McCain’s slide is sad indeed
Let us listen carefully to the debates. Too often elections are determined by image-makers using 30-second sound bites intended not to speak to our values, our logic and our intellect but to manipulate us by appealing to our emotions (fear mainly) and prejudices.
It is my opinion that the greatest threat to our country is not terrorists but the good people who allow themselves to be manipulated by blind loyalties to a label. They become easy prey for demagogues.
I am very sad that a real hero like McCain — a man of great courage, conviction and integrity — has crossed over and sold his soul to the power elite. I was looking forward to great debates by two men of integrity, sharing an issue-by-issue vision of how they will get this country back on track.
I am sure that the string-pullers of the political right — now that McCain is willing to lie and resort to trickery — will do everything they can to obscure the real issues in this campaign. How else do they disguise eight years of bankrupt and bankrupting policies? The last thing the Bushtites that surround McCain want is to be held accountable for their misdeeds and failed leadership. The question is, just how low will the demagogues go? Check out the politics of fear and prejudices spun by various conservative/religious talk-show hosts.
I still keep hoping that John will come on after an attack ad and say firmly, “I do not approve of this ad. It is an insult to the integrity and intelligence of the American people.” I expect the Democrats to respond in kind since they lost the last election by trying to maintain an issue-oriented high road.
Sad, isn’t it?
Hal Pullin
Mount Vernon
Need divided government now
As a politically centrist voter, I am supporting John McCain. I also supported McCain against Bush in the 2000 primaries. I believe America would be better off had McCain been elected president back then. Nevertheless, now that the economy is the No. 1 issue, I believe it is a no-brainer that a divided government is needed.
Studies have clearly shown that having differing political parties running the executive and legislative branches improves the economy. This is true especially with respect to investment growth for retirement savings for every American who has taken the initiative to begin a retirement savings plan.
For those who haven’t done so and now expect government entitlements and the redistribution of wealth from those who have actually put forth effort, I say work harder and save more. American capitalism provides the most opportunities. Marxism, or the redistribution of wealth, has proved to be a failed theory even though it looks good on paper. See the USSR, Cuba, Venezuela and others.
Gary Brown
Anacortes
Trickle-up economics a better fit
I’m sure you have heard it a thousand times from the Republicans that if taxes are raised (on the wealthy), it will kill jobs. I would agree with that if, but only if, those taxes were never spent.
Our taxes are spent. Taxes are spent to provide goods and services in and for America. They pay for everything from toilet paper to aircraft carriers and all are purchased from the private sector, I might add. Even welfare money is spent in the private sector.
If the money is left in the pockets of the wealthy, some will trickle down, but there is increasingly less indication that the wealthy will spend it in a way that sends much of it trickling down to the rest of us here in America.
If you think the captains of industry care about you, Google “child labor” and examine the history of the captains of industry in America. You think they would not do that today? Why do you think they are investing so much in Third World countries? Look at the availability of unrepresented labor and in many instances child labor in those areas.
Don’t misunderstand me; I don’t give a rip how the wealthy invest their money, but contrary to popular belief, taxes are not their money and most especially it’s not theirs when we are running a national debt.
Finally, the wealthy have the most to gain from our taxes because they own and operate the private sector in which those taxes will be spent. I call it trickle up.
James Bonner
Mount Vernon
GOP platform: Outlaw abortion
Why is abortion the Republicans’ best “wedge” issue? Like a good contraceptive, it’s safe, cheap and effective.
It’s safe because GOP corporate donors couldn’t care less about the issue. It’s cheap because most anti-abortion legislation doesn’t involve expenditures, only more regulations and restrictions on a woman’s right to choose. It’s effective because anti-choice, framed as “pro-life,” is all that some voters want to hear; they won’t even listen to exceptions for rape, incest or the health of a woman.
Though overturning Roe v. Wade remains their immediate goal, the Holy Grail of anti-abortion activists is a constitutional amendment outlawing abortion just as the 18th Amendment outlawed the manufacture and consumption of alcohol.
