OpinionDecember 27, 2006
Speak Out 12/27/06
Provide infrastructure; Over-the-counter issue; Cairo's election; Another choice; Cold War analysis; Wrong again; Blame Republicans; Stealing tax dollars; It's our fault; As about real ideas; Getting benefits; Private streets?
Provide infrastructure
CAIRO, ILL., has one large business in town. Bunge Corp. has a huge soybean-processing plant. It's one of the biggest in the United States. It's a perfect location. It's on the Ohio and Mississippi rivers. But Cairo can't stay organized. It's not taking care of streets, not taking care of the water system. It can't even have city council meetings. Bunge wants to increase the size of its plant and turn it into a soybean biodiesel plant also. Cairo needs to get its act together and provide good streets, water and sewers and take care of the infrastructure that a good business needs.
Over-the-counter issue
MOST ARE in agreement that if you are driving drunk or have illegal drugs in your system you belong in jail. The issue is nonprescribed drugs. As a law-abiding driver, what is going to happen to me if I swerve a little on accident and get pulled over by an officer who thinks I am drunk? He finds out I'm not drunk and asks me if I've taken anything. I tell him I've taken DayQuil. Now he can give me a $500 ticket or take me to jail. Morley Swingle, Cape Girardeau County prosecuting attorney, needs to rethink the wording on his proposed legislation.
Cairo's election
JUST BECAUSE Carolyn Ponting didn't oppose the mayor at the expense of the residents of Cairo, Ill., she is his lackey? Wrong. The council members who opposed the grant for the road and the ones who had to be threatened with the loss of the biodiesel plant to accept a grant to repair the sewers are selfish and petty. Ponting is the only one of the bunch, the mayor included, who deserves consideration for election. The rest have some nerve to even believe they are worthy to serve.
Another choice
ALL OF us as Time's person of the year? What a joke. It has to be the president of Iran, who has become a major player in the international arena and will likely lead the country to becoming a nuclear power.
Cold War analysis
David Limbaugh, the lesson of the Cold War is to contain the threat, not to go on the offensive, stir things up much more than they were beforehand and try to force our political system down everyone's throats. If you had been calling the shots during the Cold War, I fear mankind would be extinct.
Wrong again
THERE HE goes again. The consensus of a policy of containment existing during the Cold War is rendered untrue by David Limbaugh. He wants you to think there was a sharp division between Republicans (he wrongly calls them conservatives) and Democrats (he wrongly calls them liberals) and that the congressional Democrats were soft on communism and that the congressional Republicans weren't. In reality there was an ongoing bipartisanship that eventually worked and led to the fall of the Soviet Union. There is, of course, a consensus on Iraq with two-thirds of the people believing we're on the wrong course. Limbaugh's ultimate goal is not to promote some kind of consensus concerning which direction to go from here, but sow more seeds of divisiveness between the political parties. The difficult spot that he's in is that he doesn't know which way his party is going to go with a multiplicity of recommendations being pondered. So rather than make a bold recommendation himself vis-a-vis Iraq, he is waiting, none too patiently, for the talking points. The odds of Limbaugh making a specific recommendation on what to do in Iraq before the GOP irons out its differences (if it ever does) are less than zero.
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Blame Republicans
A TYPICAL Republican blamed Bill Clinton for NAFTA and left out the fact that it was a Republican Senate and a Republican House of Representative that came up with the idea and passed the bill.
Stealing tax dollars
THE DIFFICULTY of the process of getting Social Security disability is born out of necessity. There are many people collecting a check each month who do not deserve it. This costs me and my neighbors tax dollars that could go to the truly needy. I'm glad the government is trying to be careful with my money. Try to remember the cause of your aggravation is not the government but the millions of swindlers who steal tax dollars every month.
It's our fault
THE NEWS articles touting the new minimum-wage laws are just plain wrong. They say it is going to hurt businesses that employ minimum-wage earners. Absolutely untrue. The real effect is on the consumer. Just the other day my favorite diner raised the buffet prices. Why? The new minimum-wage law. Business owners will not take the hit in profits. They pass the increase on to us. We were the idiots who passed the minimum-wage increase. It is only right for us to pay the increased wages with a substantial increase in our consumer bills.
As about real ideas
AS BANTER about the next presidential election begins, regardless of your political ties, everyone better be asking all of the candidates what they would do differently in regard to the U.S. role in crises around the world. It is obvious that diplomacy and negotiation are failing and few other countries seem to be concerned about growing threats to our freedom. All I've heard so far is Bush-bashing and sidestepping. It's time for real ideas.
Getting benefits
IN RESPONSE to "Lack of concern" for disabled veterans: It may take some time to get Social Security or VA benefits, but it's better than having our deficit blown up by paying people who try to cheat the system. I am a disabled vet getting both Social Security and VA benefits. They have taken care of me fine.
Private streets?
THE COMMENT from a Pioneer Orchard subdivision resident, telling drivers they have no business driving on those streets unless they live or are visiting there, elicited a mental "What?" Are those private streets in that subdivision?
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