Letters on campaign ‘news,’ Terri Moses, Brownback, Gitmo, guns

Too much election ‘news’ on TV

Since it is September 2015 and I, for one, am already pretty numbed by the continual efforts of the media to worry to their core every kernel (no matter how insane or simply stupid) of anything that any candidate spews into the fray, and since we will all apparently have to put up with it until November 2016, I have a practical suggestion: Let’s, by popular demand, encourage the creation of up to three television channels to be entirely devoted to political campaigning, messages, advertisements, coverage, pundit comment and reportage, 24 hours a day, and ban all those things on all other channels.

ABC, NBC, CBS and any number of cable channels can have their own special hours on those channels to search out each tiny tidbit of campaign “news.” That way, those who wish to submit themselves to the constant barrage of “information” about all of those running for office can do so while the rest of us can simply watch whatever else of minor import might be happening in the world.

A great chief

Back when I was a young man and in my wild and crazy days, I got in my share of trouble, though never anything serious. I would on occasion run into a police officer named Terri Moses, who was always nice and understanding.

Moses, who is a finalist for Wichita police chief, was always friendly and fair. She treated me with respect when there probably were times she did not have to.

Many years later I started working for the city of Wichita and ran into Moses at an employee function, and I told her how I always appreciated how she treated me. She remembered me and was still very kind and nice. She had not changed a bit.

I think Moses would make a great chief of police. She had all the right qualities and the temperament many, many years ago. Believe me – I would know.

Brownback mess

The fiscal mess in Kansas created by Gov. Sam Brownback and the Legislature reminds me of the lessons I learned on the farm while growing up during the 1920s and ’30s. When chickens come home to roost, eventually someone has to clean the chicken house.

Keep at Gitmo

The use of the prison at our Navy base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to detain the Islamic terrorists made sense. Their fellow jihadists would surely try to free them, or at least destroy the prison.

On the other hand, access to the base from Cuba was very difficult because the island is tightly controlled by an old-style communist military.

If they were to be moved to Fort Leavenworth or to the U.S. Naval Consolidated Brig in South Carolina, they could demand rights, real or imagined, provided by our Constitution. This would complicate the adjudication of their cases and make them seem to be the victims.

Many have forgotten the Cuban Missile Crisis – which occurred when President Obama was a toddler.

Obama’s current courting of Russian President Vladimir Putin and Cuban President Raul Castro almost guarantees that, if possible, he will give Gitmo back to Cuba, give trade unions work on a new prison, and give Kansas a new dangerous neighborhood.

Stricter checks

The media are all over the senseless killings in Virginia, as they should be. The dead were two of their own.

I am a life member of the National Rifle Association. I have owned, bought and traded for a lot of firearms in my 82 years. I look back and I can’t think of any time that I needed the weapon the same day I purchased it.

We need stricter background checks. I know what the NRA is afraid of: Give some of these anti-gun people an inch and they will take a mile. I also know that background checks won’t stop all the killing, as many killings are committed with stolen weapons. But if we could save just a few innocent lives, it would be worth it.

It should be the responsibility of the individual wanting to buy a gun to get the necessary forms filled out. It should require a statement from your doctor on his or her letterhead, from your employer, and from a neighbor or two. One or more of these should raise a red flag, if needed, and should not delay the purchase more than a week.

If you plan to go dove hunting the day before the season opens and you need to buy a shotgun, that’s poor planning and you just don’t need to go. I’m very sure as you read this you can think of one or more individuals who don’t need access to a firearm.

Liberal push

Will the media moguls ever learn that the more they continue having constant stories about shootings in most every newspaper, the more they encourage copycat nuts to do the same thing they have read about, hoping to get some degree of fame as others have?

It is so obvious that there is a constant liberal push to rid this country of the Second and First amendments to the Constitution. Newspaper leadership, it seems, will try most anything to upset enough people to vote out most, if not all, firearms in any way possible.

Probably a simpler effort would be to rid this country of all mosquitoes.

This story was originally published September 2, 2015 at 7:03 PM with the headline "Letters on campaign ‘news,’ Terri Moses, Brownback, Gitmo, guns."