Well advised as Mr. Bauernfeind’s plea for more balanced opinion columns may be as a rule of thumb, your post-script to his op-ed contribution notes accurately portrayed your commitment to print views regardless of political or other perspectives.

That said, before we bow too low or too long at the altar of Ayn Rand, would it not also be “balanced” to probe her writings from perspectives other than her total admiration of the heroic titans of industry?

Since Mr. Bauernfeind has advised our business college students to read her writings, why not include the humanities as well?

That way many more Murray State students would be exposed to the premises and implications of the objectivist philosophy she developed and advocated.

Rand’s writings, after all, have social implications that extend well beyond the cultivation and admiration of entrepreneurial prowess, among them:

All human relations are best mediated in a marketplace;

The highest moral standard man (her term) can aspire to is the empowerment of the self;

All social initiatives undertaken by government amount to the unjustified and immoral usurpation of goods produced through individual initiative.

The list goes on. So, yes, let’s all study Ayn Rand, but let’s make a thorough job of it and not stop with her own uncritical worship of America’s captains of industry, as if all human relations were to be reduced to mimic those transacted in a marketplace.

Letter by Michael Basile, Former Murray State staff member

I have been reading and listening to arguments about how the gassing of the Syrian people should be equated to American abortion.

This argument seems to lead into whether we should attack Syria, leave Syria alone after killing approximately 1,400 of its own people and whether or not this should be the ideal time to look at our own country’s abortion laws.

First, it has been established that Syria has broken international law by gassing its own people in this civil war that has been going on for two years.

All of the world’s countries know about this, but only a very few will agree to take a stand against this.

Our president and Congress seem ready to stand with these few countries in order to “punish” the Syrian government.

At this point, our government leaders are like salmon swimming upstream on this.

The overwhelming majority of Americans do not want anything to do with Syria. Who said government officials have it easy?

Not this decision.

As for equating abortion to this, I can say many, many people are against abortion! I am a Democrat, but that doesn’t mean I can’t be pro-life.

Letter by Tim Bledsoe, Nonstudent from North Augusta, SC