Letters to the Editor 07-08-2004

- Gun Control Update - Art At The Fair - Thanks For Golf Results - Good Samaritan - Real Americans Gun Control Update Editor, Times-Union: Thanks, Matt, you remind me I haven't reported since the first of the year. Mixed bag again this year.As always, good news and bad.It appears President Bush has shot himself in the foot a few too many times and we may very well lose the White House.The Senate hardly matters.Even though we supposedly control it, with Senators such as Lugar and McCain, it's still anti-Second Amendment.But as long as we can hold onto the House we should be all right.Not likely to get anything reversed but should be able to hold off anything new.

Letters to the Editor 03-04-1999

- EDIT Is A Tax - NIPSCO Service - NIPSCO Closing EDIT Is A Tax Editor, Times-Union: Let's cut to the chase.EDIT is an additional tax.To me this means more money will be coming out of local taxpayers' pockets than is being taken out now. I have yet to see or read anything about EDIT which would make me want my county council members to vote for it.

Letters to the Editor 03-19-1999

Letters to the Editor 07-15-2005

- Abandoned Cat - Setting A Date - Responsible Pet Owners Abandoned Cat Editor, Times-Union: This is to the person that apparently dumped your tortoise-colored cat for someone else to take care of.I assume you dumped her because she wasn't wearing a collar and she's not really a "pretty" cat. She probably was cute when she was small, but then she grew up.She came here in February and laid in the bushes outside our garage in the rain and snow.We took pity on her and put food out.We couldn't let her go without food in the cold.We later discovered she had ear mites so we treated her for those.Then we discovered she had worms (as all feral cats do) so we treated her for those also.

Letters to the Editor 09-11-1998

NorthWood Panthers Face Stiff Challenge, Rise To Challenge

NAPPANEE - Heading into Saturday night's boys basketball game at NorthWood, the host Panthers would find out just how good this team would be. Coming off an emotional win over East Noble Friday, the Panthers schedule only got tougher.Enter the 4-0 Fairfield Falcons, also winners Friday night by defeating Goshen 56-52 to stay unbeaten. To say the least, this game was huge for both teams as only one team would escape without a loss. The first quarter went exactly as expected as both teams came out in a pressure man-to-man defense.Early on, the Falcons and Panthers traded baskets. Fairfield, who starts five guards, came out lighting up "The Pit."Senior Cullen Stanger was the hot Falcon early, hitting all four shots in the first quarter, including one three-pointer and scoring nine early points. Then the Panthers found a way to control him, limiting Stanger to only four more points the rest of the game.

Local Football Games Will Go On Tonight With Special Observances Tonight

In the wake of Tuesday's tragic events, local athletic directors have been faced with decisions they never thought they would have to make. The decision to cancel athletic competitions Tuesday was pretty much a given, but then the athletic directors were faced with the decision of when to resume the regular sports schedule and whether to play football games tonight. "It was a very difficult decision," said Wawasee athletic director Mary Hurley."We decided to have practice Tuesday with no strings attached.If the players wanted to be home with their families, if the players parents wanted them home, they were free to go.It was their decision to be there.Many of the coaches tied in the events of the day at practice, and we have recognized the tragedy at each of our sporting events since.

Bush Should Go Easy On Iraq Policy

I can't say I view the invasion of Iraq with quite the same level of enthusiasm as W and Vice W Dick Cheney. I completely agree that Saddam Hussein is a bad man.He's done some very bad things.He used weapons of mass destruction against people in his own country. That's just mean. By the way, when did we start calling big bombs "weapons of mass destruction"? It's a relatively new term.But there have been big bombs for more than 50 years.I guess it just sounds more sinister and ominous than "big bombs." And how much stuff does a big bomb have to be capable of destroying before it can be called a weapon of mass destruction? Is a Sidewinder or Scud missile a weapon of mass destruction? Or does it have to be a really big bomb like an Intercontinental Ballistic Missile? Because I don't think Saddam has any ICBMs.Or does it just have to be chemical, biological or nuclear? But I digress. Saddam truly is a bad man and his regime is quite repressive.

Tigers Use 23-2 Run To Zip Past Raiders

Fueled by a 23-2 run in the second quarter, the Warsaw Tigers defeated Northridge 75-34 to keep their Northern Lakes Conference record unblemished. The Tigers jumped out to an early 4-0 lead in the first quarter, but Northridge made a comeback and scored four straight baskets to take an 8-4 lead. However, that was the largest lead the Raiders would hold.The Tigers fought back to tie the score at 10, and by the end of the quarter the score was knotted at 12-12. "We hadn't played since last Tuesday," said Warsaw coach Will Wienhorst, "and we just didn't come out of the blocks." The the wheels of the Northridge machine fell off. The Tigers jump-started the second frame with Hilary O'Connell, Christy Colt and Jenna Rooney combining for eight unanswered baskets.Northridge's first points of the quarter did not come until the 6:00 mark when Gretchen Herto hit two free throws to make the score 20-14.

