Police chief’s burglar
Re: “Thief to chief: It’s not fair,” March 30 news story.
Heh, heh, heh, the poor burglar got caught, but now is being singled out for his crimes because he burgled the Denver police chief’s home? It’s a shame, facing 12 years when he got probation last time? Pity, he is being held in lieu of $35,000 bail, when his bail was only $5,000 last time?
What part of “career criminal” does Peter Lewis not understand? It’s all Gerry Whitman’s fault, of course, having not had the decency to warn budding burglars as to which house to burgle and which house to avoid. Then it is also Whitman’s fault that he supposedly had more than normal resources in tracking and returning him to Denver. Of all the nerve!
The mastermind criminal? Hardly. They only exist in the movies.
Leonard W. Molberg, Denver
Colo. initiative process
Re: “Higher standard for constitution changes,” March 20 editorial.
The Post’s editorial expressing angst over the continued popularity of initiatives is puzzling. The editors seem to think that the public desires only to complicate the law.
This concern is misguided. The reason that initiatives are so common is that the citizens of Colorado do not trust their legislature. And for good reason. Legislators generally act in the interest of the those who lobby them, and the lobbyists’ goals often do not coincide with the values and priorities of the electorate. Consequently, many initiatives aim to minimize loopholes that might provide opportunities for the legislature to benefit campaign contributors and influence-peddlers and undermine the public’s policy desires.
Hank Lacey, Castle Rock
The real George Mason
The March Madness victories of George Mason University’s basketball team have astonished fans around the country. It’s ironic that the school’s namesake was an American patriot who also has been little-known outside Virginia. No less a figure than Thomas Jefferson called him “the wisest man of his generation.”
In fact, Jefferson borrowed extensively from the Virginia Declaration of Rights, which Mason drafted in 1776, for the first part of the U.S. Declaration of Independence.
As a member of the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia in 1787, Mason argued forcefully for a bill of rights. When this proposal and others he championed were rejected, he helped lead the campaign against ratification. It failed, and Mason retreated to his estate. But later James Madison introduced in the new U.S. Congress a bill of rights that, once again, borrowed from a version that Mason had drafted; the rest is history.
The Patriots’ team mascot, Gunston, is named for Mason’s pastoral estate, Gunston Hall. It’s open to the public and worth a visit.
Barbara Haddad Ryan, Denver
Natural gas drilling
I want to express my gratitude to U.S. Sen. Ken Salazar for supporting Senate Bill 2253 in committee. [The bill would require the secretary of the Interior to offer part of the Gulf of Mexico for oil and gas drilling.] It is obvious by his actions that Salazar understands that we must be open to various options when it comes to solving the natural gas crisis in this country.
While it is true that long-term solutions are needed to truly solve the natural gas shortage in the United States, we need to look to opportunities in the present to begin to resolve the dire situation we are in.
Greg Archuletta, Golden
