Letter writers’ opinions on ivory, Benghazi and Maya Angelou

Safeguarding ivory

Although I am not generally in favor of weaponized drones, it occurred to me that we could tackle the African ivory-poaching problem on two fronts:

1) The United States could deploy drones with weaponized lasers to provide secure perimeters around mobile elephant herds and rhinoceroses and, if necessary, zap the poachers.

2) The U.S. and other countries could get geological or mineralogical scientists to develop a synthetic substitute for ivory that could be introduced and sold to Chinese, Vietnamese and other ivory markets, which have been creating demand for ivory in the first place.

If the scientists could come through, it would produce enough income to create an incentive for scientists to come up with a suitable ivory substitute and pay for ways to protect the endangered elephants and rhinoceroses.

Dennis Weiser

Kansas City

Diuguid column

Great column regarding inclusion of Maya Angelou in the Hall of Famous Missourians (6-16, Commentary, “St. Louis native merits honor”). She was an incredible woman, very talented, and she contributed so much to our world.

It would be a terrible shame if she does not get included, especially because a certain talk-show host is there. That one really made me scratch my head.

I guess he is pretty famous, but still.

Carolyn Spohn

Shawnee

Medicaid expansion

There is a health-insurance gap that needs to be filled.

The Affordable Care Act health-care exchanges offer affordable insurance. Low-income persons — often working temporary and seasonal jobs — remain uncovered, resulting in Missouri hospital emergency rooms being used as primary-care physicians.

Talk about wasteful and illogical. Both the Missouri House and Senate need to pass humane Medicaid expansion bills to cover these 260,000 Missourians.

Kathleen Kennedy

North Kansas City

Overblown Benghazi

Ever since the Sept. 11, 2012, attack on the U.S. Embassy in Benghazi, Libya, Fox News has blamed President Barack Obama, and the cable news network won’t stop.

Obama has said that people in his administration made mistakes, but Fox won’t stop.

It happened two years ago, everyone has heard it and Fox is the only news network (besides radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh and other smaller networks) that keeps mentioning Benghazi. Everyone knows that Obama made mistakes, and you can blame him for a short period of time.

It’s inappropriate to keep ranting about the issue after he has accepted that he has made a mistake. It has been too long to keep this as a current news story, and nobody else cares.

Robbie Putney

Prairie Village

Curtailing bullying

Bullying has become more than a problem but also a fear. Children haven’t just been scarred on the outside but also on the inside.

Suicides are occurring by the ones we loved and the ones we barely knew. Bullies cause people to feel worthless.

Parents don’t help the matter when their child is the bully. Each parent thinks of her child as perfect, and none believes the kid would do such a thing.

Bullies should be given a consequence by being put into counseling or a helpful environment. Instead, the anger builds from kicking the bullies out of school or from giving them detention.

Fixing the problem now could save many lives. Bullying is and has been a huge problem.

But with the right help, motivation and inspiration, we can save many lives and end children’s fears of stepping outside and facing the world.

Tiana Danford

Lenexa

Recycling important

I know recycling isn’t really in the front of people’s minds, but I think it should be. People are extremely careless when it comes to their trash.

Whether this is because they just don’t care or because they don’t have adequate places to recycle, I’m really not sure. However, I think it would benefit Kansas City a lot if more of an effort were made to place public recycling bins next to every trash can.

Recycling isn’t that hard to do, and more people would feel guilty for not doing it if there were more places to actually put recyclable items. In addition, restaurants should make an effort to enforce recycling.

I work at a popular chain restaurant, and even if we just recycled the extra receipt paper, it would make a huge difference. We continue to waste without thinking about the consequences.

If people in the community do not change their views on the importance of lessening the amount of trash we create, then who knows what will happen? Recycling is a small act that makes a huge difference.

Also, just a random thought, but it would be cool if there were more jobs created specifically for sorting recyclable materials out of trash piles. It’s not the most appealing job opportunity, but they would be jobs nonetheless.

Rachel Smith

Kansas City

Government troubles

Recent revelations concerning the Department of Veterans Affairs hospitals should remind us all that these facilities are under the jurisdiction of the federal government. Slowly, but surely, pressure is on to make our national health system also under the direction of the government, conveniently called “single payer.”

There is no mistake. If the government cannot handle successfully the plight of many of our veterans, who deserve the very best, there is no reason to think that the government could handle the complexity and enormousness of our national health system.

On two or three occasions when serious events concerning the United States or the world occurred, President Barack Obama or his spokesman recounted that he first learned about the occurrence by reading the newspapers. His latest was with the serious problems at the Phoenix VA facility.

I’ll tell you folks, as a World War II veteran, I am no spring chicken and I do believe that part of my survival is to have positive thoughts. With President Obama obtaining crucial information through news outlets, I am content in knowing that he is well-read.

Maynard J. Mitchell

Independence

Capital punishment

Why do those on the liberal left insist on complaining about who provides the drugs used in state executions? Because they want to intimidate those companies into not providing the drugs for the execution.

No one needs to know who made the drugs. But there might be a solution available.

Because the liberal left is seemingly comfortable with the drugs and the humanity of the medical procedures used in late-term abortions, let’s use the same drugs and procedures for the state executions. Make it all public.

Evidently, there would be no pain and suffering and the families of the victims could have their justice. Problem solved.

Frank Green

Kansas City

Help from strangers

Recently, while walking my dogs just west of Interstate 35 on Parvin Road in the Northland, they broke out into a horrible fight. In 16 years of dog rescue, I have never seen a fight like this.

My dogs outweigh me, and although I tried desperately to break them up, I couldn’t get them apart. My hand was seriously injured in the process.

I was so traumatized, I remember very little.

However, I do know that several people got out of their cars and came to my aid. These Good Samaritans approached two large dogs and did not give up until both dogs were separated and safe.

There were several men I wish I could personally thank, and a wonderful, kind stranger named Lisa who made sure we all got home. She stayed with me until I was calm enough to be left alone.

She offered to drive me to the hospital and drive the dogs to the vet.

Thank you to the random strangers — and the Good Samaritans — who came to the aid of a helpless woman.

My dogs are everything to me, and they’re both alive and well today because of these people.

Sarah Estlund

Kansas City

This story was originally published June 18, 2014 at 5:05 PM with the headline "Letter writers’ opinions on ivory, Benghazi and Maya Angelou."