Opinion
Lawrence Journal-World l LJWorld.com l Tuesday, March 29, 2016
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Syrian Kurds are best option for U.S.
EDITORIALS
Pedestrian priority Planners shouldn’t give pedestrians short shrift when promoting safety on city streets and pathways.
T
he concept of “complete streets” that has drawn considerable support in Lawrence calls for streets that are designed to promote safety for all users: motorists, bicyclists and pedestrians. Bicycle lanes have been a big focus, as have “shared use” paths. Sometimes the paths are used in conjunction with bicycle lanes and sometimes, as is proposed for the East Ninth Project, they are intended to replace bicycle lanes and be the primary route for bicycles, people on other conveyances, like skateboards or roller skates — and pedestrians. The shared use paths certainly provide a safer area for most of those users — but not so much for pedestrians who have to compete with a variety of wheeled vehicles on the path. An 8-foot-wide path is envisioned for the East Ninth Project. That’s probably wide enough to accommodate multiple uses if both foot and wheeled traffic is light, but planners hope this will be a heavily traveled route. It’s easy to imagine conflicts between pedestrians who are strolling, or perhaps pushing baby strollers, and bicyclists rolling along toward their destinations. The East Ninth Project certainly isn’t the only place where this could be — or already is — an issue. When walkers are handling a dog, talking to a companion or using earbuds to listen to music, they may be unaware that a bicycle is approaching them from behind. Some bicyclists ring a bell or shout something like “on your left” as they approach, but their warning often comes so late that it startles pedestrians but gives them little time to react. Again, on paths with relatively low traffic, problems may be minimal but, if the idea is to encourage walking and cycling in the city, problems are likely to increase. Walking is great exercise and often the exercise of choice for the retirees that Lawrence is trying to attract. It’s great to promote safe cycling, but don’t forget the pedestrians.
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Paris — After Brussels, President Obama’s strategy of gradually degrading the Islamic State looks terribly risky. And much too slow. Yes, the Islamic State has lost around 40 percent of the territory it seized in Syria and Iraq, much of it retaken by Kurdish forces with U.S. air support. But it still holds the cities at its heart: Raqqa in eastern Syria and the major urban area of Mosul in northern Iraq. Right now, it appears unlikely that either will be liberated in the near term. That cross-border territorial base enables the jihadis to retain their ideological appeal to alienated Muslim youths in Europe and at what won’t work before laying out the one plausible (but risky) option that could do the caliphate in. For starters, let’s scratch the idiotic post-Brussels panaceas offered by Donald Trump (more torture) and Ted Cruz (“patrol and secure” Muslim American neighborhoods). Both would create more recruits for the Islamic State than they would deter.
Trudy Rubin
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trubin@phillynews.com
Yet if the goal is to destroy the Islamic State caliphate more quickly, helping the Kurds of Syria take Raqqa may be the only option, one that must at least be seriously examined.” elsewhere. That base also permits the Islamic State to maintain its fiction that it has resurrected a caliphate. It allows it to train fighters with European passports who can return home and wreak carnage. Moreover, the fear generated by these attacks is stoking a wave of rightwing populism in Europe that threatens to undermine America’s most important alliances — the European Union and NATO.
Quicker action is needed None of this excuses the glaring European failure to share intelligence, or act on information that might have prevented last week’s tragedy. But the Brussels disaster forces the question: Should the United States be moving more quickly to upend the caliphate, before the Islamic State sinks deeper roots into Europe and North Africa — and spreads to America? After spending two weeks in Iraq and Syria, my answer is yes. But I don’t mean send in the Marines. Indeed, it is best to look
Retaking Mosul delayed The complexity of the Syrian front has led many to focus first on the Iraq option. U.S. troops have been retraining the Iraqi army that collapsed in 2014 when the Islamic State invaded Mosul. Early hopes were that Mosul could be liberated in 2015, but that goal was pushed back to 2016 and even that date is now in serious doubt. Speaking at a forum held by the American University of Iraq in Sulaimani, the special presidential envoy for countering the Islamic State cautioned against expectations for a speedy liberation of Mosul. “Everything now is trending the right way, but this will be a long haul,” said Brett McGurk in Kurdistan. “This is going to be longer than people want.” The reasons for the delay: A weak and beleaguered Iraqi prime minister is being pressed by Iranian-backed militia leaders to let their Shiite fighters lead the offensive on Mosul — a predominantly Sunni city. This would risk an outbreak of sectarian slaughter. Political infighting has also delayed the raising of a Sunni tribal force of 15,000 men from northern Iraq to join the army. This Sunni component is essential to reassure Mosul civilians that the anti-Islamic State force won’t take revenge on them.
“Fighting between politicians in Baghdad while we are fighting ISIS puts a stone on the way of Iraq,” I was told by Gen. Najm alJabouri, commander of the operations center tasked with organizing the Mosul offensive. “We don’t have enough troops, enough equipment,” he told me at his headquarters in Makhmour. Retraining of Iraqi army troops is slow. Jabouri says he has three brigades but could use eight to 13. These deficits mean that the Mosul offensive will likely take place in stages; any move to retake the urban core probably won’t happen until 2017. This harsh truth forces us to reexamine whether there is any prospect of an earlier liberation of Raqqa, and who could provide the troops. The easy (but incorrect) answer is: Let the Russians do it with their Assad regime ally. Syrian government troops, backed by Russian air power (yes, Vladimir Putin is still active in Syria) are on the verge of retaking Palmyra, which lies along a crucial route to Raqqa.
