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Hanging chads: Does anyone remember them?
The importance of fully separating your chads was just one of many lessons we learned from last year's election.
We learned that certain election procedures needed close review and reform in many cases.
We learned that candidates who don't win on first blush (or second blush or third blush) can turn to the courts for assistance. And that's something that the founding fathers probably never intended when they devised their three-branched governmental structure, having the court system decide an election. The electorate was supposed to be who put individuals into elected office.
But the most important lesson we learned is that the right to vote is not to be taken for granted. If you don't get out to vote, you have no right to be upset with the results.
We learned that every vote can make a difference. That will be the enduring lesson of the 2000 election.
But just one year after all of these lessons were learned, we're still reeling in the aftermath of our nation's darkest hour. We worry about alleged threats to blow up suspension bridges in California, as well we should. We would be daft to consider such acts unthinkable, because nothing is unthinkable any longer.
We worry about receiving toxic spores in our mail, because many people are. We worry about our economy, with staggering unemployment figures affecting hundreds of thousands of individuals and families nationwide. We worry about our businesses, small and large, that find themselves in a full-blown recession/correction/dip/put in your own descriptive word here.
And while we are understandably preoccupied, we need to remember what happened one year ago this week. Prior to Sept. 11, it was unthinkable that the election lessons of last year could have been forgotten. And if we forget to vote or just decide not to go to vote, you can chalk up another victory for Osama bin Ladin and Al-Qaita in again disrupting our way of life.
Let's not let that happen. Let's not let terrorism negatively affect our election process. Let's make it just the opposite, let's set records for turnout in off-year elections. Let that news filter into some cave in Afghanistan with a very defined exclamation point. The message would be, You won the battle, but you haven't and won't win the war.
And if you vote in a precinct that uses paper-punch ballots, do yourself and everyone a favor. Make sure all of your chads are fully separated.
Tom Mitsoff is a longtime daily newspaper editor and syndicated editorial columnist. His Web address is http://www.tommitsoff.com.
Defending freedom
Dear Editor
In response to a recent letter to the editor from Maj. Gen. Patrick Brady regarding an amendment to protect the flag. This is another attack on the constitutional rights of every citizen. The flag is a "symbol" of our country, and the freedoms we all hold dear. To attempt to take that very freedom from someone who has tried to express his opinion of a perceived wrong is totally ridiculous.
Taking this idea to its extremes, we should arrest those disrespectful villains who decide not to salute the flag when it passes in parade, or worse yet, won't sing the national anthem when played before a ball game.
Fine those that won't display it on Flag Day or Memorial Day. Remember, that flag is, more than likely, the personal property of the person who has decided that its damage would most represent his distaste for a governmental policy. Essentially, you're talking of taking an individual's freedom because he chose to make a statement in opposition to the government that is entrusted with the protection of his freedoms.
Personally, as a veteran, I would give any mere "symbol" of our hard-earned freedoms to keep the real tangible evidence of freedom intact.
No matter how repulsive the idea of the burning of our flag is to me, I defend any citizen's right to display his displeasure with the errors our government will inevitably continue to make. That is how a free society learns from its mistakes.
Zelienople, Pa.,
Microwave the mail
Dear Editor:
A common kitchen appliance may be of great use to reduce or eradicate the presence of anthrax and other household pathogens - by subjecting a suspect batch (a few letters at a time) in the kitchen microwave oven.
A regular size, two-page letter will begin to combust at approximately one minute 20 seconds in a regular kitchen microwave oven. This and some common sense, like washing your hands after handling mail that is suspect and using regular facial protection gear (painter's mask, handkerchief, etc.) may do the job for minute volume of household pathogen encounters. This, of course, is the undersigned layman's deductions.
I would prefer to roast Osama Bin Laden in the microwave, myself, if I could, of course. The authorities may want to pursue further experiments on this method.
Las Vegas, Nev.
