Can’t we just watch a Chiefs game without all the commentary? I blame ‘Sesame Street’
Let us focus
I have noticed the broadcasts of Chiefs games are interspersed with nonessential commentary from the sidelines and the announcers’ booth. My belief is someone making these decisions thinks the viewing public wants this. My preference is to simply watch the game.
As a retired teacher, I blame “Sesame Street” for making people need a topic change every 20 seconds.
Perhaps we could dispense with the interruptions?
- Ruth Kauffman, Mission
Dawson’s grace
I was born in Greenwich, Connecticut, and became a lifelong Chiefs fan watching the AFL in the mid-1960s as a 6-year-old. My older brother picked Oakland, so it only made sense for me to pick Kansas City. Len Dawson became my idol.
I got engaged at Arrowhead Stadium in October 1992, where I had a banner flown overhead asking my girlfriend to marry me. She said yes. My first child was a daughter. My second child was a son. I named him Dawson after Lenny the Cool.
Dawson wore No. 16 on every jersey in every sport he played. When he was 9, we went to Canton, Ohio, for the Hall of Fame inductions of Marcus Allen and Hank Stram. Both of us wearing our No. 16 jerseys, we met Len himself. I told him my son was named after him. He shook my hand. What a thrill.
We somehow got tickets to Super Bowl LIV, and I wore my Len Dawson jersey under my Patrick Mahomes jersey that great day.
Thank you and rest in peace, Len Dawson. May you be matriculating down the field in heaven with Hank.
- Mike Kipniss, Milton, Georgia
Saw me safe
While leaving an office building several years ago, I noticed a man walking next to me, making sure I was getting through the parking lot safely. When at my car, we visited for a while. This kind man was Len Dawson.
- Drew Bodner, Overland Park
Paid our way
We worked our tails off and did without on teacher salaries to get our two kids through college debt-free. Now we have to pay off others’ loans as well. How can that be anything close to fair? My daddy taught me that if you incur a debt, you pay it off. I’m pretty sure we know how to vote in the midterms.
- Teresa Long, Grain Valley
Cheney’s oath
The Aug. 25 letter to the editor under the subheadline “Unrepresentative” complaining that Rep. Liz Cheney “flagrantly violated her duty to represent her constituents” is based on a false conclusion. (8A)
All men and women elected to the U.S. Congress swear an oath to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. By their sworn oath, they are required to put their country above the state or congressional district from which they were elected.
Members of Congress do not pledge allegiance to any person, party or state. Their only oath is to the Constitution of the United States. By that single standard of patriotism, every Republican member of Congress from Kansas and Missouri pales compared with Cheney.
While I disagree with Rep. Cheney on a few issues, I wish more members of Congress understood their oath and put their country above their reelection with the fortitude she has displayed.
- William Vaughn, Wellsville
Split the difference
Jon McCormick, president and CEO of the Retail Grocers Association of Kansas and Missouri, complained about credit card fees in an Aug. 26 letter to the editor. (7A) I have a proposal for him and all other retailers with this problem: I’d be happy to pay you with cash or a check if you give me a discount for doing so. If you cut the cost of my purchase by half of what your fee would have been, we both win.
- Nancy Fox, Overland Park
Reconsidered
Dear Sen. Josh Hawley:
Congratulations on making national headlines by showing your famous fist pump in support of the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol and its subsequent violence.
You have embarrassed our state. In my more than 50 years of taking part in our elections, voting for you will always be one of my greatest blunders.
- Jerry Soetaert, Parkville
Road hazard
Wornall Road, which has been under construction in various places for 30 years, is closed at Red Bridge Road. This is an inconvenience to locals who use it. The last two times I went by that intersection, there were no workers, only equipment sitting.
I assume the Kansas City Public Works Department is on top of this as usual.
- Mike Neenan, Leawood
Who’s extreme?
Amanda Adkins lost to Rep. Sharice Davids two years ago, but she again seeks to represent us in Congress. In her Aug. 25 guest commentary in The Star, she attempts to hide how extreme she is. (9A, “Decisions about abortion should be made in Kansas, not in DC”)
She says she opposes “government overreach in our lives.” Does she really? She may claim she would oppose a federal ban on abortion, but she wants that power to go, as she puts it, to “we the people.” That is, she wants the government of Kansas to force pregnant women against their will to carry their pregnancies to term. Tell me why that isn’t “overreach.”
“We the people” in Kansas recently settled that issue. Government needs to stay out of woman’s reproductive lives, we said.
Let’s leave the decision of what to do with a woman’s body where it really belongs: to the woman, not to the government
- Max J. Skidmore, Overland Park