LETTERS: Abortion and cancer; Obama's column; and more

Effective campaign ploy

Regarding President Barack Obama’s Homeowners Bill of Rights, op-ed Feb. 5: On the surface, his proposal to allow mortgage refinancing at lower rates sounds good, putting $3,000 in the pockets of many home-owners. However, this bailout creates just another dependence on big government, adding to the many social programs and tax holidays that have driven our record budget deficits and debt to unsustainable levels. To fund the program, a tax increase on banks was proposed rather than finding $10 billion to cut from Obama’s $3.7 trillion budget for 2012 where 30 percent is borrowed money.

Obama’s “economy built to last” is an effective campaign ploy supported by temporary government transfer payments, but ignores the real problem that our economy cannot grow after the election under current policies. The Congressional Budget Office’s recent economic forecast beyond the election is dire, with rising unemployment (9.2 percent in 2013 vs. 8.3 percent today) and falling GDP growth (1.1 percent in 2013 vs. 2.7 percent last quarter).

A economy truly built to last beyond the election must have a balanced federal budget, a smaller government promoting free enterprise job creation instead of middle class dependence on government hand-outs for upward mobility, and a tax system where all income earners pay a fair share, rather than a shrinking number of taxpayers.

Steve Paddock

Colorado Springs

Before our very eyes

I grew up being warned against the security and police states of World War II. How things have changed. We are using the tactics of such autocratic nations — indefinite detention, torture, extreme rendition, absence of arrest, charges, attorneys, jury trials — for our enemies and for Americans.

If military troops murder foreign civilians their charges are dismissed. And so will be the charges against the five soldiers who urinated on the bodies of those they killed. But an idealistic private who turns over secret papers, similar to the Pentagon Papers during the Vietnam War, is placed in indefinite detention without trial for more than a year and is now faced with a life sentence, demonstrating the hypocrisy of military tribunals and the protection of predators of American citizens.

Now this is spreading to our state legislatures such as in Colorado, where Rep. Mark Barker, a Republican from Colorado Springs, and a former police officer, wants to shield police who brutalize American civilians and who are filmed doing so, from prosecution by claiming that these acts of brutality are personal and not public and therefore cannot be used as evidence in trial against them. These are the characteristics of a security and police state and continue to become our practices before our very eyes.

Bill Durland

Colorado Springs

A way to decrease breast cancer

My wife (a breast cancer survivor) and I used to run in the Susan Komen Race for the Cure until we found out about their relationship with Planned Parenthood. Komen’s mission is to save women from breast cancer, and no preventable causes for breast cancer should be ignored — regardless of politics. 

One of these causes, although still controversial, is evaluating the possible link of first-trimester abortion and breast cancer. Komen has given no acknowledgement (or effort) into investigating this possible association, preferring to appease a pro-choice crowd. On the other hand, Komen’s alignment with Planned Parenthood indirectly acknowledges one way to decrease the number of breast cancers in the future: 600,000 females are aborted each year and Planned Parenthood proudly plays a leadership role in this area.

That’s more than half a million women per year who will not have to “run” the risk for this cancer.

John O’Keeffe

Colorado Springs