Danger

Columnist Thomas F. Schaller's analysis is incredibly myopic ("Avoiding Europe's austerity nightmare," April 18). To compare the economic condition of the U.S. to those of Greece or Spain at the beginning of the economic crisis is comparing apples and oranges. The fundamental strength of the American economy was far greater than that of the countries he selects in order to contrast and applaud President Barack Obama's response. In short, America had the ability to absorb additional debt - for a time.

Chicago -- James Woolsey's product was danger. He had to convince us that the CIA is still needed, though the occasion for setting it up has disappeared. ''It is still a dangerous world,'' he liked to say.The trouble is that the CIA has a history of augmenting danger, not eliminating it. It helped get us into avoidable crises -- as in its whole bungled history of dealings with Iran. It helped bring on the missile crisis with its assassination attempts against Fidel Castro. It made enemies by interfering in others' internal affairs.

On a recent Friday night in the Baltimore Police Department's high-tech Watch Center, an urgent but vague tip came in — a murder witness was in danger. The tipster had overheard a conversation but knew only the nickname of the witness and had a hunch about the name of the street where the killing had taken place. Could police figure out the witness's identity and get to him before those who wanted to harm him? The Watch Center is a nerve center built on the ninth floor of police headquarters after the terrorist attacks of Sept.

The night started out right - good friends, carousing, the lead-up to an out-of-town wedding. But between festivities, after Nicole King popped into her hotel room to change clothes and was heading back out, she wanted to text her pals to find out where to meet them. Hurrying along in the dark, punching letters into her phone, she tripped over a heavy decorative bench. "My face hit the bench on the way down," the University of Maryland Baltimore County professor says. "It was bad. " It was six stiches from nose to lip bad. Big, ugly black eye bad. And yet - somehow - not quite bad enough for King to stop walking and texting.

Every time we invade a foreign country, it makes the people mad as hell. In no time at all, they start tossing bombs and killing our soldiers. So please, let's stop this audacious insanity and bring the troops home now. Daniel K. Hays Towson

The drivers don't like to talk about it. IndyCar isn't crazy about the subject, either. But there's no getting around the danger of open-wheel racing. You don't have to be a genius to figure out why. Take Sunday's Grand Prix of Baltimore. For openers, you'll have 25 cars racing at ridiculously high speeds around a tight 2.04-mile course in the heart of a city. Throw 25 super-competitive drivers into the mix. Now add road surface changes from concrete to asphalt, 300 manhole covers, blind turns and light-rail tracks and the potential for disaster is everywhere.

These days it's hard to imagine anyone going to a sporting event -- particularly one as epic as the Super Bowl -- without bringing a smart phone to record the moments. Did anyone catch the Ravens at their own pep rally on Monday? Almost ALL of them where making videos and taking pictures as they were being honored by the city, aiming the phones out into the crowd. So leave it to the extended warranty company SquareTrade to figure out why this is dangerous to the health of your phone.

History played a macabre trick on Germany when the Berlin Wall fell three years ago on the same date -- November 9 -- that Nazi thugs went on the 1938 Kristallnacht rampage against Jews that anticipated the Holocaust. Both events go to the heart of the German dilemma: how to deal with an ugly past and a present in which the high hopes of reunification have been replaced by rightwing attacks on foreigners and anything Jewish.There was a whiff of Weimar in what happened this week when political leaders tried to mark this double anniversary by leading a protest against a mounting crisis enflamed by their own dithering.

Responding to a 2005 stalking complaint, a Virginia court found Seung-Hui Cho to be dangerously mentally ill, but that legal judgment didn't prevent him from buying the guns that he used to kill 32 people at Virginia Tech last week. He should have failed his background check - but he didn't because of the standard by which states report such cases to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System. This is a loophole that can't be left open. Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine has indicated that he wants to change the reporting requirement.

A morning run on Carroll's rural roads is not supposed to end in tragedy. But last Thursday, a car -- whose driver had fallen asleep -- plowed into two runners on Littlestown Pike shortly after dawn, killing one and severely injuring the other. The accident shook the county and is another example of the dangers of running on roads where there is high-speed traffic.Terrence Burk, the 48-year-old owner of the Treat Shop at the Cranberry Mall, died while in surgery about eight hours after the 6:40 a.m. accident.