April 21, 2004

Without vision, state's higher ed will crumble

It is encouraging to finally see evidence of political will emerging among our elected leaders to deal with the state's financial crisis. Recent statements from the governor and legislators suggest the possibility of compromise on the Taxpayer's Bill of Rights and Amendment 23 in this legislative session. The stakes are high. Without action, the general fund in three years will not provide any funding to higher education. Colorado will have the distinction of being the first state to "unfund" its community colleges, state colleges and universities.

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The key to the extraordinary economic strength of the U.S. was its early investment in education and infrastructure. Programs such as the G.I. Bill provided access for millions of Americans to the middle class and produced the skilled labor and professionals that brought the prosperity we enjoy today. The Colorado business community understands the connection between economic development and quality education. Revenues generated by our research universities are critical to Colorado. To allow these institutions to lapse into mediocrity may destroy the seed corn of the state's economic future.

The facts are clear. The state has a structural deficit that must be addressed. The fundamental question is, what are the vital services that must be publicly funded in order to maintain a healthy and prosperous community? If the "ratcheting down" effect of TABOR continues without change, Colorado may end up with the lowest taxes in the nation, but also with a crumbling infrastructure, mediocre and inaccessible higher education, an underfunded judicial system, trashed parks and a safety net full of holes for our most vulnerable citizens.

We now need courageous leadership that will not settle for Band-Aid steps that only get us through 2004, but rather for longer-term solutions that will ensure the economic health of the state and reflect the basic values and the sense of community desired by all Coloradans.

Thomas Kaesemeyer
Trustee, Mesa State College
Denver

Developer's threat clear in Wal-Mart deal

I attended the Elitch Wal-Mart meeting on April 15, which was nothing more than a civic group therapy session ("Wal-Mart plan divides forum," April 16). The only clear purpose of the meeting was to allow the residents to vent their frustration with absolutely no impact on the final decision. The deal with Wal-Mart has already been signed and the only way it will not happen is if Wal-Mart backs out. Wal-Mart apparently believes that "if you build it, they will come," and they are probably right. The Rocky Mountain News reported that the meeting would be about discussing design options, yet we were told that it was too early to answer those questions.

Of great interest was the statement made by developer Chuck Perry after most of the audience left. Mr. Perry said that without the Wal-Mart, there may well not be enough tax-increment financing to fund the restoration of the historic Elitch Theater. The implied but clear threat was this: either deal with the Wal-Mart or lose your theater. Perry made it very clear that the "fly" of the Elitch Theater would be demolished in order to accommodate parking. If memory serves me, the "fly" contained part of the stage, the storage area for props and costumes, and the dressing rooms once frequented by Hollywood stars. I hope that the Colorado Historical Society will be allowed to inspect this building before it is demolished in order to ensure that there is truly nothing of historical value left in it.

Marianne Webb
Denver

9-11 commissioner should resign, testify

The 9-11 commission hearings suggest the probable cause of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks was the failure of the intelligence community to connect the dots of all the information collected. The FBI was not allowed to talk to the CIA, the CIA was not allowed to talk to the National Security Agency, the NSA was not allowed to talk to the FBI.

So who was it that instituted these arcane rules? In the now declassified memo released to the 9-11 commission by Attorney General John Ashcroft, it was Jamie Gorelick. Gorelick, deputy attorney general in Bill Clinton's administration, wrote this memo and signed it in 1995. This memo created the wall between counterintelligence and criminal investigations, a key impediment to terrorism probes.

Jamie Gorelick now sits on the 9-11 commission. She should immediately resign her post and be called before the commission to testify under oath as to why she issued these orders. She may be the answer as to why 9-11 occurred.

Don Shaeffer
Arvada

Parents falling down on job of being parents

While I will agree that drinking on college campuses and in high schools is a concern, why is it letter writer the Rev. Harold Reiss blames the university presidents or high school principals? ("Roust binge drinkers," April 6).

Reiss' line of thinking is no better than the thinking that ultimate responsibility for the University of Colorado sexual assault problem lies with Gary Barnett.

The problem our country faces with its college- and high school-age kids is that parents are not doing their jobs. You are fooling yourself if you believe that you can be best friends with your 15-, 16-, 17- or 18-year-old. If kids are binge drinking in high school, why aren't their parents doing anything about it? Last time I checked it was not a teacher's or principal's job to watch your children on the weekend.

I am a teacher. My wife is a teacher. We love kids. We love teaching. We do everything we can before, after and during school to help kids, but we can only help if the parents support our efforts. If we are required to do our jobs, why aren't parents required to do theirs?

Outside of school it is a parent's job to be an authority figure to their kids. If parents don't lay out rules about drinking early, then don't be shocked and appalled at the stories you hear coming out of campuses and schools across the nation.

Mike Cohen
Broomfield

Police officer sacrificed on altar of politics

Because of events put into motion by the Childs family, the Turney family is now devastated ("Turney suspended," April 16). Ten months' suspension without pay for doing his job in accordance with department policy and training?

How can Al LaCabe say, "the shooting was justified," yet in the next breath levy such extreme punishment? It's contradictory.

Any time that officers are sacrificed on the altar of politics, it must be condemned. Each time the name "Paul Childs" is invoked, I think, "Patrick Pollock . . . James Wier . . . Robert Wallis . . . Shawn Leinen . . . Ron DeHerrera . . . Bruce VanderJagt . . . Dennis Licata" - slain officers all.

No matter what the disciplinary result was, it would never be enough to satisfy those who hate the police. Unfortunately, those are usually the voices who are heard, not the majority of law-abiding citizens.

Lisa Dobson
Denver

Meddlesome priest

So, the Rev. Bill Carmody thinks that our state legislators should use their religious beliefs in the offices that they hold ("Politically charged prayer criticized," April 14).

