Welcome ruling, but ban guns as well

It is interesting that “public pressure” saved the right for smokers to pack in and consume their addiction at public parks [“No smoking ban after all,” NWFriday, Feb. 19]. Not being a smoker, I laud Parks Superintendent Timothy Gallagher’s solution of requiring smoker’s to steer clear of non-puffers by at least 25 feet.

It occurs to me that a similar restriction could be placed on those individuals who demand the right to tote guns in and around children play areas. Since guns have a farther range — and are more immediately lethal than cigarette smoke — it might be prudent for Gallagher to set aside special “gun parks” similar to Seattle’s numerous “dog parks.”

This should please the gun-dependent and preserve — if not improve — our murder-rate statistics. In these set-aside areas, gun-packing citizens could frolic and play brandishing their weapons. I assume no leashes would be required.

— David Clifton, Seattle

Unwelcome reversal

Parks Superintendent Timothy Gallagher was right the first time around and shouldn’t have caved in on his position. There’s no getting around it: Smoking is pollution.

If we have the expectation that governments should rid our planet of toxic industrial waste-byproducts, then how are we wrong in similarly expecting them to keep parks clear of smokers when the only difference between these is a matter of degree?

What Chernobyl was on a massive industrial scale, smoking is on a private individual scale — it’s pollution.

— Herb Aldinger, Seattle