Letters on Ranzau and Peterjohn, ‘growth economy,’ Obama, Trump, racial violence

Name-calling was uninformed

In criticizing the Sedgwick County Commission’s decision to restore the Community Health Improvement Plan coordinator, commissioners Richard Ranzau and Karl Peterjohn find name-calling helpful: “Nanny-state progressives” and “nanny-state drones” (Aug. 19 Opinion). Their name-calling is as uninformed as it is unimaginative.

What their commentary instead does is expose their fundamental misunderstanding of the last century of mainstream medical literature.

When physician Samuel Crumbine of Kansas took on tuberculosis, another disease that is the “result of complex interactions of multiple factors, including individual lifestyle decisions and genetics,” he didn’t propose that we simply line up every tuberculosis patient outside doctor offices and hope for the best. He knew that no such magical healing would take place as the result of such a strategy.

Instead, he focused on measuring the causes and effects of tuberculosis and designing sometimes counter-intuitive strategies to counteract the disease. Remember the “Don’t spit on the sidewalk” bricks that used to be incorporated into streets and sidewalks?

Those, among other measures, were not the result of Crumbine’s efforts at establishing a “nanny state.” They, in retrospect, were common sense.

Debate growth

Some time ago, an Eagle editorial lamented that Wichita’s population is growing too slowly (June 5 Opinion). Actually, planners in this area need to consider debating the whole concept of a “growth economy.” We need to consider moving to a “maintenance economy,” or what I have called a “controlled growth economy.”

This debate rose up in Germany in the late 1970s with discussions on “sustainable living.” Europeans can’t really afford the kind of growth we have here. They have way less open land and less resources. The idea is to find ways to sustain the population and conserve the use of these resources.

There are some U.S. cities that have limits on urban sprawl. In California, San Jose and about a dozen other cities have already adopted some form of a growth boundary to limit new development and prevent urban sprawl. Though they get a lot of criticism, the people who move there claim the quality of life is better.

Growth-based economies require resources that have to expand, and keep expanding, in order to work. That means more power (gasoline, electricity), more land, more building of structures, more water, more sewer, more roads, vehicles and everything else we need to live. All these resources will run out eventually. And that day is probably sooner than most people realize.

It’s time to begin the debate about a policy change that has to be faced sooner rather than later.

Obama failure

The Eagle has printed many reader comments regarding the state’s financial problems under Gov. Sam Brownback and has not been shy about including its own editorial criticisms. There is one element of the Kansas and U.S. economies that is conspicuously missing – the impact of President Obama’s policies.

Obama’s failed fiscal policies, his surrender and troop withdrawals in the Mideast, and the miserable failure of Obamacare have contributed to unemployment and withdrawals from the workforce by American workers. The impact of foreign workers allowed in by Obama policies and lack of immigrant controls have also contributed to workforce problems.

These failures of Obama are directly contributing to the dismal U.S. economy. Unfortunately, the president has used his famous pen to try to make his “Obama money” pick up the stalled economy. To put his “programs” in perspective, the national debt is now about double what it was when Obama took office.

We can see that Brownback’s efforts failed to provide the hoped for stimulus, but Kansas is not alone. The Obama failure should be our primary concern this election.

Trump bigotry

Donald Trump recently announced he would “reject bigotry, hatred and oppression in all its forms” if elected president. I have to wonder why he has to make this rejection a condition of his election. If he were truly sincere, why doesn’t he simply stop his bigoted, hateful and oppressive remarks now and apologize for the ones he has made in the past?

Trump is approaching the election of president as if it were a common business deal with contractual conditions. But that’s not how the public considers the election. We elect a president to be a leader and the face of our country.

And considering how many business deals Trump has made and then reneged on, why should we believe he would not renege on his vow to reject bigotry, hatred and oppression if he is elected?

In our hands

The growing racial violence and hatred bring to mind the following poignant lyrics of a song from the musical “Children of Eden”:

“Of all the gifts we have received, one is most precious and most terrible. The will in each of us is free. It’s in our hands.

“And if one day we hear a voice, if He should speak again, our silent Father, all He will tell us is the choice is in our hands.

“Our hands can choose to drop the knife. Our hearts can choose to stop the hating, for every moment of our life is a beginning.

“There is no journey gone so far, so far we cannot stop and change direction. No doom is written in the stars. It’s in our hands.”

That’s it. We have a choice how we behave and how far this is carried. What will we choose?

This story was originally published August 24, 2016 at 5:03 AM with the headline "Letters on Ranzau and Peterjohn, ‘growth economy,’ Obama, Trump, racial violence."