Playing flag football

Re Larry Wilson’s Wednesday column: I love flag football. Played it in middle school in recreation leagues. I the played three seasons of traditional football in high school.

Blocking and tackling is the essence of football in high school, college and the pros. It’s a ferocious physical game, but that’s competitive football. For youngsters it’s a right of passage that requires physical courage.

I believe that high school and college football players should play both offense and defense. That would eliminate the 300-pound-plus players whose agility and endurance is limited to very short spurts to the benefit of more all-around players and reduce injuries caused solely by collisions with enormous individuals capable of only brute strength. I played flag in college intermurals. And later touch in very competitive city leagues. Great games. Perfect for boys and girls, men and women, young to more mature. But they’re a different game. The professionalism of the college game’s pay-for-play is destroying its heritage. Specialization is killing the notion of student athletes, school loyalty and tradition. If one plays principally for pay, the risks may be worth the rewards. But that’s not college football. It’s the NFL development league and it serves only a very small minority of the players.

Disappointments of politics

While I understand the disappointments of politics, the ability of partisans to rationalize their party’s failures is seemingly infinite. A letter writer predicts all sorts of horrible things and cannot fathom how his side lost. He asks, “Did the voters actually know what they were doing?” and concludes: “I doubt it. They were hoodwinked, believing the lies spewed by social media and by Fox News.” No lies by his side?

How’s this for a more truthful alternative? The American people, having witnessed the past eight years in politics, were fully informed about the nature of the two major parties and their candidates. How in the world could they not understand what the letter writer thinks they didn’t understand, given all that the mainstream media, Hollywood, academia, etc., have endlessly proclaimed for the past eight years?

A majority of the letter writer’s fellow citizens, being fully informed, expressed their disapproval of the letter writer’s party, its policies, its candidates and the civilizational culture it advances. They understood the letter writer’s arguments against his political opposition, and emphatically disagree with the letter writer and his party. They are as nice as the letter writer, as intelligent and informed as he (or better), and most certainly are not, as major figures in his party continue to assert, “deplorables” or “garbage.”

— Rich Mason, Altadena

In Syria

Two thoughts about your editorial calling for us to not intervene in Syria. First, I’m not aware of anyone who is calling for a U.S. troops on the ground type of intervention in Syria except for the 900 troops who are already there and are expected to be recalled soon. Second and more importantly you equate the situation in Syria to that in Libya when Gaddafi’s regime fell. There is one very major difference between the two. Syria shares a border with Israel, our most reliable ally in the Middle East, whereas the large country of Egypt comes between Israel and Libya. We have vastly different interests this time around.

— Ron Garber, Duarte

Expat taxes

“End Worldwide Tax Grab by IRS” was the title of Veronique De Rugy’s article last Sunday. Catchy title, right? Yes, there definitely is a tax grab, but not by the IRS. It is Congress that must act since the IRS can only enforce rules enacted by Congress. I retired two years ago as a CPA enrolled to practice before the IRS and our clientele has always included a large number of expatriates; that is, those Americans living and working abroad. As the article explains, expatriates often face double taxation — by the foreign country in which they work and also by our government. There exist some offsets, income exclusions and tax credits, but this does not totally cure the duplication nor eliminate the gross complexity expats face with their federal income tax filings. Most countries do not tax their citizens abroad; we are unique in this regard.

There was a French citizen years ago who as a kid obtained American citizenship perhaps by birth in the U.S. or by American citizenship of a parent. But he was a pilot always living and working in France with no need for American citizenship. However he was required by U.S. law to file annual returns with the IRS subjecting him to double taxation. How unfair! Then consider dual citizens residing in non-English speaking countries who don’t speak English but must comply with our law or face extreme penalties! Congress must cancel this outrageous tax overreach faced by expatriates, also saving scarce resources needed by the IRS to support this unfair law.

— Lee M. Willard, Whittier