Letters to the editor

Topeka Capital-Journal, The, Nov 16, 2007

Flyer, beware

We recently had an opportunity to travel to the Yellowstone area. The flight was booked months in advance through AAA.

We were awakened at midnight and informed by United Airlines that our flight had been cancelled. We were offered an earlier or later flight and chose the later option. When we arrived at KCI we reported to the counter as directed, and the bags were checked. We were given boarding passes only for Denver, not for the connecting flight on to our final destination.

We boarded on time to a full flight. Then an announcement was made that a mechanical problem with the plane would delay our departure. In about 45 minutes we departed. In Denver we were given boarding passes for Jackson, Wyo., but when we arrived there it was discovered our luggage was left in Denver.

The next day I went back to the airport and the employee there suggested it was "our" error, that we bought tickets in Denver at the last minute. I met the next flight in and delighted that our bags were aboard. The United employee seemed glad I was there since it saved her the trouble of finding someone to deliver our bags.

At no point did any employee of United express regret for the problem with the lost luggage. Beyond lost luggage, there were maintenance failures on two of the four aircraft we flew. Both had to be repaired on the tarmac while filled to capacity with anxious passengers.

Lost luggage is a problem, but compromised maintenance is dead serious, and underlying all seemed to be an attitude of "not my problem."

If you are planning on traveling this holiday season you may want to adjust your expectations - and take out some flight insurance.

KEN SMITH,Hoyt

Insults unnecessary

If Glenda Overstreet doesn't like Terry Sandlin as a candidate for USD 501 superintendent, she should just say so and state her reasons. She shouldn't insult the man by failing to acknowledge that he has his doctorate (unlike the previous superintendent when hired) by calling him "Mr." Sandlin or by referring to him as a "fixture."

She apparently has a bias with respect to Dr. Sandlin's age. After all, "fixtures" conjure up the notion of antiques. Does the NAACP discriminate against folks over a certain age? I don't think that has been a part of its history.

As to the matter of following what the appropriate procedures are for selecting a superintendent - does she think anyone in his right mind would want the job with the procedure having been usurped? He would have to be a glutton for punishment given the complaints that would predictably follow.

CAROL JOLLY,Topeka

Harder times coming

Muslim militants have finally found a way to bring down the free world - oil. The sheikdoms that seemingly rule most of the oil- bearing land have cut production and restricted movement. Even those who profess to be our friends have jumped on the bandwagon of making more money.

These sheiks have more money than 40 people could spend in 40 lifetimes. Meanwhile, their subjects live in poverty. But how did these sheiks get all that land? Easy. Their elders of yesterday took the land by force and held it by force.

The mass of the militants are ignorant. They are taught by their mullahs and religious bigots to hate everything Western. The followers of Allah aren't allowed to think. True thinkers - anywhere in the world - wouldn't do what the militants do in destroying their own people.

There is a second reason that oil is going so high. The major oil conglomerates are manipulating the price of crude oil. They have already proved to the United States and the rest of the world that they care about profits and power, and, boy, do they rack up profits.

If we go into a depression, I lay the blame directly on the oil companies and the chief executives of all large corporations with their unsightly salaries and golden parachutes.

I've been predicting that the oil corporations could and would cause a depression. Maybe someone will listen to me now that it's actually happening.

ERNEST 'COWBOY' SMITH,Lecompton

Faith will prevail

We have faithfully crisscrossed this nation for 17 years. In more than 33,000 pickets we delivered the word of God to a rebellious, disobedient and filthy nation that hates God and His commandments.

Then, in a new and different effort to try to make us shut up, a judge with a military background and some military lawyers in Maryland, ignoring the First Amendment, put us on trial for our religious beliefs and practices.

It was wrong and will resound throughout eternity to the everlasting shame of this nation and every person who remained silent at this hour. Doomed America delivered a message to the entire world, to wit: We are just like the heathen nations around us. We have no religious liberty and do not deserve that First Amendment that we have shoved in the face of all the nations, insisting that they be like us.

Then, you pretend something big has happened - that, finally, someone has told us straight up that they hate these words. You know that jury was just a microcosm of doomed America and that when you put us on trial for the word of God's sake we are never going to run from it.