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Letters for Nov. 1, 2009
Published November 1, 2009
Letters to the Editor published in The Facts:
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Mainstream press ignores real problems in US
What is wrong with the mainstream media? Instead of screaming about the Wall Street crooks and big banks’ theft of trillions of hardworking Americans’ dollars and the ongoing theft by Bank of America, Citigroup, AIG, etc., and their leading executives backed by all the U.S. governing bodies; they are worrying about whether the president includes women in a basketball game.
Instead of exposing the failures of our military brass policy in Afghanistan, they feature the president’s wife playing with a hula hoop. Come on people, it’s entertainment at its worse. Where is the investigative journalism?
Why are the 10 million-plus unemployed Americans and those who have run out of benefits not featured? We should demand more and better journalism in the U.S., and if they are afraid to go against the grain, with only PBS and foreign news sources showing what is going on, democracy in the United States surely is doomed.
The failure of our congressional, executive and judicial politicians is leading us down a road we will never be able to turn around on.
David Payne, Brazoria
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Force US companies to produce flu vaccine
Here’s some interesting information regarding the seasonal flu vaccines. The Centers for Disease Control lists the following manufacturers for this season (2009-10): Sanofi Pasteur Inc. (French), Novartis Vaccine (Swiss), MedImmune Vaccines Inc. (U.S.), CSL Biotherapies (Australia), GlaxoSmithKline Biologicals (U.K.), ID Biomedical Corporation (U.K.).
It’s interesting that only one of those companies the United States depends on to fight the flu is an American company. To be honest, a couple of these do list U.S. manufacturing sites for their flu vaccine. I might suggest, however, that all drug companies allowed to operate and sell in the U.S. be required to be set up to produce the vaccine.
The reason the vaccine is not popular with U.S. drug manufacturers is they can’t charge an arm and a leg for it. They are more interested in spending subsidized research dollars (i.e., government grants to university professors doing the research for them) on “new and improved” drugs with outrageous side effects they can push on TV to try to get you to ask your doctor to prescribe it for you if you have some new disease they made up.
And we wonder why our health care costs are the highest. Duh.
Don Gerard, Lake Jackson
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We shouldn’t coerce others to pay for our needs
Why is it a right to demand another pay for our needs? This concept is not new as witnessed in slave owners, aristocrats, kings, tyrants and despots. A casual examination of the past 10,000 years reveals it is mankind’s natural state for one segment of the population to be coerced to work and pay so another segment can have its needs met.
In 1776, America began a grand experiment to expunge this idea, but it took a war and several constitutional amendments to eliminate slavery in the Old South.
Sadly, in the attempt to right past wrongs, folks with good intentions have not eliminated this evil idea entirely. They simply ask for another population segment to take on different chains justifying coercion as they always have, on the basis of need.
Is forcing another to meet our needs really a right? The recipients of such benefits always believe so.
Since America was founded, politicians have enabled slavery in its various forms. Will they do so again? The health care debate will show us.
Will mankind never learn? Humans enjoy freedom when each person seeks nothing from his or her neighbor but good will.
Dennis Fink, Lake Jackson
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Public health option opt-out idea puzzling
Opt-out vs. opt-in. What’s the difference?
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., announced the public option — government-run health care — with a provision that allows states to opt out of the program as the best possible solution to the nation’s perceived health care crisis.
There are unanswered questions concerning the opt-out option. Will residents of states that decide to opt out be required to pay taxes, fees or penalties to support residents of states that decide to participate in the program? Will residents of opted out states become exempt from these taxes, fees or penalties? If a state opts out, can it join at a later date? If a state participates, can it opt out at a later date? Would residents of participating states be required to pay higher taxes or fees because the cost of the program is spread among fewer participants?
Requiring residents of opted-out states to pay for the care of participating states is redistribution of wealth and socialistic. Allowing states to enter and leave the program would cause the citizens to have then not have health care whenever the political majority in their state changes from party to party.
Carl Goodson, Clute
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Too honest, insufficiently funded for elected office
I read one of The Facts’ letters (Tuesday) asking if there were any Republicans out there for small government?
Of course there are; they just aren’t elected to any office of the government.
I could run for office, but I’m definitely short of funding for that endeavor. That makes no sense at all because I’m a Republican, and all Republicans have loads of money, right? That’s what I hear, anyway, from all the Democrats who want to take away what little I have to live on. That’s what the health care reform, Cash for Clunkers, auto industry bailout, bank bailout, Wall Street bailout and who knows what else bailout is doing. Taking away what little I have, trying to make it on my retirement.
I reckon I have a couple things going for me if I did run for public office, and those are my name and I don’t lie or steal. Wait, that would keep me from being elected, right? A politician has to lie, steal and do crooked dealings to be a politician. Look at all the money being spent just to be elected to a job like president.
Tom Sawyer, Needville
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First Amendment prohibits only Congress
Addressing only the interpretation of the Constitution’s Bill of Rights, I have to disagree with Barry Rhodes (Voice of the People, Tuesday), when he writes “… You simply don’t have the right to express your personal religious values on the taxpayer’s dime …” making the charge against “people who don’t seem to grasp the plain English of the First Amendment.”
Well, the opening phrase of the First Amendment, which is conveniently omitted, reads, “Congress shall make no law…”
So, I ask, where is the ambiguity in these words? The First Amendment is, plain and simple, a prohibition on Congress. Court rulings expanding the interpretation of the First Amendment are improper and wrong.
George Harper, Brazoria
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Courts ruled incorrectly on establishment clause
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.
Mr. (Barry) Rhodes (Voice of the People, Tuesday), that’s the plain English you refer to. It makes no reference to the executive branch, judicial branch, states or political subdivisions, such as school districts. It refers to Congress.
Many years ago, a court ruled incorrectly by misinterpreting a phrase that requires no interpretation. This “establishment clause” has become so accepted and ingrained in society that some will sue at the drop of a hat when a prayer is said at a football game, or a nativity scene set up on public property, etc. How sad.
John R. Langley, Lake Jackson
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Let’s be thankful for the regulators we have left
You have to give the Republicans credit.
Once they get something in mind, they are not at all ashamed to keep saying it like a broken record.
Deregulating of banking didn’t work. Deregulation of credit cards didn’t work. Deregulating electricity didn’t work, not for the people anyway. Now they want to deregulate insurance.
What happened to state rights?
Talk one thing and try another. Frankly, I’m glad we have insurance regulators right here in Texas. Let’s keep it here, as they care more about me than any insurance company, or at least I can try to vote them out.
Valerie Mobley, Angleton
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Use bonus money to help out small business
Why don’t we take all that bank bonus money, billions and billions of dollars, and use it to help the small banks and businesses? It’s a win-win situation.
The bank workers, who should be very grateful they have a job and are not on unemployment, like people who worked for Bear Stearns, Lehman Brothers, etc., should be more than happy to help out their brothers.
Jerry Troutman, Lake Jackson
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ELECTION LETTERS
The Facts will not accept any more letters with subject matter related to Tuesday’s election. Sunday will be the final day election-related letters are published on this page.
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