President Hoover declared that amendment “a noble experiment.” An era of unparalleled violence and corruption followed. Prohibition made criminals of ordinary citizens. Do anti-choice zealots really believe a prohibition will end abortions?
Former Communist dictator Nicolai Ceausescu outlawed both abortion and contraceptives in his misguided effort to bolster Romania’s population. This resulted in a flood of abandoned babies whose parents were not able to or chose not to rear. So he warehoused these children in large government orphanages like those proposed by former GOP Speaker Newt Gingrich for the children of welfare mothers. The hapless participants in this ill-conceived (pardon the pun) social experiment now struggle to lead normal, productive lives.
Most readers assume that a total abortion ban could never occur in this “land of the free,” where a silent majority generally supports abortion rights. Nevertheless, the 2008 Republican Party platform calls for a constitutional amendment outlawing abortion — with no exceptions, not even for the life of the mother. Anti-choice, anti-contraceptive forces are well-organized, well-funded and determined to impose their “noble experiment” on us all. Want to be a participant? If not, speak up.
Larry Edwards
Burlington
Demands in return for bailout
No to corporate welfare. We the people must not reward Wall Street, which got us into huge debt with its constant deregulations and derivative excess. We musn’t bail it out without regulations and amendments.
In return for the bailout we demand:
• Medicare for all;
• Homeowners remain in their homes at renegotiated low-fixed mortgage rates instead of being evicted;
• The government be repaid any loans made;
• Air-tight regulation of our financial system;
• No golden parachutes or other benefits to Wall Street CEOs; and
• A definite plan. So far Paulson only wants the people’s money without any strings or plan attached. Thoughtless panic will not calm the market as he intended.
Let the gambling financial institutions fail, put back strong regulations, and we will all work together to prevent another fiasco created by greed.
Eva Millette Coombs
Camano Island
McCain had own lipstick moment
It’s kind of amusing when you think about it. Gov. Palin speaks respectfully about Hillary Clinton and talks about the “hard hits” she took in the primaries. It seems to me the sleaziest hit Hillary took was when John McCain, in denouncing Hillary’s health care plan, said, “No matter how much lipstick you put on a pig, it’s still a pig.”
What goes around, comes around, doesn’t it?
Paul Strand
Mount Vernon
Two reasons McCain chose Palin
John McCain’s selection of Sarah Palin was about two things: His need to bring the religious right into his campaign, and her ability to enter a couple of beauty pageants. Now before some of your readers scream in feigned outrage about the second reason, let me explain.
After attending five small colleges, Palin finally graduated from a small college in Idaho with a degree in journalism. She was a sports announcer at a small television station in Anchorage. She was mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, a town with a smaller population than Sedro-Woolley or Burlington. For 16 months, she was governor of Alaska, a state with about half the population of Seattle.
If the Republicans were truly interested in bringing anyone other than a beauty contestant onto their ticket, why didn’t they pick any of their proven, experienced Republican women? That list of experienced Republican women includes Sens. Murkowski (Alaska), Snowe (Maine), Hutchinson (Texas) or especially Elizabeth Dole (North Carolina). How about Condoleezza Rice or Elaine Chao out of Bush’s Cabinet?
No, instead they pick gun-totin’, moose-killin’, wolf-slayin’, born-again, speaking-in-tongues Sarah. Oh, did I mention she has been in a couple of beauty pageants? She has been involved in the succession movement in Alaska for a number of years. These are the people who, because of their separatist views, are screaming for Alaska to become its own country.
She’s the one with all the foreign experience because on a clear day she can see a Russian island from her state. I find it hilarious that McCain can’t draw enough people to fill a large phone booth without her at his hip, and the Republicans can’t trust her by herself for fear of what nonsense she will say.
Oh yeah, did I mention she has been in a couple of beauty pageants?
Tom Montgomery
Anacortes