It appears that Carmody doesn't understand the principle of separation of church and state. Without this separation, the U.S. would risk becoming another theocracy, using religion as a justification for tyranny. The United States would then be just as fouled up as any number of counties in the Middle East.

This isn't only a bad suggestion but a ridiculous one. After all, aren't there enough religious nuts loose at the Statehouse without this meddlesome priest encouraging more of them?

Thomas B. Johnson
Aurora

Casino idea will fly

The Cheyenne-Arapaho casino/historical/cultural center near Denver International Airport is a marvelous idea ("Indians file huge land claim," April 15). When people are stranded because of flight delays or they have long layovers, they could go someplace to have a good time and get some history - and we could get their money. A win-win arrangement.

Joyce Thorn
Denver

Meds have made her life finally worth living

In response to Laurie Alder's letter of April 15, "Drugs only mask mental problems," I say amen! Alder wrote, "these drugs just disrupt normal brain function." Again I say amen! You see, my "normal" brain function leaves me depressed and hoping to die.

Now I know Alder must think highly of the one psychiatrist she mentions in her letter as being the absolute authority on the issue of mental illness/mood disorders. After all, she's willing to take his word over doing her own research. He may have headed a mental health institute for 12 years, but I've lived with these issues for 36 years.

Had we been more aware of depression, bipolar disorder and other afflictions when I was a kid back in the '70s, then maybe - just maybe - a fraction of my childhood would have been happier. Instead I just wanted to evaporate.

Alder is right on one point: Medication does not cure mental illness, but that's not a big revelation. None of my doctors has ever told me I'd be "cured," nor have I run across anything in my extensive research that mentions a cure.

But with the help of my medication I finally feel like the person I've always known inside that I am, but no one else had gotten to meet. I no longer wish I had never been born. Life just isn't so darn hard on a daily basis. I am able to handle life's daily problems. The side effects of the medication have been minimal and well worth it to not feel as bad as I used to.

Finally, I just wanted to let Alder know what I've been up to while in my "chemical haze," as she called it. I'm such a slug that all I've been able to do is become a business owner, a wonderful wife and the mother of two beautiful, intelligent, healthy children, and - oh yeah - go back to school where I'm just finishing up another anatomy class. I'm a 4.0 student on my way to earning another college degree.

Alder can just go back to being the perfect, unimpaired person she seems to think she is. I'm certain she has no medicines at all in her home because those nasty pills for headaches and colds would only prevent her from dealing with the real issues at hand.

Kelly Perkins
Parker

Salazar would be fine . . . as our governor

The last time Colorado Democrats nominated and elected a "conservative Democrat" to the U.S. Senate, that person defected to the Republicans two years later. Since then that senator has helped put this state and this nation into the mess it's in now. His name is Ben Campbell, and now another "conservative Democrat" and professed admirer of Campbell's, Ken Salazar, has been anointed by the "powers that be" in the Colorado Democratic Party and the Democratic National Committee.

Many of us in the rank and file of the party have nothing personal against Ken Salazar (in fact, we think he would make a fine governor). We just don't think he supports or will fight for many of the core principles of our party in the U.S. Senate. Now more than ever, we need - and we have a real chance - to send a senator to Washington who has the experience, vision and courage to help turn this country around. Let's get it right this time. Let's nominate and elect Mike Miles, soldier, statesman, scholar.

Eliza M. Carney
Fort Collins

Buck doesn't stop here

According to our so-called national security adviser, apparently engraved invitations are what it takes to reach the level of intelligence the Bush administration needs in order to act to defend our country.

I guess $100 billion a year for intelligence gathering isn't enough. We need personalized cards from Hallmark. It amazes me that on Sept. 11, 2001, more than 3,000 people were killed in an insidious attack, the worst attack in our country's history, yet it's no one's fault!

President Truman was famous for the plaque on his desk that read, "The Buck Stops Here." Not a single person in the Bush administration is taking any kind of responsibility whatsoever for the worst intelligence failure of our times. For Bush, time and again, the buck stops with Bill Clinton. Condoleezza Rice completely and utterly failed in her job, but I'll bet a buck it never stops at her desk.

Brett Hoff
Aurora

Cesspool of lies

Toward the end of President Clinton's final term, the rallying cry for the right was that he lied to the American people. Yet, we have been lied to by the Bush administration for the past four years. This isn't an issue of infidelity; this is an issue that killed 86 Americans in the past month alone.

The sheer arrogance of the administration is an affront to our character as Americans. We must not tolerate this cesspool of lies and political spin. By the way, can anyone tell me what the Taliban government did with the $43 million that President Bush gave them in May of 2001? Maybe Condi can blame former administrations for that one as well.

Stephen Poikonen
Arvada

It's only fair

While I sympathize with the plight of letter writer Tate Travis, who cannot afford to pay tuition for his "two Anglo-Saxon children" ("A feeling of bitterness," April 14), rest assured that in this brave new world and in this melting-pot society, "Anglo-Saxon" is no longer the magical phrase it once was, akin to "Abracadabra" and "Open sesame."

As a fellow Euro-American, I have taken the advantages my skin color provided as a fact of life in America, but always knew that someone else was being deprived because of it. Now the global playing field is being leveled like never before, and it's only fair.

Jim Bernath
Englewood

Victimless crime?

Michael Blagg (a fake Christian, see 1 Corinthians 6:9-10) was fixated on pornography ("Blagg sentenced to life," April 17). His wife, apparently a true Christian, was going to leave him. Her reasons, in part, were the demeaning sexual demands he made upon her. She was a victim to the end. Whoever says pornography is a victimless crime is a liar!

George Lilly
Denver

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