill intended to even the voting playing field? Missouri voters overwhelmingly supported and voted for it. The scheming legislators would not have it. So, they devised the confusingly worded Amendment 3 last fall, just in time to wipe out fair, equitable redrawing of voting districts.
Now, state Rep. Cody Smith from Carthage has introduced a bill to stall phased-in minimum-wage increases voters approved in 2018. (March 31, 1A, “Missouri lawmaker wants to delay wage increase”) Initially, he tried to abolish the increases altogether. Republicans passed a law in 2017 to prohibit cities from setting minimum wages. This led to the successful voter initiative in 2018 that Smith is trying to wipe out.
This pattern of overturning voter initiatives is despicable. Calls and letters to legislators have absolutely no impact. Why do we retain these self-serving legislators who reject and repeal voter initiatives over and over? Do you care? I do.
- Dorothy Whited, Kansas City
Why is that bad?
What does “antifa” mean, and where did it originate? And why are Donald Trump and his fans so concerned about it?
Not knowing anything about the name, I researched it. I found that it has roots in Antifaschistische Aktion, an organization formed in Germany in 1932 to resist fascist forms of government. Antifaschistische Aktion failed, and millions of people lost their lives in World War II and the Holocaust.
The most basic definition definition of fascism is a way of organizing a society in which a government, ruled by a dictator, controls the lives of the people using a very harsh form of authority. Think about that.
Why is Trump so against antifa? What form of government does he envision for the American people and what role does he envision himself playing in that government?
From what I can discern, the modern incarnation of antifa has no specific leader or organization. It is more of a philosophical way of looking at a government and law enforcement.
- James P. Gann, Lanagan, Missouri
Model rules
I propose that the U.S. Senate reform the filibuster to treat senators with the respect now provided to Georgia voters. Filibustering senators would have to stand outside regardless of the weather, waiting for eight hours or more. It would be illegal to provide them food or drink. And their eventual votes against the pending measure would be derided as illegally cast and fraudulent.
- Peter Sloan, Kansas City