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Boeing didn’t follow free-market tenets
Regarding several recent letters concerning Boeing’s departure from Wichita and the free market: Most Wichitans share the anger and sadness at how this company’s management behaved in such a shameless and, some would say, deceitful way.
However, any reading of the works of philosophers and economists such as Milton Friedman and Adam Smith would not find an endorsement of lying and false promises. Boeing artfully, and for a long time, concealed its true intentions.
A free market depends upon trust, cooperation, honesty and industry. Without these essential elements, the whole economy collapses – and with it human society, reverting back to a primitive dog-eat-dog existence.
Boeing’s behavior does not represent a true free market but the opposite, which is that any means justify the ends, no matter who is hurt.
HAIG KURDIAN
Wichita
Boeing duplicitous
If it is true that Boeing has wanted to leave Wichita for a very long time, that makes its request for Kansas’ help in securing the tanker contract even more duplicitous and despicable than most of us initially believed. Boeing’s decision wasn’t made until Dec. 30? In a pig’s eye.
LYNN STEPHAN
Wichita
Keep Emerson
As a parent whose three children attended Emerson Open Magnet Elementary School, I find it disheartening to hear of the possible closure of this wonderful school (Jan. 7 Eagle). Had our children not had the opportunity to be in a setting of hands-on learning, patient and caring staff, and a small classroom structure, I do not believe they or the other students would be as well-versed in education, or be as respectful students.
We chose this school because of the smaller size and location in a quiet neighborhood. In addition, Emerson has a long history for USD 259. It was the first magnet to open, and it has achieved and maintained great progress with its students. Two of our children had special needs, and thank goodness this school gave to them the caring attitude to assure them an educational opportunity, which is hard to find in many schools.
I understand the need to consolidate and streamline due to budget constraints. But placing two schools together at the elementary level, with possibly 400 or more students in one building, would lose the smaller structure and the one-on-one approach for these tender minds. There also would be additional costs of busing students from the current location to one farther away.
JEANETTE PARKER
Wichita
Nothing wrong?
Kari Ann Rinker, state coordinator of the Kansas National Organization for Women, believes that rather than pursue restrictions on abortions in Kansas, legislators should focus on job creation and education (Jan. 5 Opinion). And you should agree with this, she said, “no matter what your view on abortion may be.”
Rinker can say this because, unlike her pro-life opponents, she does not see anything wrong with abortion. But pro-life advocates believe that abortion is legalized murder. If they are correct, then one of our first priorities as a nation should be to end this injustice.
Only someone who saw nothing wrong with abortion (or who saw it as a much lesser evil) would be able to say that “no matter what your view on abortion may be,” we should push our legislators to focus on other issues. We might say the same about human trafficking, which is still a prevalent issue. The victims of human trafficking are alive, at least for some amount of time. The victims of abortion, if pro-lifers are correct, are killed.
JOHN MACIAS
Wichita
Evolution of intent
A Jan. 6 Opinion Line Extra comment said that President Obama “doesn’t even respect his own party. Democrats run the Senate, and they kept the Senate session going to prevent recess appointments. Yet Obama made them illegally, with no respect for senators from his own party.”
This comment was in error. When Congress – both the House and the Senate – is not adjourned, either the Senate or the House may recess, but only with the permission of the other. It is the Republican House that has been requiring the every third day pro forma “session” that is being used to block recess appointments. By the way, this tactic was first used by the Democratic Party during George W. Bush’s presidency.
The history of recess appointments makes for interesting reading. It illustrates the evolution of the constitutional intent – filling a sudden vacancy when Congress was adjourned for many months – into the modern-day application in which it has become yet another political weapon used by both parties.
MICHAEL AUBORN
Wichita
Paul only choice
Stop the debates. Enough of the same has been said already.
If one agrees with the wholeness and intent of constitutional property rights, GOP presidential candidate Ron Paul is the only choice. If one wants to bomb Iran and maintain a costly and threatening military presence throughout the world, all the others are the other choice.
That reminds me: Now that Boeing has fully divorced Wichita, there is no reason left for its citizens to find economic favor with the military industrial complex.
RON. A. HOFFMAN
Rose Hill
