LTE: Focus on play

Regarding "Wilfork knows how to win, and it starts with consistency" (Friday Sports C6), former New England Patriot Vince Wilfork sounded off on his new team, the Houston Texans, complaining of "missed opportunities", "how inconsistent we were" and that "we didn't come to play".  He also declared himself "frustrated" and "disappointed".

Perhaps before Wilfork gets down on the Texans, he might look in the mirror.  In two games to date he has zero sacks, zero passes defensed, and zero quarterback hits.  His contribution is a measly two assists.

Coming from a Superbowl champion does not entitle you to an opinion.  We learned that with the disastrous Ed Reed experiment two years ago.  Pehaps Wilfork should make a contribution with his play before he expresses any more.

Pete Smith
Cypress, TX

http://www.chron.com/opinion/letters/article/Saturday-letters-The-Alamo-Vince-Wilfork-6530637.php

Because It Looks Like A Bomb

Regarding "Muslims: Police, school not at fault in clock alarm" (Friday B3), a boy brings to school a device that has circuit boards, wiring harnesses, loose wires, batteries and a device that looks like a timer, all housed in a briefcase; in other words, a device that in all of its particulars looks exactly like a bomb, and nothing like a clock.  He is briefly taken into custody while the device is investigated, then released.

In response, local Muslim leaders blame un-named political leaders for "espousing inflammatory anti-Muslim rhetoric and creating a “climate of fear.”

I don't get their argument.  The child brought something that looked like a bomb to school, he was not mistreated by authorities and the matter was resolved.  So unless these leaders are asserting the right of students to bring devices that look like bombs to school, I don't see that they have any complaints, much less the right to sow mistrust by playing the blame game.

Pete Smith
Houston, TX

LTE: Bats On Display

Regarding "A little myth busting helps separate bat fact from bat fiction" (Page E1, Saturday), thanks for this informative and entertaining article on bats. It's amazing to think that an amazing ecosystem - a veritable explosion of wildlife - could evolve in a span of just a few years in the heart of a large American city. It is also gratifying that public policy had evolved to the point in Houston where it was ever allowed to happen. The bat colony under the Waugh bridge enriches us all.

Pete Smith, Houston

https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=1424518256957440211#editor/target=post;postID=3112709387148231511

Judge Starstruck, Brady Is Still A Weasel

"Judge discredits NFL findings, lifts Brady’s 4-game suspension" (Friday Sports) reads the title of one article on Deflategate.  "Has NFL boss done more harm than good?" reads the title of another.  Based on the reportage, sports fans might believe that New England quarterback Tom Brady has been completely exonerated of the NFL charges that he conspired to have his footballs under-inflated, and that commission Roger Goodell trumped up the charges against him, but that is far from the truth.

For starters, federal judge Richard M. Berman comes across more as a Brady Fan Boy than he does a judge.  His black and white ruling concludes that the NFL was wrong, and that they victimized Brady by denying him his rights as a defendant, citing "several significant legal deficiencies” in the league’s handling of the controversy, including no advance notice of potential penalties", and "a refusal to produce a key witness."  The problem with Berman's conclusions is that Brady was accused of workplace misconduct, not a crime, so he was not entitled to the same protections. 

And it is anybody's guess what kind of Pandora's box Berman opened for HR departments across the land with his assertion that Brady was entitled to "advance notice of potential penalties".  If the NFL was required to advertise a schedule of punishments for the 1001 potential ways that players could alter a football, their uniforms, the playing surface or any other aspect of the sport, it's safe to assume that everything about employee misconduct can now be litigated, endlessly.  

What is most startling to me, though, is Berman's complete lack of curiosity about the facts that the NFL did provide regarding Brady's culpability, including the text messages between the trainers discussing their conversations with Brady, the suspicious destruction of 10,000 messages on his cell phone, and his general stone-walling.  Judge Berman presides over a court of law.  Wasn't he required to consider the incredible assertions of Brady as vigorously as he challenged the credible assertions of the NFL? 

If this thing progresses, inevitably Tom Brady is going to have to put his hand on a bible and swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, and the stakes are going to be a lot higher than a piddling four game suspension.  With his unilateral actions, Berman may have postponed Brady's day of reckoning, but he just upped the consequences by an order of magnitude.  The NFL has no choice but to pursue the matter further, or risk the integrity of their sport, and Brady will finally be forced to testify.

His day of reckoning just got a whole lot darker.

Pete Smith

Houston, TX

LTE - Punishment deserved

Regarding "Missouri man who got life sentence on pot charge freed" (Wednesday Nation A2), in this article I learned that convict Jeff Mizanskey was a family man and a victim of America's supposedly unenlightened attitudes towards marijuana, imprisoned for 22 years for possession of pot.  I got to read him complain about how unfair his incarceration was. Heck, I even got to learn that his favorite breakfast was steak and eggs.  

Not until the 12th paragraph did I get to learn that Mizanskey was also a recidivist drug dealer who worked for the drug cartels and was caught with six pounds of dope, enough to roll over 10,000 joints.  

This author of this AP article seems to have gone out of her way to confuse the larger argument about the decriminalization of marijuana possession with the actions of a gangster.  It was the amount that he was trafficking and his association with organized crime that landed him in prison, and that was where he deserved to be.

Pete Smith 

Houston, TX

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Regarding "Missouri man who got life sentence on pot charge freed" (Page A2, Wednesday), I learned that convict Jeff Mizanskey was a family man and a victim of America's supposedly unenlightened attitudes toward marijuana, imprisoned for 22 years for possession of pot. I got to read him complain about how unfair his incarceration was. Heck, I even got to learn that his favorite breakfast was steak and eggs.

Not until the 12th paragraph did I get to learn that Mizanskey was also a recidivist drug dealer who worked for the drug cartels and was caught with six pounds of dope, enough to roll over 10,000 joints.

The story seems to confuse the larger argument about the decriminalization of marijuana possession with the actions of a gangster. It was the amount that he was trafficking and his association with organized crime that landed him in prison and that was where he deserved to be.

Pete Smith, Houston

http://www.houstonchronicle.com/opinion/letters/article/Friday-letters-Drug-dealer-voting-6483944.php