Americans should be wary of a lame-duck Obama
Re: “A second term: Obama unleashed,” March 29
A sitting president who criticizes the Constitution? Even if President Obama tries only half of the ideas outlined by Cal Thomas in a second term, Americans should be very, very afraid.
Mary Evans
Arlington
Real reason behind gun registration
Re: “Ask Canada — gun registration won’t make D.C. safer,” March 28
John Lott and Gary Mauser have overlooked the real reason for gun registration. It’s so the authorities know where the guns are when they come to confiscate them.
After that, anyone with a gun who is not a cop is, by definition, a criminal and can be eliminated on sight.
Larry Krauser
Gaithersburg
Wireless industry puts its own profits first
Re: “Lanier: Wireless companies contribute to cellphone thefts,” March 22
Police Chief Cathy’s Lanier’s comments regarding the wireless industry were right on target. It does all it can to protect the billions of dollars gained through illicit wireless phone use, despite the damaging and even lethal effects it is having on public safety nationwide.
Illicit cell phone use has become epidemic in America’s prisons and jails, used for everything from coordinating contraband trafficking to the murder of witnesses. Experts estimate that prisons account for $4 billion in illicit cell phone activity a year. Prison officials nationwide have sought to jam these transmissions by using available technology to curtail and/or seize these phones.
Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, introduced legislation in 2010 to help law enforcers tackle this public safety problem by developing and legalizing technology to help them, but wireless industry lobbyists claimed that fighting illicit wireless use might infringe on legitimate activity.
The wireless industry is putting profits over the public’s safety.
Sgt. John Rosser
Vice chairman,
FOP DC Corrections Union
Two fixes would reform health care system
Why is it that so few pundits talking about the pros and cons of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act get to the heart of the matter? The root assumption seems to be that the government must inevitably provide U.K.-style health care for all, and that nothing can fix the problems in our current system. But very few have bothered to question why the current system is the way it is.
Unlike any other form of insurance, health insurance is tied to employment. This was set in place in the 1930s in response to government wage controls. I don’t have to change auto, property or life insurance providers when I change jobs, so why do I have to change health insurers and open myself up to “pre-existing condition” problems? We could solve this by simply decoupling health insurance from employment.
Much of the vast increase in the cost of medical care is due to the costs of frivolous medical liability lawsuits. If we are to bring down the cost of medicine, we must implement tort reform. Doing just these two things would solve most of the problems with our current health care system.
Paul Blase
Alexandria
