Unfettered Letters

America less safe?

Former Vice President Dick Cheney’s assertion that America is less safe under President Obama (3/16, A-3) is ironic. On whose watch did 9/11 occur? Did the “shock and awe” hunt for fictional weapons of mass destruction keep us safe or rather kill thousands of our young soldiers, create a terrorist beehive in Iraq and sap more than a trillion dollars from our Treasury?

Has warrantless surveillance of our citizens and other disregard of our constitutional rights made us safer or did it encroach upon our liberties? Did failure to recognize and regulate big corporations’ abuses help save us from bank failures, foreclosures, unemployment and a huge loss of savings?

Did the contemptuous alienation of foreign friends make us safer? Did dismissal of environmental problems make us safer?

The truth is that Cheney helped destroy our safety and Obama is doing his best to restore it.

Byron A. Stewart Jr.
Independence

Security rules for private jets

In The Star’s  article regarding proposed new security rules for private jets (2/24, A-1, “Security plans rankle Kansans; Private jets would be subject to tougher rules, angering the industry and state lawmakers”), Rep. Todd Tiahrt compared it to searching passengers in a recreational vehicle or passenger car.
I have been to California in both a car and a recreational vehicle, and we were stopped and searched to see if we were bringing any fruit into the state. Although it was a little inconvenient to us, it was necessary, I’m sure, to protect their agriculture.
Isn’t it worth a little hassle and inconvenience (like golf clubs being banned as carry-ons) to minimize the possibility of terrorists using general aviation to attack our country?
If such an attack did occur by terrorists and we did not have the security in place, I imagine that Sens. Pat Roberts and Sam Brownback and Rep. Tiahrt would be the first to blame the Obama administration.
Delores Straub
Independence

The blame game

Before Jan. 20, everything that happened was Bush’s fault, including the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s responses to natural disasters. Now that tainted peanut products have been sent to the victims of the ice storm, it’s FEMA’s fault.

What am I missing?

Rex Hargis
Shawnee

War hasn’t kept us safe

“Post hoc, ergo propter hoc,” means, “following this, therefore, because of this;” i.e., because one event follows another, the former must have caused the latter. Example: “My taking heavy doses of vitamin C is how I escaped colds this year.”

Many persons unknowingly invoke the above Latin phrase to explain ex-President Bush’s invasion of Iraq and his use of numerous questionable practices and policies as the reason for our avoiding another major attack. I am reminded of the rooster who thought his crowing caused the sun to rise until he overslept one morning.

Ford Thompson
Independence

Nuts to FEMA

Unless you have been living in a cave recently, you have heard about the salmonella-contaminated peanut products. Despite all this widespread coverage, the Federal Emergency Management Agency sent 168,000 emergency meal kits containing peanut butter to Kentucky residents following a devastating ice storm there (2/6, A-2).

Although residents were eventually warned not to eat the peanut butter, FEMA officials were obviously asleep at the switch. Can FEMA ever do anything correctly?

Jane Toliver
Leawood

Gitmo detainees

Sen. Pat Roberts (2/5, Letters) writes that moving Guantanamo detainees to Fort Leavenworth would insert them “into our daily lives.” This is nonsense, the sort of rhetorical cant that has taken the place of political discourse in our country.

Leavenworth has long been known as precisely the sort of community that can handle the toughest and most dangerous criminals. There is nothing about the Guantanamo detainees that makes them more dangerous than the high-security population already present. These are not super-criminals who belong in some phantom zone. The danger they pose to us is not primarily physical; physical threats are readily contained. Of far greater concern is the symbolic value of their incarceration and treatment to those who would harm America.

Sen. Roberts is opposed to closing the prison at Guantanamo. Honesty requires that he state that objection plainly and not hide behind an ersatz NIMBY façade that is disrespectful of both the intelligence of his constituents and the professionalism of the prison staff at Fort Leavenworth.

Jim Abel
Leawood

It’s funny that Pat Roberts fears for our safety if we house terrorists at Fort Leavenworth, yet he is OK with putting murderers and rapists there and in neighboring Lansing.

Has he ever been to a prison or even watched a documentary on prisons? They would probably get better treatment at Guantanamo. Our good old-fashioned, American- made criminals would rip these guys to pieces.

Honestly, I couldn’t care less if they come here. In fact, I bet they are more worried about it than we are. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed doesn’t stand a chance in Leavenworth, and I feel sorry for anyone worried about them coming here.

Shaun Peterson
Lansing

Perplexed by plan to close Gitmo

I am very perplexed by all the chatter regarding the closing of the prison at Guantanamo Bay. George W. Bush, Barack Obama and John McCain have all expressed that they wanted to close the place.

Since 9/11, the U.S. government has spent billions on Homeland Security. Did anyone think about the need for housing for enemy combatants? If we have another attack and have the need to detain thousands, where would we put them?

If Homeland Security doesn’t have a plan, and the U.S. government can’t come up with a facility to handle 200 people, then we’re in more trouble than I thought.

Oh, I almost forgot. This is the same Homeland Security that handled Katrina.

Vicki Bronson
Overland Park

Scale back Department of Homeland Security

The Obama administration will be looking for ways to trim federal expenditures. I have a good one for them. How about we cut way, way back on some of the department of Department of Homeland Security?

We don’t need two-thirds of the security being conducted at our airports, assuming that the doors to the cockpit have in fact been reinforced and are kept locked. If terrorists cannot get control of the planes, there is no real incentive for targeting them.

As for other Homeland Security activities, just check out the new television show where they are highlighted for their drug interdiction program. Why such activity when we have the existing Drug Enforcement Administration for such?

Way too much of this huge new department is simply duplicating efforts made elsewhere. Before conservatives start jumping up and down, claiming that my suggestion will soften gains made in protecting this country from terrorists, let me be clear. I am not saying that the new department should be dismantled. I am simply saying that a hard look should be made to ensure that big, big expenditures are not simply being wasted.

Richard L. Strickland
Mission

The enemy at home

The first attack on the World Trade Center in 1993 and the second on September 11, 2001 were said to be an attempt by Osama bin Laden to destroy the U.S. economy. Isn’t it ironic that our own people accomplished what radical Islamic terrorists failed to do, and they did it without taking a single life?

Given our current financial uncertainty, bickering and posturing in Congress, and with the presidential election just a month or so away, our government appears to be in a state of chaos. In the eyes of our enemies we may appear vulnerable. I certainly hope those in charge of our national security are paying attention.

F. D. Jordan
Kansas City

9/11 happened on GOP’s watch

Whenever I hear people exclaim: “at least George Bush has kept us safe from the terrorists” I can’t help but wonder: Do they remember who our president was on Sept. 11, 2001? I think the Bush administration has not taken enough of the blame for ignoring the repeated warnings by Richard Clarke and the intelligence community that Osama bin Laden was planning an attack inside the United States.

Despite their total failure to prevent the horrific attacks of that day, Republicans continue to claim that theirs is the party that will “keep us safe” and warn us that if a Democrat is elected we might get “hit again.” I find such fear tactics objectionable, even a little amusing, in light of the fact that the worst attack in the history of our country occurred on “their watch.”

The assertion that the Democratic Party is weak on national security is just another myth perpetrated by Republicans meant to frighten the American people. It has no basis in fact.

Bill Lipira
St. Joseph