Hold a lottery to fill government posts
To the editor:
John L. Smith's recent column headlined, "As justice center rumbles, the case for appointing judges grows by the day," states that there are those who find this suggestion attractive.
I say, why stop there?
It seems to me that the taxpayers would be better served without all those elected officials. How many former county commissioners are in jail? How many more are under suspicion? What about ex-City Council members and the state officials whose past shenanigans pop up from time to time? And let's not forget the problems in the U.S. Congress.
Where I differ with the recommendation is that I think we should have a draft. It worked for the military and the NFL, why not in politics? How much worse off would we be? After all, we have a national debt of more than $8 trillion. We have more than 511,000 elected officials nationwide, we have more than 25 million government bureaucrats and workers, we have so many laws, rules, regulations and other restrictions on our freedoms that I don't think it would make much difference if all elected positions were filled by lottery. If anything, it would be fun to watch.
BRUCE FEHER
LAS VEGAS
Democratic debate
To the editor:
The best question asked during the Democratic presidential debate last Sunday did not come from one of the CNN "professionals." It came from Ivy Merrill, a substitute elementary school teacher who was in the audience. She asked the candidates what their top priority would be during their first 100 days.
The answers told us more about the candidates than any of the babble that went on up to that point of the debate.
The main thing we learned is that Rep. Dennis Kucinich ("Be a president who helps to reshape the world for peace"); New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson ("I would upgrade our schools"); former Sen. John Edwards ("To travel the world -- re-establish America's moral authority in the world"); and Sen. Barack Obama ("The second priority is getting moving on health care"), need to restudy the Constitution, which does not authorize the federal government to be involved in any of those activities. Indeed, the answers given by Rep. Kucinich, Gov. Richardson and Mr. Edwards sound like responses that might be given by Miss America candidates, rather than presidential candidates.
Kudos to Sen. Hillary Clinton and Sen. Joe Biden, whose priorities ("end the war and bring the troops home") are within the constitutional authority of the commander in chief.
But the top prize goes to Sen. Chris Dodd, who said, "I'd try to restore the constitutional rights in our country. This administration has done great damage to them. I would do that on the first day. I wouldn't wait 100 days on those items." Bravo.
The Declaration of Independence explains that the purpose of government is to secure the unalienable rights endowed to us by our Creator, not to "reshape the world for peace" or "upgrade our schools." Sen. Dodd's interest in restoring constitutional rights is good news.
Unfortunately, that good news is more than offset by the bad news of his Senate voting record on many other issues.
Too bad, because we are in dire need of a president who acknowledges that the Bill of Rights is routinely trampled by the federal government, and it is time to reverse course. Thus far, Republican Rep. Ron Paul (a Libertarian in Republican clothing, and clearly a long shot) is the best candidate who meets that criterion.
JOE SCHAERER
LAS VEGAS
Gas prices
To the editor:
Congratulations to the Review-Journal on your May 29 editorial exposing the rhetoric of Sen. Harry Reid on the "greed" of the big oil companies. Your statistics clearly revealed that the state and federal government make almost six times as much profit per gallon of gasoline as do the oil companies -- with absolutely no risk!
DONALD E. BANNON
LAS VEGAS
Bad things
To the editor:
In response to Christopher Hitchens' criticism of religion in his book, "God is Not Great," Mike Robinson in his letter of June 4 states that Mr. Hitchens must have forgotten the millions killed by Stalin, Pol Pot and Mao in the name of atheism.
Well, Mr. Hitchens says that, "It is interesting to find that people of faith now seek defensively to say that they are no worse than the fascists or Nazis or Stalinists."
More to the point, Richard Dawkins in "The God Delusion" notes that, "Individual atheists may do evil things, but they don't do evil things in the name of atheism." He goes on to say, "What matters is whether atheism systematically influences people to do bad things. There is not the smallest evidence that is does."
Grant Couch
NORTH LAS VEGAS
