Letters on refugees, communism, Dole, Kassebaum, hawks

Brave enough to help the refugees?

Jay Inslee, the governor of Washington state, was interviewed on National Public Radio this week. He has said that he would allow Syrian refugees to settle in Washington.

When asked if he was not concerned with the threat these refugees posed, he replied that if we did not accept our obligation to help these people, we would regret it. He went on to compare the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II and the regret we felt over that action to shirking our obligation to the Syrian refugees of today.

I wonder if he is right. Surely we in Kansas are brave enough to accept the minimal risk to our safety by helping these people at the most dire time in their lives. After all, are we not the home of the brave?

Elephants, refugees

News of elephants and refugees has been reported in The Eagle lately, causing me to ponder the issue of bringing them to the United States, Kansas and even Wichita.

In regard to elephants, these are potentially dangerous beasts capable of injuring people. Most elephants (perhaps all) are unlikely to hurt residents, but anything is possible. These elephants will require considerable care, resources and money. Sure, there are organizations supported by tax dollars and private contributions that are willing and able to receive the elephants. It’s even possible that harm will come to the elephants if they are not welcomed here. Should my fear of elephants overrule my compassion toward them?

Now, substitute “refugees” for “elephants” in the above paragraph. Unlike elephants, refugees potentially will become productive legal residents and citizens.

Epic rivalry

During the past several decades, the world has been witness to an epic rivalry between democracies with free-market capitalism and socialistic/communistic countries with rigorous centrally planned and controlled economies.

After World War II, the division of Germany into East and West and the division of Korea into North and South fortuitously provided natural comparisons of the two economic systems.

To escape the oppression and deprivation of communism in East Germany, so many moved to West Germany that East Germany built the Berlin Wall to stem further migration. As soon as the wall was finally torn down, droves of East Germans fled to West Germany, including two families that settled next to my wife’s brother in Bavaria. They unabashedly expected special privileges to help make up for the years of hardship they had endured in East Germany.

While North Koreans face starvation and are constrained from leaving their communist country, South Koreans enjoy freedom and prosperity in their democracy with free-market capitalism.

But it is only fair to give credit where credit is due. The paramount tenet of communism is that the masses should be equal, something communism is eminently successful at – although it turns out to be equal misery.

Classic Dole?

Apparently, once you are older than 85 or in bad enough shape, you aren’t considered a threat. People can be whatever we wanted them to be in the past. How else to explain Mary Sanchez’s commentary, “Dole is still wiser than many Republicans” (Nov. 15 Opinion)? She wrote that Jeb Bush “is not a pit bull. He’s more like Dole: old school in reason and tone, given more to common sense, not flamboyant rhetoric.”

Dole was the “hatchet man” from the 1970s who was turned loose by Richard Nixon to go after his detractors. He earned that moniker for a reason, clear through the 1980s. He had zero use for Ronald Reagan, who nearly derailed his vice presidential ambitions with Gerald Ford in 1976, and in 1980 desperately tried to get Ford to enter the race when the primaries started as a “stop Reagan” candidate. Yet when Dole was the nominee, he tried to pass himself off as Reagan and brought on Jack Kemp as his running mate.

So whom does he not like now? Well, Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, of course, the conservative of the group. Classic Dole, according to Sanchez: “coyly polite, but telling it like it is.” Funny – didn’t sound like that when he said it.

Class acts

The article about former Kansas Sen. Nancy Kassebaum Baker was delightful (Nov. 12 Eagle). Our class acts from Kansas left Washington, D.C., when Bob Dole and Kassebaum Baker retired.

Too many hawks

The Nov. 8 Eagle Outdoors section featured information on Cooper’s hawks. I think the time has come to consider reducing their numbers.

Driving on any Kansas country road or highway, one will notice the big increase in these hawks. Several times I have witnessed them taking songbirds (and not at a bird feeder). Last summer in our backyard, I had a Cooper’s hawk sitting on a low branch, eyeing our 5-pound dog. And we live in the middle of Wichita.

Between Cooper’s hawks and outside cats, it’s no wonder there is a big decline in songbirds.

This story was originally published November 19, 2015 at 6:04 PM with the headline "Letters on refugees, communism, Dole, Kassebaum, hawks."