Readers Write for Sunday, Jan. 31

As soon as President Obama finished his State of the Union address, U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann gave her one-sided view about health care. She said that the people have overwhelmingly stated that they don't want the government to control our health care. I think she misses the point or just doesn't listen. Seventy percent of all of the people want health care reform and want Congress to get off of its collective lazy butt and fix the system.

To do nothing means private health insurance companies will continue to deny coverage to people with preexisting conditions and raise our rates until we can no longer afford to have health insurance. It should be an embarrassment to our senators and representatives that the United States is lagging behind the rest of the industrialized world in providing health care to all of the people.

Health care shouldn't just be for the rich or for our representatives and senators; it should be for all of God's children.

STEVE KOZICKY, MINNEAPOLIS

Katherine Kersten's Jan. 24 column, spiking the ball and doing a victory dance on her own 41-yard line over the election of Scott Brown, is a new low in political hackery.

So, what does it mean to be a "self appointed Messiah" anyway? Ordinary users of the English language might think it means that a person said, "I appoint myself the Messiah," or words to that effect, at some point. Words to that effect might include "God wants me to run," or "God chose me," as former President George W. Bush and U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann in fact said, words that Kersten, to this point, doesn't seem to have any problem with. Of course, Obama never said any such thing. The words "I appoint myself Messiah" turned out to be the voices in Kersten's head.

Kersten applies a different standard to Obama. According to Kersten, you have appointed yourself the Messiah if a Newsweek writer used a God simile to say you're above the fray. Well, that plus you have to stand in front of a Greek temple (and for those purposes, a spare set with a few classical elements, much like those in our nation's Capitol Building, will do). Which raises an interesting question: If a recently elected senator from Massachusetts is described in swooning rhetoric by a columnist in Minneapolis, does that make him a god, too? I trust Kersten would say not.

RICHARD E. LANGER, MINNEAPOLIS

Gary, Gary Keillor! You did so well as a comedian where you seemed to know what you were doing -- why did you get into political commentary? Your Jan. 24 column seems to be nothing more than blame the right and Republicans and Christians, and call names. After excising the names and blames, there is no there there.

Then you claim that Holy Scripture points toward health care as a right, but you don't give me chapter and verse. I believe that Holy Scripture is intended to instruct individuals, not governments. If you wish to care for your neighbor, you are encouraged to do so by Holy Word (Matt 25:34-36 for starters), but you are not to coerce tax money from me under threat of jail to do your charitable works. Why is that so hard to understand for Democrats?

ARTHUR LINK, EAGAN

As a former miner, I'm disappointed in Rep. Tom Rukavina's Jan. 24 letter about mining in northeastern Minnesota.

Virginia is almost surrounded by operating taconite plants, and the result is a shrinking school enrollment and a blighted main street. It's cynical for him to propose mining for other communities when it has failed so miserably in his own.

Rukavina's reference to "tough U.S. environmental laws" ignores the reality that the leaking tailings ponds in his district are polluting public waters.

No cost-benefit analysis has demonstrated that Minnesota would prosper by destroying its wetlands to open up a sulfide ore body that is less than 1 percent copper.

BOB TAMMEN, SOUDAN, MINN.

Greg Breining's Jan. 24 column claims that silver and bighead carp might not be so bad for our ecosystem after all. And some other aggressive exotics, such as buckthorn and purple loosestrife, might not even be worth fighting.

Once removed, exotic buckthorn regrows before most native species can fill in the empty spaces. Birds and other animals do eat the black berries (they disperse the seeds effectively because the fruits are highly laxative), but animals cannot live on buckthorn alone, and scraggly buckthorn trees do not provide good nesting habitat and cover for the many desirable inhabitants of our natural spaces.

We may not be able to eliminate exotics, but we need to be aware of their effects on the environment and keep them under control.