Netlets for Thursday, May 14

If the DFL Party is serious about realizing massive long-term budget saving for all Minnesota taxpayers, it need look no further than the lavish defined-benefit retirement pension plans bestowed upon all public employees. When health care and pension benefits are factored in, the average public employee's total compensation is far superior to the average employee in the private sector. This needs to end immediately.

At a time when the 401(k) plans of many private sector employees plan look more like 201(k) plans, Minnesota taxpayers can ill afford the request currently before state Legislature calling for an additional almost quarter-billion dollars to further fund state employee defined-benefit pension plans! These state and local employees face no personal market risk with their defined-benefit pension plans. Instead, we -- the ordinary taxpayers -- are 100 percent exposed to the market risk to support these guaranteed pensions, and at almost a quarter billion dollars our taxpayer risk is truly staggering and unacceptable at this time. These lavishly expensive defined benefit plans for public employees must be terminated and converted into 401k plans -- plans like the rest of the private sector has for their retirement. And the state (taxpayers) can match public employees contributions up to 6 percent of salary, just like what employers do in the private sector.

The silent-hidden mounting cost to fund these defined-benefit plans is a ticking time bomb and needs to be defused immediately. Doing so will save countless millions right now, and billions of dollars in the decades ahead. Now this is change all Minnesota taxpayers can believe in.

TOM SCHWEBACH, EDEN PRAIRIE

A viable community needs revenue As I see it, the only way out of the economic shortfall that we have here in Minnesota is to insist that those who have the most help out the most. Just borrowing a billion or so from our descendants so that those of us who have the most don't have to pay slightly higher taxes doesn't seem fair. We can't let the burden of a bad economy continue to be born by the poorest of the poor, through massive cutting of social services.

After years of regressive taxes and bailouts for the rich, we finally have a modestly progressive tax bill passed by the state Legislature. Unfortunately this bill has been vetoed by the governor. Unless the people rise up to insist on the fairness of progressive taxation, it will just be more suffering by the people who have suffered the most, while the rich and powerful party on, insulated from the troubles of the rest. Insist that our legislators override the governor's veto of the budget plan passed by both houses of the Legislature. Insist that revenues be raised fairly so that we can continue to have a viable community.

ROGER CUTHBERTSON, SHOREWOOD

MIKE BURG, EDINA

Daniel's decision must be respected About 10 years ago, my dad had Hodgkin's lymphoma. This is the same cancer that Daniel Hauser is living with ("Sleepy Eye parents, teen fight to refuse chemo," May 8).

People choose to disobey doctors' orders all the time. Although I do not agree with the Hausers' decision, I have to applaud them for standing up for what they feel, which goes against the grain in our society today.

When my dad has cancer, he went through painful treatment and a year later he was fine. He chose to have this treatment. He was not forced by any doctor or his family; he wanted it. Daniel does not want it and he should not be forced to have it. It is each person's right to decide what should and shouldn't happen to them, and it just so happens that Daniel's choice goes against the majority.

ANDIE KUEBLER, EDEN PRAIRIE

However we also have callously locked up young men In Guantanamo without regard for their guilt or innocence. These men have mothers who bore them and grieving families as well. This is another reason to be a moral leader and respect the rule of law. A good reason to do onto other's children as we would have done onto our own sons and daughters.

JAMES ROETTGER, MINNEAPOLIS

The solution seems clear Regarding "The predator pursued" (front page, May 14): I'm sympathetic to the plight of Minnesota ranchers who are losing newborn calves to predator wolves. I can also understand how tempted the wolves are to an easy meal like a calf dropped in an open, unprotected field -- "wolf candy."

A compromise like isolating gestating cows in a more secure and protected environment until they've calved and stabilized might be a win-win situation for ranchers and wolves alike.

MARY RITTER, MINNEAPOLIS