CIVIL AIR PATROL PROVES TO BE A TOP-FLIGHT GROUP

The Civil Air Patrol is celebrating its 50th year of existence nationally. A Cape Girardeau chapter of this organization, after years of dormancy, is again functioning and its cadet program is providing a fascinating education for young people interested in aviation. The focus of the group remains in emergency services and aerospace education, though some intangible benefits, such as ethical and leadership training, naturally result. The Civil Air Patrol is vital to search-and-rescue missions in the region and often serves as experience for those who go on to military aviation careers. We join the local organization in observing this golden anniversary. It is a top-flight group.

Missouri is known far and wide as the "Show Me State." Given the policy by which candidates can file to be on public ballots, the phrase might better read the "Show Up State." Persons representing various statewide candidates are loafing outside the Missouri Secretary of State's office and have been since Oct. 21. Their mission is to get their candidate's name on the top of the ballot for respective races leading to the August 1992 primary. This follows the dubious and somewhat insulting argument that voters, uninformed or indifferent about an elected office, will mark the first name they see, giving an advantage to the candidate who signed up first. The filing period doesn't even start until Jan. 14. Missouri is a state where all shoulders are needed at the wheel, not idling in a Capitol hallway. The state should do away with these lines and adopt a lottery system that determines the order in which candidate names are listed on the ballot. Candidates shouldn't be rewarded because of the number of people they can get to loiter on their behalf.

There is an old saying that goes, "If you don't like the weather in Missouri, wait 10 minutes and it will change." Many residents sing the praises of the "four distinct seasons" of our area, but we might bemoan getting all four so close together. Within the last two weeks, Cape Girardeau has experienced torrential autumn rains, powerful spring-like winds and frigid winter-like conditions. Temperatures are supposed to rise by the weekend, but it would be too much to hope that the climate would duplicate a summer day. As Southeast Missourians, we have come to expect some nasty winter days; of late, they have been nothing short of ridiculous.

We note with some interest that a man and wife from Texas were arrested over the weekend for allegedly robbing a bank in Tightwad, Mo. The village, incorporated in 1984, is in Henry County, in the west-central part of the state. While there is no real editorial point to accompany this news item, we do find it heartening that robbery is taken seriously in Tightwad.