Letters to the editor on independents, tax bill and nuclear treaties (Feb. 16, 2019)

Support independents

Howard Schultz explores an independent run for president, and Democrats patronize, belittle and assail him as a spoiler. They fume he would steal their votes and hand the election to President Trump, the latest product of the very two-party electoral system they defend. Their outrage at more than two choices on the ballot and independents “stealing” votes they presume to own suggests our democracy is a sham.

Our electoral process is disgraceful. Republicans have dropped even the pretense of democratic principles to gain power, restricting access to voting and also gerrymandering to win without a majority of votes. Tiny fractions of voters in gerrymandered districts choose representatives in party primaries months before the rest can have a say. Party officials or committees select replacements for elected representatives who leave while in office, instead of voters. Congress has approval ratings under 20 percent but re-election rates well over 90 percent.

Healthy democracies encourage citizens to step forward with diverse, competing ideas. Here, party faithful point to crowded primaries to dismiss challengers of the status quo, but the majority of Americans are neither Republicans or Democrats and only see 50 shades of red or blue. We need to break this duopoly for a real democracy.

Howard Schultz, or any other independent, cannot be a spoiler because the cart is already rotten. Run, independents, run!

Tax cut bill is irresponsible

I could not agree more with Gov. Laura Kelly when she says the Republican tax cut bill is irresponsible. Yes, some of our taxes will be raised, but considering it’s the result of tax policies of a Republican president, what’s the big deal. If he says his tax policy is “great,” it must be, right? Never mind the national debt is climbing ever higher under his so-called leadership.

But Kansas, unlike D.C., has to balance its budget and not go back to a time when the state was starved of the revenues it needed to pay for the services the citizens say they want — now is not the time to cut taxes.

And to Sen. Susan Wagle: I work for one of those factories that is saying it will be taxed too much, and believe me, it’s doing fine. And our young are better served by having some of their higher education funding restored than by a tax cut.

More money in our pockets is great, but not at the expense of our schools, our child protective services, our infrastructure, prisons, or anything else we want to see fully funded. Eight years of that baloney was enough. Lets not repeat the same mistake again.

Talking out of both sides

A letter in the Feb. 10 Eagle (On Missile Treaty, Trust But Verify) used the old adage of “trust but verify” to justify the U.S. pullout from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty with Russia.

However, in May 2018 the U.S. unilaterally withdrew from the Iran Nuclear agreement, or JCPOA, which was designed to keep Iran from developing nuclear weapons that they could put on their missiles. Our allies are still signatories to that treaty.

On Jan. 29, 2019, the heads of our intelligence agencies, all Republican appointees, testified before the U.S. Senate and verified that, at this time, Iran was not trying to build a nuclear weapon, and was in compliance with the JCPOA.

There’s another old adage that says one cannot talk out of both sides of ones’s mouth at the same time. Peace may not be as profitable for some as an arms race, but, in the nuclear age, it is indispensable to life on Earth.