Boneheads, subversion and constitutional tune-ups

Who is the bonehead who authorized the road construction on the Parks Highway on Sunday evening? Anyone with knowledge of traffic patterns should know that people would be streaming into Anchorage on Sunday night, after enjoying a weekend outside the city.

I bet the person who engineered this fiasco is the same person who designed the traffic flow in Wasilla.

- Vamori G. Burgheim

Woe to the Republic

"I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them." - attributed to Thomas Jefferson. Our country's current conditions and national measures promoted show American happiness being increasingly sabotaged by government lip-service to, or ignorance of, our political heritage.

Anyone researching the answers to these questions can prove this.

1) Can your elected officials demonstrate they govern more by leading citizens than by ruling to protect people and why?

2) Can your elected official show you the infrastructure he uses to harvest, organize, and represent contributions from citizen minds and initiative towards good government, based on how our Founders defined "represent"?

3) Can your elected official demonstrate he regularly goes to libraries or reference websites to improve his skill at leading and governing in a constitutional republic?

4) Why are emergencies being increasingly found to justify bypassing our republic's constitutional structure in favor of "protecting the public" through enlarging executive, bureaucratic, and military discretionary power?

- Stuart Thompson

Wasilla

We need to tweak our constitution

The Alaska Constitution mandates a vote for a Constitutional Convention every 10 years. I encourage my fellow Alaskans to vote for a State Constitutional Convention when the question is next put before us.

Our 1959 Constitution can use a little "tune up". Alaska can lead the nation in addressing issues such as:

* Allowing political donations only from registered voters residing in the district of the candidate.

*Checking the ability of senior politicians to disenfranchise citizens at will.

* Choosing Legislative Committee leadership positions by lottery.

* Adjusting the number of Legislators to represent a growing population.

* Representation apportioned by area instead of population

* Banning a sitting elected official from running for another elected office without resigning their current office.

* Requiring citizen access to government records except for specified exceptions.

We also might want to adopt other States methods such as electing our Attorney General.

A web site to discuss constitutional convention issues should be maintained by the State for future use by the delegates.

- Lynn Willis

Eagle River