Fred Kaplan of Slate wrote a piece decrying Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld’s sorry excuses for answers to questions about the Iraq war last week. But his piece focuses more on the members of the Senate Appropriations Committee and their sorry excuse for questioning. Here is his take on Rumsfeld’s response to a question about whether we have a plan should civil war erupt in Iraq:
“Rumsfeld replied, ‘The plan is to prevent a civil war and, to the extent one were to occur, to have the Iraqi security forces deal with it, to the extent they are able to.’
“That’s not a plan, and Rumsfeld must know it. He even, wittingly or not, left an opening in his reply — Iraqi security forces will deal with it, ‘to the extent they are able to’ — that any high-school debater would have plowed through with gusto. ‘To what extent are they able to?’ would have been one decent follow-up (especially since U.S. officials in the field have noted that many of these security forces have stronger allegiances to ethnic factions than to a central government).
“But nobody followed up.”
Posted by Melissa Cooley
Wichita religious leaders who regularly deal with the city’s homeless population told The Eagle editorial board last week that they’re frustrated and fed up with the community’s inaction on this problem. They’ve announced a “Purple Tent Project” to set up purple tents and ribbons on church grounds as a visible protest of the uncaring status quo — and as a call to action.
What’s needed, they say (and we agree in our editorial on today’s Opinion pages), is a permanent 24/7 one-stop shelter where the city’s homeless can find not only shelter and food but also treatment and resources to get back on their feet.
Wichita can largely end chronic homelessness — but only if ordinary citizens get involved and pressure our city and county leaders to fund a solution.
Posted by Randy Scholfield
The Wall Street Journal’s editorial board supported the Dubai port deal, and isn’t happy about the forces that scuttled the deal — which include a majority of members of Congress and the majority of the American public. Its editorial warned: “What’s especially dangerous here is that we’re seeing the re-emergence of the ‘national security’ protectionists. They were last seen in the late 1980s, when Japan in particular was the target of a political foreign-investment panic. The Japanese were buying Pebble Beach and Rockefeller Center, and so America was soon going to be a colony of Tokyo. A Japanese bid for Fairchild Semiconductor of Silicon Valley was seen as a threat to American defense. Those fears seem laughable now. But here we go again, with new targets of anxiety.”
Posted by Phillip Brownlee
As the question of whether Kansas will get a concealed-carry law this spring comes closer to being settled — likely yes, even if the governor tries again to veto it — lawmakers have been wrestling with where such lawful heat-packing should be possible. When members of a House committee debated last week whether to allow permit holders to carry handguns into churches, two quotes pretty much summed things up.
Rep. Judy Loganbill, D-Wichita, said: “To me, that’s just so blatantly offensive, I can’t see straight.”
Rep. Judy Morrison, R-Shawnee, opined: “As far as I’m concerned, there’s always a place for a gun if you’re responsible.”
In the end, the committee designated churches and temples as gun-free zones. But like all things under the dome, that is subject to change.
Posted by Rhonda Holman
Allowing District of Columbia residents to voluntarily use a flat federal income tax system, as Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., is proposing, seems administratively impractical. But Brownback deserves credit for seeking to simplify our Byzantine tax system. Brownback chaired a hearing last week of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on the District of Columbia. He floated the idea of testing a flat tax — which would apply the same tax rate to all taxpayers and would eliminate nearly all itemized deductions — on D.C. residents, and predicted that the new system would result in more economic growth, new jobs and lower taxes. “Our system should be fair, simple and easy to understand,” Brownback said.
So much money is spent on compliance and enforcement of our tax system that simplifying this likely would be an economic boost. However, there are concerns that a flat tax would mostly benefit the wealthy, because it would eliminate our progressive tax structure and wouldn’t tax investment income. As a result, billionaire Warren Buffett, who makes most of his money on investments, would pay very little in income taxes.
Posted by Phillip Brownlee
