RSSEmail letters, Aug. 24, 2012
Lies that often said are often believed
The Romney campaign began with a lie using President Obama quoting John McCain saying, “If we talk about the econ0my we’re sunk,” as if Obama said it. The etch-a-sketch campaign then moved on to say that Obama ended the work requirement for welfare that was designated false by fact checkers.
Now the Romney campaign is saying that $716 billion is “stolen” from Medicare beneficiaries while fact checkers say it is actually a savings. Paul Ryan’s budget actually takes out the same $716 billion, but gives it to tax cuts for the wealthy while Obama’s savings goes back to beneficiaries in the form of benefits such as closing the drug doughnut hole.
Past campaigns might remove ads proven blatantly false, but now it is promoted with $100 million and supported by false equivalency on major networks. Say a lie often enough and some will believe it, especially if there is a desire to believe it.
How else can a party’s philosophies crash the economy, then oppose everything the new president does without compromise, then blame the president and not be just laughed at by news organizations?
Ignore the president’s jobs bill, deny that there even was a bill and then blame the president for poor leadership. Create an illusion. Hate the truth.
When the economic policy is to lower taxes on the wealthy and pay for it by ending Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, it is probably best to make things up. Even destroying the country’s credit rating to give tax cuts to the wealthy is not a bridge too far, but evidently infrastructure upkeep when we need jobs is.
Public education, pensions, unions, women’s rights and college loans all benefit the wrong people, so they need to go. Or maybe it is the lies that need to go.
HARRY MCDONALD
Grand Junction
Profitable oil, gas companies given subsidies, tax breaks
We’ve subsidized and given tax breaks to oil and gas companies for nearly 100 years. I have questioned this for a long time, particularly when they show record billion dollar quarterly profits.
We don’t have to go very far to see examples of death and damage to the human race and environment. South American countries are still after Chevron for damage and destruction caused years ago that they’ve never accounted for. Exxon Valdez. BP Gulf of Mexico disaster, death. Texas City’s multiple disasters, death. More recently California’s explosion, death—and all with toxic pollution. And they’re not bound by all our Clean Water Act regulations!
Don’t misunderstand me; birds are very important, but are there studies to save birds from windmills? Seems there might be warning signals similar to units mounted on vehicles’ front bumpers to ward off deer.
Where is the common sense? Why are we still subsidizing oil and gas when they make monster profits and leave death, damage and destruction behind? Where is the capitalism when we give them breaks similar to those we accuse other countries of unfairly using to benefit their businesses at our detriment?
The 2009 fine for killing 85 birds in five states that Larry F. Brown of Palisade uses to support his views, makes me believe that wasn’t the whole story and it just wasn’t as simple as he implies. I suspect there were warnings given for quite some time before the fine was applied. After all, he states “killing … over a period of five years,” one-sixth of the time he says wind power has been subsidized.
Isn’t the “programmatic take” permit that Brown quotes similar to the air pollution updates waived on aging power plants or the collateral damage suffered by soldiers and citizens in Pakistan, Afghanistan and other countries we’re “helping”?
RALPH HICKS
Clifton
Will we have four more ‘goofy” years?
Let’s assume for a moment that what the Democratic Party has claimed these past few years is true, that the bad economy is all Bush’s fault, and further, it’s worse than we first thought. O.K. What now?
Even conceding that, if we’re on the right path, why hasn’t the economy not only not improved, but gotten worse in four years?
It’s obviously so messed up that continuing to do things that don’t work is goofy. Why would we intentionally act goofy for four more years?
AL CARLEY
Grand Junction
Keep children out of political tug-of-war
I found the article “D51: All busing …” concerning. Not because of the position that District 51 Safety and Transportation Director Tim Leon has been put in, but because of the comments by Mesa Valley Education Association President Jim Smyth.
His glib response “…now folks are realizing those repercussions…” is irresponsible for someone in his position and indicates he is more concerned with lashing out at those he blames for the current budget woes than finding solutions, or the safety of our children.
Not all parents have flexible work schedules or options for transporting their young ones to school so some children will undoubtedly be forced to cross very busy roads such as Patterson with little or no supervision.
Yes, the measure failed, and, yes, tough sacrifices are going to continue, but referring to our children and their safety as if they are pawns in a political tug-of-war because the measure he supported failed is inexcusable.
The measure did not lose because voters are ignorant or self-absorbed, as Smyth seems to assume. Maybe it was because the measure was overly vague as to how money would be spent, or because it lacked solid support among D51 employees.
Tough choices need to be made, but never at the expense of the safety of our children. Anyone who would relish the legitimate fears of parents is insensitive and should not speak on behalf of any organization associated with the D51 or its employees.