There's Plenty Of Misleading To Go Around

The war in Iraq isn't very popular these days. So, of course, the politicians are all about blaming W and demanding timetables for troop withdrawal and saying the whole thing was a big mistake. Things were very different right before we went to war.That's when the war thing was popular. All the politicians were waving flags and pledging their support. Well, not all of them.But the vast majority of them, anyway. I will be the first to admit the American people were misled about Iraq. We were misled about weapons of mass destruction.We were misled about Saddam's connection - or lack of connection - to 9/11. In fact, I admitted that back on Aug.27 in this very column: (I used to give W the benefit of the doubt. I thought he got bad intelligence.After all, the whole world - Germany, Russia, France, everybody - thought Saddam had WMD.

Tigers Find Enough Offense To Edge Concord

DUNLAP - A piece of paper with statistics on it didn't give Warsaw's boys basketball team a win over Northern Lakes Conference rival Concord Friday, but it did tell Tiger mentor Al Rhodes just how, in this case how bad, his team was playing after two quarters. Rhodes said he gets stats on a piece of paper at halftime that tells him how many points per possession his team is averaging.Last night Warsaw trailed 19-15 at halftime.Rhodes said he didn't remember if this was the lowest halftime score he's seen, but Warsaw's .43 points per posession was a low. "In my opinion, with the absence of Steve (Siebenmorgen), everyone tried too hard," said Rhodes. Siebenmorgen, who suffered his second concussion this season, watched the game from the bench for the second consecutive game.Rhodes said he will be evaluated on Tuesday.

Obama - Who Is He, What Has He Done?

Barack Hussein Obama Jr., the Democrat U.S.Senator from Chicago, has become a rock star in his party. After the holidays and consultations with his family, he will let us know if he will run for president in 2008. Most pundits think he will. According to the U.S.Senate Historical Office, he's the fifth black senator in U.S.history and the only black now serving in the U.S.Senate. He delivered the keynote address at the 2004 Democratic National Convention.At the time he was still serving in the Illinois State Senate.He was elected to the U.S.Senate in November 2004. According to his 1995 memoirs, "Dreams from My Father," he was born Aug.4, 1961, in Honolulu, Hawaii, to Barack Hussein Obama Sr.of Nyangoma-Kogelo, Siaya District, Kenya, and Ann Dunham, of Wichita, Kan. His parents met at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, where his father was enrolled as a foreign student. When he was 2, his parents divorced and his father returned to Kenya.

Warsaw Girls Lose On Senior Night

For a group that seen it's share of ups and downs, Thursday night's game against Northern Lakes Conference foe Elkhart Memorial served as a fitting snapshot. Six Warsaw seniors ended their regular season careers on the Tiger Den floor in a 47-46 loss to the Crimson Chargers. Jennifer Scherer, one of the six seniors, put Warsaw up 46-45 after she nailed two free throws with 20.6 seconds left in regulation. Memorial answered right back as Abby Kinder retrieved an offensive rebound of a missed Alyssa Pittman three-pointer and banked home a layup to give her team a 47-46 lead with 6.5 seconds left to play. After a dangerous inbound that saw Amy Abbit launch a half-court pass into the arms of Kate Denlinger, Warsaw took it's fourth timeout of the quarter.

Chasing Autographs Often Turns Fruitless

PITTSBURGH - It is four hours before Sunday's baseball game at Three Rivers Stadium between the Houston Astros and Pittsburgh Pirates. The fans here this early before the first pitch are few - less than 20 - but you find them lined up on a sidewalk behind a fence.They carry backpacks and hold things like baseballs, albums and bats. They are the autograph seekers, the ones who have turned the profession into an art and a science.They are the ones who call each other by name because they are together at the park so much. The talk this day is of one Big Unit, one 6-foot-10 stringy-haired, craggly-faced left-hander named Randy Johnson.Johnson was traded to the Astros at 11:54 p.m.Friday, six minutes before the trading deadline, and his flight to Pittsburgh arrived Saturday evening.Sunday afternoon he will make his first start for the Astros. A few of the greener autograph seekers talk about Johnson signing their cards and baseballs. Little do they know.

Shall We Mine For Some Data?

