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OpinionDecember 1, 2002

Got off too easy I WOULD like to say a big thank you to the Southeast Missourian for the article on the insurance agent and her stealing. As one of her victims, I think she got off too easy. I'm very disappointed in the prosecutor's office and legal system at this point. The police worked very hard on this case only to see the woman given very little punishment. I think this sends a message to the others that it's OK to steal from your clients...

Got off too easy

I WOULD like to say a big thank you to the Southeast Missourian for the article on the insurance agent and her stealing. As one of her victims, I think she got off too easy. I'm very disappointed in the prosecutor's office and legal system at this point. The police worked very hard on this case only to see the woman given very little punishment. I think this sends a message to the others that it's OK to steal from your clients.

Church support

I HAVE been looking for a church to join here in Cape Girardeau, but I would never join one that does not support my country and my president in time of war.

Gift certificates, please

TO OUR children and grandchildren: Please don't get us any Christmas presents. We have so many things now we don't need. Dad has enough ties and socks he'll never wear, and I have things I don't need. Every Christmas when we open our gifts, our hearts fall to the floor. What we really need is gift certificates we can use for medicine and food. I think I'm speaking for all our elderly people.

Union effect on pay

I'M CALLING about the "Getting a fair share" comment in Speak Out where someone says he is really tired of people attacking unions all the time. Unions didn't come up with the 40-hour week and overtime pay. There are a lot of other people who are hardworking and never get what they're worth because of the unions. Most businesses can't afford to pay more than minimum wage. So the unions have done a lot more bad than they have good. Unions are overpaid while other people doing the same job are underpaid.

Internet taxation

IF I get in my car and travel to Kentucky and purchase something at a mall, I pay sales tax in Kentucky. But if I get on the Internet and order something from the same mall in Kentucky, I'm supposed to owe taxes to Missouri. I just don't understand the rationale. I don't understand how they're ever going to come up with an equitable taxing system on the Internet. I don't understand how they're ever going to be able to collect the tax.

No terror training

THE SCHOOL of the America's does not train terrorists. It is a course of instruction in unconventional types of warfare such as covert operations, special demolitions and small-unit tactics. It does not teach its students to blow up school buses, bomb malls, fire automatic weapons into the grandstands at sporting events, take hostages, hijack planes or carry out suicide missions. It teaches techniques that are designed to be used against an organized military force, not to use terror against civilian populations as a means to an end. Some who have attended in the past may have turned to terrorism, but that is not the intent of the school. It is, however, the intent of the terrorist training camps in Saudi Arabia, Syria and Palestine.

Just common sense

WHERE ON Earth do people get the idea that Republicans are willing to poison our environment for monetary gain? That does not pass the common sense test. We have to live in the environment too. What we want is a return to common sense. We can build with wood which requires the cutting of trees, or we can build with steel which requires the mining of metals, or we can build with materials like adobe which would require us to dig huge holes in the ground and ruin the landscape and make large portions of the land unable to support plant life. Wood is our only renewable building material, and there are more acres of forest now than at the end of the 19th century. The American people, including Republicans, are smart enough to know these things, and few would agree with the rape of the environment.

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Lovingly critical

I KNOW that this will be hard for some to grasp, but it is possible to love your country and still be critical of the government and its foreign policy.

Setting us straight

I HAVE noted with interest the various comments regarding our possible actions in Iraq. One recent caller went so far as to suggest the United States is responsible for innocent civilian deaths because of sanctions imposed upon Saddam Hussein's regime and implied we have used biological and chemical weapons against someone ourselves, although the caller did not say whom. It was Saddam Hussein who used these weapons against Iran and his own people. It was Hussein who invaded Kuwait. It is Hussein who has repeatedly impeded the process of inspections and has continued to develop restricted weapons. It is Hussein who rakes in billions in oil revenue yearly and still starves his people. And it is the same talking heads -- who insisted on sanctions in 1990-1991 rather than war to get Hussein to peacefully pull out of Kuwait and comply with U.N. resolutions -- who now say the sanctions are bad and we are responsible for innocent deaths.

MoDOT doing good job

I HAVE read the articles and Speak Out comments about the Missouri Department of Transportation and highway conditions and could not help but laugh at the variety of views. One complains about the Diversion Channel project and why people aren't "working around the clock." Another comment deals with how bad our roads are. I have driven in a number of states and know from experience that even though our roads are not as good as they were 15 years ago, our state has done a good job keeping them better than most every other state. MoDOT only gets 61 percent of the revenue collected from fuel taxes and licenses. My business uses the state's and nation's highways, I wish that the $650,000 annually we pay in fuel taxes and the $130,000 we pay in license fees would be used to maintain our infrastructure, whether it is for roads or law enforcement. MoDOT, thank you for your hard work. Keep it up. There are those of us users who appreciate your efforts.

Top-rate leadership costs

IT IS very easy to be critical of the pay and perks won by the new president of the University of Missouri. It also makes good political fodder for the state's politicians to thump their chests over. Lest we shoot ourselves in the foot I think that the people of Missouri need to do their own thinking on this issue and filter all the media rhetoric floating about. It is no more the fault of the residents of Missouri than it is of the governing board of the university that our society has reached a level where all the money goes to those at the top. I am the first to agree that it is ridiculous what CEOs make. However, do we want to run our university into the ground because we will not go the market value for first-class leadership?

Less dependency

YEA FOR hybrid cars. They will lessen our need for oil in the long run. Yea for solar and wind power technology. They will lessen our need to dominate the Middle East with risky military fiascoes. Yea, Missourian, for putting it on the front page. Yea for democracy. Yea for Speak Out.

Owned by the right

YOUR EDITORIAL from The Wall Street Journal about talk radio was right about one thing. There is an inordinate number of right-wing hatemongers on radio stations across the nation. This is ample evidence that, contrary to the opinion you try to propound, the media are owned lock, stock and barrel by right-wing corporate America. This is why balanced coverage of the proposed war in Iraq simply isn't available to most Americans.

Reflect a moment

BOB POLACK is exactly correct. It is our duty to explore the issues and resist actions that are likely at best to bring about another war when many innocents die and at worst to bring about the ultimate thermo-nuclear holocaust when we all perish. Step back and reflect for a moment. There remains no evidence that Iraq and al-Qaida are connected. Is unprovoked aggression against a sovereign nation really called for in this situation?

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