I voted FOR the ballot measure last time, but because of Smyth’s comments I can understand how some voters chose not to and may be opposed to do so in the future.
BRAD MCCLOUD
Grand Junction
Casida a viable candidate for 3rd Congressional District
The article in The Daily Sentinel concerning the 3rd Congressional District race mentioned only the Democrat and Republican candidates, completely ignoring the fact that there is an Independent candidate, Tisha Casida, who was petitioned onto the ballot by the people and not chosen by the party elites, as were Tipton and Pace.
Casida is a very viable independent candidate who will truly represent the interests of the people, not just the interests of a political party as Pace and Tipton do. The platform she is running on may be found online at
http://casida2012.com/platform/. This is her own platform and was not dictated by a political party, as are the platforms of Tipton and Pace.
Our government has been and is now under the control of the dysfunctional two-party system for too long, and, as a result, our country is deeply in debt, has high unemployment and has engaged in outsourcing of jobs, wars for profit, the destruction of the middle class and open borders for illegal aliens, to name only a few problems.
To solve these problems, we the people must select and elect independent thinking representatives who will take action to return our country to the principles of the Constitution and our Founding Fathers .
I believe that Tisha Casida is one of those candidates.
GARRY EVENSON
Battlement Mesa
Republicans insensitive to plight of race/incest victims
Well, here we are again. We are once more given the opportunity to disprove H. L. Mencken. Over the decades, we have sometimes been able to rebut Mencken’s assessment of the American middle class, but more often than not that has not been the case.
This election year presents so many issues that have the Democrats and Republicans separated by a wide gulf that it would be very difficult to cite them all. Perhaps the issue on most people’s minds is the stance of each party related to whether a victim of rape or incest should be required to have the child of the criminal or not.
The Republicans have proposed a definitive stance at their convention that requires the victim to have the child with no exceptions. The Democrats hold that the victim should certainly have the right to chose whether to have the child or not.
There, of course, is a view of this issue that has not received much attention and is raised by the stance of the Republicans. Given that there are no exceptions to the Republican position on victims of rape or incest who become pregnant, how do the Republicans justify requiring the twelve-, thirteen-, fourteen-, fifteen-year-old and older girls who have suffered the horror of rape or incest to bear the children of vicious criminals?
In addition, the Republicans should explain their rationale in insisting that a pregnant woman who, because of her medical condition, would die giving birth should be required to do just that.
So, as succinctly as I could, I’ve presented only one of many, many issues that the two parties disagree upon and we must base our votes upon what we discover in examining the issues with clarity.
Hopefully, we will not confirm Mencken’s view of the middle-class as the ignorant, gullible, sanctimonious and hypocritical Boobus americanus.
JOHN CHAPLIK
Grand Junction
FMS principal lauds solid support from City of Fruita
I am honored to represent the talented and devoted staff at Fruita Middle School where we serve more than 500 6th and 7th graders. We have had great growth and achievement. The staff at FMS makes a tremendous difference in the lives of our students, and we have received great support from the City of Fruita in our work.
The Chief of Police can often be found taking crosswalk duty around our campus before and after school. His frequent presence, as well as the proactive support we get from our school resource officer, makes a statement about the importance of student safety.
Parks and Recreation worked with us to make sure the sharing of our facility for Saturday basketball leagues didn’t impact school on Monday mornings, and a generous donation was made to our school so that FMS kids who couldn’t afford the community center still had a chance to go to there to swim and play.
At Christmas this past year each staff member at FMS received letters of encouragement from the chief of police, the city manager and the mayor at the time. Many staff members told me how much the encouragement meant to them.
I want to thank the City of Fruita for its financial support and dedication to academic achievement and student safety. While our parents and school staff make the most impact on student achievement, having the community behind us certainly helps.
BRIG LEANE
Fruita Middle School Principal
Fruita
COMMENTS
Commenting is not available in this channel entry.Apparently, one prerequisite for joining the Romney-Ryan campaign is the ability to lie convincingly.
Romney’s Republican primary opponents frequently accused him of lying – about his record as governor, about Bain Capital, etc. – but Romney prevailed anyway.
Ryan is also adept at dissembling – relying on his unflinching blue eyes to persuade the uninformed that “rape is rape” (when he was the first to inject “forcible rape” into our legislative lexicon, and voted some 38 times with Todd Akin on anti-abortion measures), that he had never sought “stimulus” funds for his district (when his signed letters proved otherwise), and that President Obama’s auto bailout was a “failure” (citing a shuttered parts plant that closed while Bush was President).