Let's discuss data mining, shall we? For a long time I have been having conversations with friends and associates about the absence of terror attacks on U.S.soil. I wonder why there hasn't been a single - even minor - terrorist event since 9/11.Don't get me wrong, here.I am thankful, ecstatic, thrilled that there hasn't been. But I also realize that this is a pretty big and difficult country to defend and there are plenty of extremists who truly hate America and would like nothing more than to blow something up over here. In short, I don't think the lack of terror is from a lack of desire on the part of the extremists. I think most of the credit goes to the U.S.government. And while, as I said earlier, I am thrilled at the success, I wonder just how they are going about it. Well, I think a lot of it has to do with what they like to call data mining in Washington these days.

Carroll Wins Rematch, Ends Warsaw Girls Season In Sectionals

COLUMBIA CITY - The smallest girl on the court, 5-foot-3 Carroll senior Abby Noll played the biggest role in downing fifth-ranked Warsaw Friday in the semifinal round of the Columbia City 4A Sectional. With Warsaw leading 21-20 at the half, Noll ignited the Chargers with a barrage of second-half three-pointers, leading Carroll to a 66-57 victory over the Tigers. Noll, who finished the evening 7 of 12 from the field overall, shot 4 of 5 from the arc in the second half, including a deep three with 2:08 remaining that gave the Chargers a 53-47 lead. "Noll's three that put them back up by six in the fourth was a big play," Wienhorst said."She's a very good basketball player.To go 5 of 9 (from the arc) at any level is remarkable, nonetheless to do it from where she was shooting from.Her toes weren't on the line, they were three or four feet back." Noll finished the game with 25 points, eight rebounds, five assists and two steals.

Just Not Sold On A War In Kosovo

I am glad to see the Kosovo engagement winding down. But since the beginning I have wondered why we were involved.It is difficult for me to see the national interest. I am not a big fan of war to begin with, but when we do have to get involved in such matters, I like to think there is a really good reason. Several conflicts the United States has been involved in seem not to meet that standard. I could see, for example, the need to get involved when Saddam Hussein took over Kuwait.He probably wouldn't have stopped there. He probably would have kept going until he had control of most of the Middle East.That wouldn't be a good thing.It would not be in our national interest for Saddam to control the vast majority of the world's oil production. Now, I know the politicians told us that attacking Saddam wasn't about oil.It was about returning autonomy to the sovereign nation of Kuwait.

The News From Iraq Isn't All Bad

Before the war in Iraq started, I suggested that W shouldn't go to war without the support of the U.N. When he decided to go to war without U.N.support, I wasn't really all that enthusiastic about it, but I supported the decision and the troops. Since then, I have been critical from time to time of some of W's policy, including spending, and what appears to be hawkish foreign policy. Media reports in general seem to be quite negative when it comes to the war in Iraq. I realize that when something blows up in Iraq, it is news.There is no question about that. But there are positive things going on in Iraq, too, and I think those stories are being underreported by the mainstream media. To that end, what follows is a message allegedly sent by Lt.Col.Scott Seitz, a commander in Iraq, to his troops.He was attempting to show his troops that they should be proud of what they have accomplished in Iraq.

Tiger Golfers Win State Championship

FRANKLIN - Richmond looked the part.Warsaw played the part. The Tigers, down three strokes after the first day of play at the Indiana boys state golf championships, overcame the deficit to the Red Devils and Leo to win their first golf title in school history with a score of 37-over par 613 at the Legends of Indiana Golf Course Wednesday. Warsaw teed off with Richmond and Leo in the final pairing of the day, a day that was dominated by wind gusts as high as 40 miles per hour. The Red Devils, all dressed in red shirts and black shorts with bleached-blonde hair and Oakley sunglasses hanging from their ears on the back of their heads, looked like the cream of the golf crop. Warsaw, dressed like hit men with black shirts and black shorts, played like the cream of the golf crop.

Impeachment Has Precedent

The impeachment process is starting to get interesting. And, as it unravels, it keeps changing. After the House passed articles of impeachment - which lots of people said would never happen in the first place - there was talk of how there would never be a trial. All the CNN and network TV talking heads and their paid experts were telling us that there would be some sort of deal for censure and the Senate would simply forego all this trial nonsense. Then they told us, well, there will be a couple days for each side to present its case.After that there would be a vote.If two-thirds of the senators didn't vote to have a trial, then they'd would move to vote on censure. Then they told us, well, there might be a trial after all, but it won't be much of a trial.It will only take a week or so and there won't be any witnesses. Next they said, well, it looks like there will be a trial after all and maybe a couple witnesses might be called, but not Monica Lewinsky.