Speak Out A 10/09/01

Keep the taxes down

I WOULD like to say hooray for Jim Drury, because we are being taxed out of our own town. Senior citizens can't afford the taxes they put on us every year.

Going to extremes

TO ALL who have spoken out against the River Campus project: I think you're right. Arts and humanities are just for people who are too lazy for real work. Let's shut it down and forget about it. But I don't think that goes far enough. I think SEMO has tried to pull the wool over our eyes a few too many times. So let's just close the school down forever. But even that's not enough. Knowledge and learning are dangerous. So let's close down all the schools so no one will be able to learn anything except good, honest, decent work. But that's still not enough. There's still TV, computers and books. No problem. Let's toss them all out and say good riddance to bad rubbish. And anyone who comes to Cape Girardeau but does not live here should be regarded as unworthy of our contempt and thereby ignored. By the way, has anyone ever read anything by Jonathan Swift?

Quick to anger

GREGORY LINCOLN is correct. This is no time for politically correct rhetoric. The anti-war demonstrators, peaceniks, conscientious objectors and others are coming out of the woodwork. Yet as far as we know at this writing, we have not fired one shot in anger. Don't these people have anything better to do? Have they forgotten already that over 6,000 American citizens lost their lives just a few weeks ago? And that this happened on American soil?

Just do the math

I JUST finished reading the comment that "without Drury there would be no university." How ignorant do you have to be to believe that garbage? The university is 128 years old. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure that the university is far older than any of Drury's enterprises.

Big miscalculation

OSAMA BIN Laden's megalomaniac misjudgment of the will of the American people has been matched only by Napoleon's, then Hitler's lack of understanding of the resolve of the Russians.

Best gauge for moods

THE SOUTHEAST Missourian's tribute to newspapers was terrific, timely and true. The only letdown I experienced was the failure to single out the Speak Out forum for specific accolades because of its ongoing role as journalism's greatest method for determining the public mood by daily measuring the collective mind-set of the people.

Our determination

TOM EDWARDS' innuendo that "diversion" and "complacency" will stop us from staying the course in the war against terrorism will not put a damper on our determination to do whatever is necessary to save civilization from this barbarian bane of terror, now and forever.

Role of government

COLUMNIST JACK Stapleton seemed to think the terrorist attack will and should lead to the return of a bigger, more activist federal government, one which will lead us through this crisis and restore faith in our national government. Though he consistently gets praise for it, I have long felt President Reagan's well known dictum -- "Government is not part of the solution. It is part of the problem" -- was perhaps the most damaging statement ever made by a president about the proper role of government in our nation's proud history.

Newsworthy photo

THOUGH HE apologized for allowing a photograph of a bonfire burning-in-effigy of a cheerleader to be shown in the paper, I think it was unnecessary for Southeast Missourian editor Joe Sullivan to do so. By definition, newspapers publish stories and show photographs of newsworthy items. If an adult-supervised event such as this does not qualify as newsworthy, then what in God's name have we come to?