The latest addition to this “Pinocchio” team is Ryan’s senior foreign policy adviser Dan Senor, who (readers may recall) – as spokesman for the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq – blew rose-colored smoke at reporters while our “mission accomplished” was disintegrating into sectarian civil war outside the “Green Zone”.
Regarding foreign policy experience, Romney has none (unless you count his “secret” tax-avoiding bank accounts in the Cayman Islands and Switzerland), and his overseas tour was punctuated by embarrassing gaffes.
Ryan asserts that his military and foreign policy experience includes “voting to send our young men and women into harm’s way”. Then-Senator Obama opposed – and voted against – Bush-Cheney’s (and Ryan’s) Iraq War.
Thus, it is particularly ironic that Condoleezza Rice – fresh after her historic entre’ into the Augusta National Golf Club – will be introducing Ryan in Tampa. As readers must surely remember, 9/11 happened “on her watch” as National Security Adviser – after she downgraded National Counter-Terrorism Advisor Richard C. Clark’s access and ignored CIA warnings that “Bin Laden [was] Determined to Strike in U.S.” on August 6, 2001.
Do we really want to “change horses in mid-stream”?
Bill Hugenberg
There goes Mr. Hugenberg writing his blog on the DS again. The Editor should just give him a spot of his own.
Mr. Hicks seems to believe that a “PROFIT MARGIN” , as opposed to gross income, of about 8 cents a gallon is “monstrous profits”. He is either uninformed of the difference or purposely exploiting the lack of understanding of the difference by most people in order to reinforce the public’s bad image of the “evil” oil companies. That being said I wonder if Mr. Hicks would also like the government to “give up” the “monstrous income” it receives from the sale of every gallon of gasoline. (App. 23 cents a gallon).
Those “monster profits” do not go into the pockets of “big oil”, they go to the people who have invested their money by becoming stockholders. You know, those “greedy” individuals who are trying to have some kind of retirement some day. That would be people like teachers, cops, firefighters, union workers from all walks of life, and just plain old folks who can scrape up few dollars to try to do better for themselves.
We have been subsidizing “green energy” by billions of dollars and are seeing bankruptcies, scandals, and soaring prices that are taking us nowhere. It is time to stop subsidizing all industry, including banks and auto companies, and let them sink or swim on their own.
Mr. Hicks also seems concerned about the dirty stinking pollution from the oil business. Does he have any suggestions on how to clean up the toxic pollution from the fires that are burning all over the west? Maybe the EPA can levy a huge fine against Mother Nature and make her install scrubbers on all those fires to clean up the emissions.
In response to Dennis Patton, Robert Reich, President Clinton’s Secretary of Labor during the most prosperous period in our history, is “struck by the baldness of Romney’s repetitive lies about [President] Obama” – including that he “ended the work requirement under welfare” and/or that the “Affordable Care Act cuts $716 billion from Medicare benefits”.
According to Reich, but as yet unreported by our Daily Sentinel, “the mainstream media along with a half-dozen independent fact-checking organization have called Romney on these whoppers, but to no avail. He keeps making those assertions”.
While Reich concedes that “every campaign is guilty of exaggerations, embellishments, distortions, and half truths”, he cannot “recall a presidential candidate lying with such audacity”. “Why does” Romney “do it, and how can he get away with it?”
“The obvious answer is such lies are effective” – particularly when local opinion-leaders like the Daily Sentinel refuse to expose them. “Polls show voters are starting to believe” the lies – “especially in swing states” like Colorado, where they are “repeated constantly in” T.V. and radio spots paid for by Romney’s undisclosed financiers. When local media is induced by advertising dollars to avoid chronicling the truth, the lies become accepted.
As Reich further observed, “Romney’s lying machine is extraordinarily well-financed” and, with the tacit collaboration of the Daily Sentinel, “is working”.
“But what”, Reich asks, “does all this tell us about the man who is” benefiting from, even if not “running the lying machine?”
To Reich, Romney is “a cypher” who will “say and do whatever is expedient, change positions like a chameleon, [and] eschew any core principles”.
“Resorting to outright lies – and organizing a presidential campaign around a series of lies – reveals a whole new level of cynicism, a profound disdain for what remains of civility in public life, and a disrespect for the democratic process” unworthy of trust.
Bill Hugenberg 543 Rim Drive,
GJ 81507
257-1998 .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
Mr. Hugenberg. I was not commenting on the content of your comment, rather on the fact that you ARE commenting again. I was just pointing out that I have noticed that you write Letters to the Editor and make long rambling comments so often that you should have your own column. Not surprisingly you used that to write another ideological blog. Never let a opportunity pass do you.