AMNESTY AND DISASTERS
Federal budget cutshurt national relief
In the Aug. 27 letters to the editor there were two articles regarding Raul Labrador. No mention of him making big bucks finding loopholes, for illegals, so they wouldn’t be deported, now that he’s a tea party man. He and his ilk scream to high heaven about amnesty. Frankly I’m against any type of amnesty, but not two-faced about it.
The Statesman (Aug. 28) tells how Congress has cut $440 million from the U.S. Forest Service over the past two years. Recently, we had Isaac storming up the Gulf Coast. Earlier Katrina and numerous tornadoes across the country with FEMA helping out. I wonder how much Congress has cut FEMA. I also wonder how many of our “less spending and cut the deficit” party members accepted, or plan on accepting, any government relief (aka money), from FEMA, to increase the deficit.
ROBERT LEE, Boise
BUTCH OTTER
Move to the mansion
I am upset that Clement Leroy Otter, our Idaho governor, has fired Pam Lowe and hired Jeff Sayer. Both her firing and his hiring will cost all of us Idaho taxpayers.
Reality check, Butch. Move out of your river mansion and into your former daddy-in-law’s hilltop mansion.
DALE D.M. WINDHAM, Boise
EDUCATION
Curriculum companieshave a right to profit
In response to critics of K12 curriculum for being a for-profit company, I urge you to research where your children’s textbooks and school supplies come from. Are they produced and distributed by nonprofit organizations? Most of them are not. Most curriculum companies and textbook publishers are making a profit off the products they are selling, so why is K12 the only one under fire for doing the same as any other curriculum company? That’s a ridiculous double standard, utilized to produce irrational and misplaced outrage to further a specific political agenda. It’s somewhat astounding how willingly people accept biased and unfounded propaganda. I wonder if any of the critics of K12 have even looked at or used K12 curriculum, or if they’re simply regurgitating misinformation propagated by a teachers union with its own political agenda.
JULIE BROWNING, Boise
REPUBLICANS
Republicans offernothing for women
Only the women of America can save our great nation from certain calamity in the November elections.
The Republican Party has chosen the most anti-woman ticket in modern memory. Paul Ryan, whose budgetary and social policies Mitt Romney seems to endorse, wants to gut Social Security and Medicare as we know them. Furthermore, Ryan wants to slash education funding so the ultra-rich can have more mansions.
Paul Ryan has worked closely with Todd Akin, the Republican congressman who believes that women’s bodies can shut down conception during rape.
In Idaho, State Sen. Chuck Winder has said that physicians should grill a woman seeking to abort a rape-induced pregnancy to ensure that the pregnancy was not really a part of normal sexual relations. And then he wants to insert a probe into her body.
The only way to stop the Republican war on women is for the Republican ticket to lose — and lose big.
If women care about the future of this country and the place of their children and grandchildren in it, they will not vote Republican. They don’t have to vote for the Democrats, they just have to not vote Republican.
GARY BENNETT, Emmett
Romney-Ryan help onlythe rich and super rich
In listening to the Republican brags and slurs, it’s clear all they care about is winning the election. The three R’s (Republicans, Romney, Ryan) have stomped truth into bloody mud. It’s also clear that they are desperate to buy the election, as shown by the shifty, sly meetings on huge private yachts and huge private mansions. Anyone only has to look at the R’s to see that they have been bought and paid for by the rich and super rich. Looking at some of the old R theories, such as trickle-down benefits, is that the only thing that trickles down is diarrhea — the best is taken off at the top and less and less good trickles down. Just one example of the R philosophy is Ann Romney’s thousand-dollar designer dresses and jewelry vs. Mrs. Obama’s hundred-dollar dresses and jewelry from department stores. It’s easy to see R greed and thievery at work.
CATHY PARSONS, Nampa
Republicans not abouthelping those in need
If you want to get rid of public education, the postal service, government-operated prisons, Social Security, Medicare, public lands, and all rules that attempt to control the financial industry, the chemical manufacturing industry, the petroleum industry, the banking industry, etc., vote Republican. They believe that everything in this country should be an unregulated private business. Profit is their god.
Paul Ryan is a disciple of the militant atheist Ayn Rand. She despised altruism and love-thy-neighbor values while supporting extreme selfishness and greed. Helping others is a sign of weakness and only helps those undesirables survive. That is the philosophy that will be on the presidential ticket this fall.
We old people are not the ones who need to be most concerned. We have our Social Security and Medicare, and possibly a defined benefit retirement, and we realize how valuable they are. If young voters don’t wise up and vote Democrat, they are going to have none of these. They are going to have a lower quality of life while the 1 percent party drives them into poverty.
Every study of the Ryan budget says it will reduce employment and won’t balance the budget until at least 2030.
LEO E. FADDIS, Kuna
BRITISH HEALTH CARE
Citizens abroad benefitfrom equitable plan
There has been some discussion in this forum of the British health care system. Extrapolating from Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development data, let us examine what health care in the United States would look like if suddenly our system performed exactly like the British system.
First, you would pay no health insurance premiums, nor would your employer. Your health care would be paid for through taxes, and because British government per capita health care expenditures are 22 percent lower than U.S. government expenditures, your taxes would go down. Total private sector savings would be over a $1 trillion each year ($9,800 per household); government savings would be $260 billion.
Because everyone would have access to health care, the average American would visit a physician 50 percent more often. Life expectancy would rise by 1.8 years; maternal mortality would be cut in half; infant mortality would drop by 24 percent.
No American would ever again be forced into bankruptcy due to medical bills. Millions of Americans would gain a measure of dignity.
Remarkably, the British socialist system is more efficient and far more equitable than our profit-based system. You can verify this information by going to the links page at itsabouthealthstupid.com and clicking on “OECD Health Data.”
GEOFFREY BURNS, Boise
