Speak Out A 02/20/03

The A team

I HAVE a plan that will allow us to keep our Army, Navy and Air Force personnel safe. There's a small, elite group that we've been paying millions of dollars to for years and years. So all we really need to do is to send over Nick, Bruce, Jean-Claude, Pierce, Stephen and Sylvester and maybe keep Ben, Matt and Koby in reserve -- and Sean can run the whole show. They could get rid of Saddam Hussein and his henchmen in about 10 to 15 minutes, or certainly not more than two hours.

Wrong number

TO THE caller who couldn't understand why schools weren't making up snow days on Presidents Day and things like that: Stop calling Speak Out and call the school district. I did. I asked why we're tacking the make-up days on at the end of the year instead of making them up during the year. I got a very good answer, but I'm not going to share it, because you could have picked up the phone and called the school district just as easily as calling Speak Out.

Older demographic

MOST TEENS I know work and have their own money to spend. But they are not the only ones needing a non-drinking and non-smoking atmosphere. I am almost 50 years old and would love it if the Cape Girardeau area offered an evening of dining and music and a game room that stayed open until midnight on the weekends.

The real concern

FEDERAL RESERVE chairman Alan Greenspan, in his latest report to Congress, stated that a sluggish economy is due largely to investor concerns about the impending war with Iraq. He went on to say that when the war is successfully concluded, a robust recovery of our economy is very likely. This is exactly what the anti-war crowd fears. All this talk about innocent civilians in body bags is garbage. They are scared that President Bush's popularity will rise even higher after the war and the economy will recover, thus dooming them in the next election.

Pleading our case

WHO WOULD call in and say the United Nations is a sham? It's important enough that our president had Colin Powell go before and plead our case.

Not up to taxpayers

KUDOS TO the recent caller who said 17-to-20-year-olds, in order to find something to do, should get to bed at a decent time, get a job and sober up. I'm always a little bit insulted whenever I hear teenagers whine, cry and complain that it's the community's job to find them something to do. The complaints always sound like calls for taxpayer-funded activity centers, skate parks and water parks. I agree wholeheartedly with the caller.

Choosing your friends

HOW SOON they forget. At the beginning of World War II, France was crying, "Don't let the Germans get us, America." At the end of World War II, the Germans were crying, "Don't let the Russians get us, America." Without America there would be no France or Germany or many other countries. What upsets me the most is the lives of the young Americans that were spent saving these countries who claim to love freedom, honor and justice yet choose the side of a dictator who doesn't even know the meaning of these words.

Why we're despised

I THINK the main reason other countries despise us is because we give them money to make them like us. If we made them earn the money, they'd be probably at our feet begging us for some money. But we're too generous. Most of the time, the leaders of these countries put it in their bank accounts, and the people the money is meant for never see it. The leaders get all the benefits, and the people get nothing.