Letters: Gangs in Chaska

I am very disappointed in the May 5 article "Think there are no gangs in the suburbs? Think again," which made out Chaska High School as a breeding ground for gangs.

As a recent graduate of Chaska High School, I believe the article was a complete misrepresentation of the school. It is a great place to learn and is very safe. The school has many positives that easily outweigh the bad -- such as our academic teams, the music and theater departments, or even the amazing things Chaska students do on a daily basis.

Those are the things that should be on the front page.

JOHN THOMASON, CHASKA

I am a 77-year-old retired person who enjoys playing online poker. I'm doing something that I like -- on my own time, with my own money. Will someone please tell me where the pressure to curtail this activity is coming from?

The state of Minnesota doesn't care whether I gamble or not. It advertises daily that buying lottery tickets and state-sponsored scratch-off games is a good thing to do. So who really cares what I do in the privacy of my home?

RICHARD ROBERTS,

In its May 5 story about "divvying up" the first Legacy Amendment funds for clean air and water, for fish and game, and for the arts and cultural heritage, the Star Tribune revises the recent past. The amendment got extensive coverage; I think most voters knew what they were voting on.

Yet the paper implies that "many people" voted primarily for money for the outdoors, which receives nearly three-fourths of the fund. It uses a variant of the "some people say" approach to imply that arts and cultural heritage were downplayed during the campaign as "frivolous spending."

I'd love to know what clean air and water are like, and I hope the additional funding for them that this amendment is meant to provide lets me experience them in my lifetime.

But as one who voted for the amendment primarily because it included arts and cultural heritage -- and who recognizes both the intangible and substantial tangible economic benefits they bring in -- I resist efforts now to imply any frivolity, just as I might have during the campaign.

ROBERT FRAME, MINNEAPOLIS

Torture was, and should continue to be, used as an option for interrogation. For those who disagree, consider this scenario. Your child is kidnapped. The police are fortunate enough to capture the person responsible, but the whereabouts of your child is still unknown. You know he or she is still alive. As hard as the police try, the kidnapper won't tell them where the child is.

Who would allow their child to die?

DON MUSSELL, EDEN PRAIRIE

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The arguments made by Garrison Keillor and others that prosecuting torture would be too divisive and distracting for the country and that we should look forward, not back (Star Tribune, May 3), remind me of the same excuses that used to be made for the "pillars of the community" accused of spousal or child abuse.

Torture is against the law, no matter who does it or for what reasons, and when evidence exists that torture has been committed, the law requires that it be prosecuted.

The evidence is now overwhelming that torture was approved by the highest levels of government, and even if criminal proceedings are disruptive, they are necessary to uphold our laws and prove that our judicial system exists for everyone regardless of their stature.

WALTER SCHLEISMAN, MINNEAPOLIS

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In reading the May 3 commentaries by Garrison Keillor, Charles Krauthammer and George Will on torture, one wonders how their position of no punishment for those responsible in breaking our laws and international laws and treaties would have played in Nuremburg after World War II? Oh, well, let's disseminate truth but hold no one accountable while whistling past the graveyards.

This is about right and wrong.

MIKE CHEVALIER, MAHTOMEDI

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Charles Krauthammer calls torture an impermissible evil, then conjures up two exceptions. The first is the "ticking time bomb," to prevent immediate, catastrophic harm. The second, "the extraction of information from a high-value enemy in possession of high-value information likely to save lives," is so broad as to justify nearly anything.

In reality, the U.N. Convention Against Torture, which has been the law of the land since the United States ratified it in 1984, states that "no exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a threat or war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification of torture."