Retaking Raqqa But it would be a stretch too far to expect the unsteady Syrian military to take Raqqa. Nor do Moscow or Damascus have a strategic reason to do so. (The continued existence of the Islamic State is used by Russia to justify maintaining Bashar al-Assad in power.) Which brings us to the only fighters willing and able to retake Raqqa from the Islamic State if a host of political obstacles didn’t prevent them: the Syrian Kurds. Syrian Kurdish fighters, backed by U.S. air power, have already driven the Islamic State out of large swathes of eastern Syria.
“We think Raqqa should be retaken as soon as possible,” said Salih Muslim, co-president of the Syrian Kurds’ Democratic Union Party (PYD), speaking at the Sulaimani forum. “We can stand against ISIS and break down the myth of ISIS.” He’s probably right. With greater U.S. support, and an effort to enlist more Sunni tribal fighters to join the Kurds, they might well take Raqqa. Muslim says they would give this Sunni city local rule within their selfdeclared federal region of Rojava and North Syria. He says the Kurds would ensure that the Islamic State 2.0 would not emerge in the liberated area.
Work harder on Turkey But Turkey, at war with its own rebel Kurds, violently opposes this idea. Washington should try harder to persuade Turkey’s mercurial President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to renew talks with Kurdish rebels in both Turkey and Syria, but he doesn’t seem open to reason. Moreover, it’s far from clear that Raqqa’s Sunni Arab population would accept living under Kurdish overlordship. “This could become a real incendiary issue between Kurds, Arabs and Turks,” says Joshua Landis, the University of Oklahoma’s noted Syria expert. Yet if the goal is to destroy the Islamic State caliphate more quickly, helping the Kurds of Syria take Raqqa may be the only option, one that must at least be seriously examined. The longer the Islamic State keeps its territorial base in Raqqa and Mosul, the more its threat to the West will grow. — Trudy Rubin is a columnist and editorial-board member for the Philadelphia Inquirer.
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To the editor: The number of vehicle accidents is up and the number of bodily injuries is up, all due to cellphone usage while driving or walking. I have seen drivers reading paperwork, using a laptop or trying to feed french fries to a child strapped into a child safety seat behind them. Drivers have one job to do while operating a vehicle, focus on the job at hand. Saturday, when I read the paper, I was totally shocked to read an article about painting a mural on the street at a street intersection. This smacks of stupidity on so many levels. Are our city leaders considering the safety of people using this intersection? You have enough trouble with drivers not paying attention to what they are doing. Now you’re going to have drivers trying to snap pictures with their cellphones or looking down at the mural, instead of paying attention to the traffic movements at this intersection. Is this what you call an accident waiting to happen? Scott Henderson, Lawrence
Valuable assets To the editor: April is Child Abuse and Neglect Prevention Month and, as we celebrate this month, we are reminded that all
children deserve safe and happy childhoods. Each of us has a role in making sure Douglas County is the best place for children and families to thrive. There are simple actions we can take every day to help reduce family isolation and stress, which are two of the major risk factors of child abuse and neglect. Such actions include making yourself known to new neighbors and families, volunteering your time at pre- or post-school programs, or providing time for parents to have an occasional break from the rigors of parenthood. With the support of more than 40 local groups and agencies, the Douglas County Child Abuse Prevention Task Force will be asking mayors and city and county commissioners in Lawrence, Lecompton, Eudora and Baldwin City to declare April Child Abuse and Neglect Prevention Month. Along with the proclamations, we will be planting blue pinwheels in each city to increase awareness and community engagement in this important issue. Please join us Saturday, April 23, at the Earth Day Celebration in South Park to celebrate not only our earth, but also one of its most valuable assets, our children. Look for the booth with the blue pinwheels, an uplifting reminder of childhood and the bright futures all children deserve! Pamela Cullerton, Lawrence
OLD HOME TOWN
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From the Lawrence Daily Journal-World for March 29, 1916: “Unless some other community gets busy years mighty quick, the first six ago miles of concrete road to be IN 1916 built in Douglas county, will run west of Lawrence on the California road. As the result of a meeting held last night at the Brackett school house a committee was appointed … which will take charge of the work in this district and will circulate petitions as soon as they can secure the blanks. Thirty-five or more farmers were out to the meeting last night and while there were several who were outspoken in favor of building a concrete road no one expressed himself against it. ... The talks made were along the line of the cost of the road, method of building same, their worth to the farmers, and the manner in which the money is to be raised to pay for the road.” “Naming as one cause for action the fact that her husband has often been absent from home late at night without giving an account of his whereabouts, Bettie Proper this morning filed suit for divorce in the district court against Harvey Proper. Mrs. Proper alleges that her husband has often been guilty of cruelty and has failed to provide the necessities of life for her and his daughter. Mrs. Proper asks for a division of property and the custody of her child.” — Compiled by Sarah St. John
Read more Old Home Town at LJWorld. com/news/lawrence/history/old_home_ town.