Letters on nonviolence, downsizing government, Brownback math, kitten article, Kobach

Affirm nonviolence, mutual respect

As our nation observes the unrest in Ferguson, Mo., a group of Marshall Middle School students is inviting a new perspective on life in our community. Youth Corps is an inside-out approach to public service.

Antonio Kitt’s leadership classes at Marshall are inviting the youths in our community and those who care for them to join them in affirming the core values of Youth Corps: nonviolence and mutual respect. These values, affirmed by the active citizenship youth initiative in Europe, lead community members to renounce the use of violence when community issues become volatile. Community members resolve to work together with determination and calm for peace in the community.

Marshall Middle School Youth Corps’ values will be affirmed at the Wichita City Council meeting on Tuesday. The Youth Corps of Marshall decided to engage the City Council as an act of public service, to bring to mind the values of nonviolence and mutual respect, and to invite community members to join them in affirming these values.

Careful how you vote

Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform, is best known for requiring candidates to sign a document swearing never to raise taxes, which almost all Republicans have signed. Yes, Norquist is wealthy. One famous quote of his: “I don’t want to abolish government. I simply want to reduce it to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub.”

In the past, I have thought that was amusing. Then I read that our governor declared that there was no problem with the state’s budget. Did he really believe that? Or could he have meant that if the revenue is less than the budget, we’ll just cut the budget, making the government small enough to be worth the revenue we have?

House Speaker Ray Merrick, R-Stilwell, then declared all state employees produce nothing, are a net consumer, and that their pay does not stimulate the economy (“Lawmakers divided on how to plug budget hole,” Nov. 16 Eagle).

Maybe they do know what they are doing. Since it is the state government, there will be no need for the bathtub; the kitchen sink will be deep enough.

Perhaps Norquist is pleased that some Republican members of Congress are again threatening to shut down the federal government to show the president who is boss.

Be careful what you vote for.

Didn’t add up

Gov. Sam Brownback said that the budget shortfall caught him completely by surprise (“Brownback: ‘We’re looking at everything’ to plug budget,” Nov. 25 Eagle). So it’s official: Either he hired staff unable to keep him informed, and thus he is an incompetent manager, or he lacks the intelligence to understand what all but his loyal supporters have known for two years. Or did he intentionally misinform voters about the budget forecast? None of these possibilities inspires confidence in his leadership.

Brownback’s lack of judgment is matched only by that of his followers, who refused to accept the possibility during the campaign that none of what he said had any relationship to fiscal reality. Instead, they chose to believe what they wanted to believe, because that was more comfortable than accepting that what he was saying just did not add up, literally.

No human stories?

After reading “Kitten found freezing in Denver now perky, purring” (Nov. 15 Eagle), I had to ask: How did an article about a cat steal a place in the paper when there are many more stories that are much more newsworthy? I realize that it was a feel-good filler story, but surely there are other positive stories – maybe about someone meeting another person’s need.

Another question: Is the worth of a human being the same as or less than that of an animal? The effort those people in Denver went through to save this cat was interesting. There are so many homeless in Denver they probably don’t think twice about.

Yes, I was happy the cat was alive, but it would have been more heartwarming to hear about someone’s act of kindness toward a human in need.

Stealing democracy

A commentary by Chapman Rackaway asked: Why was polling off in state races? (Nov. 23 Opinion). It’s because Kansas’ “election apparatus,” as New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie likes to call it, is being manipulated by the worst of all Republican secretaries of state – Kris Kobach. In lockstep, Republican secretaries of state nationwide use programs like Interstate Crosscheck (Google it) to throw out voter registrations and votes, often without the voters’ knowledge.

As a former Wichitan who fled to California, where we have free and fair elections, I am gravely concerned that dishonest radical ideologues, such as Kobach and the Koch brothers, are stealing our democracy.

This story was originally published November 28, 2014 at 6:04 PM with the headline "Letters on nonviolence, downsizing government, Brownback math, kitten article, Kobach."