ContextPerception

Letters to --- WashPost - vaccine problems - healthcare

Dear Editors:

 

Your publishing of the letter by Brendan Regan (Oct 28) shows how/why misinformation is so prevalent in the media.   He  cites problems - "sputtering start" - with the vaccine program as a basis to question a public option in healthcare reform and the involvement of the federal government.   Apparently he missed or ignored the reason for the vaccine program's problems as being the inability of the private sector to supply the quantity of vaccine they promised.   Perhaps the government should have taken over the production of the vaccine in order to ensure the program.   Similarly the private sector is unable to provide healthcare for not only 40 million uninsured persons but also thousands that have insurance but are denied care.   Perhaps the government should take over the provision of healthcare to all US citizens.

 

Sincerely,

Letters to --- WashPost - Lane OpEd - healthcare - funds for

Dear Editors:

 

Mr. Lane seems to pass over rather lightly the fact that healthcare obtained by Unions is in lieu of wages.   This certainly isn't true of the healthcare provided for Corporate Barons and Wall Street Casino players.  The real question is why is it so unusual for the working class to have good healthcare?   Why doesn't everyone have it?

 

He also says that a 0.1 percent tax on stock transactions might just re-crash our fragile financial system.  Why is our financial system so fragile?   I don't think it is because of healthcare provided to working people but because of financial manipulation by the Wall Street Casino players.   Don't call it a tax, just call it an insurance premium for the next time we have to 'rescue' the Casino.

 

I have a simpler method of paying for reform.   Rescind the Bush tax cuts and dedicate them to healthcare for all the people.   Whose principle is it that reform has to be paid from savings?

 

Or maybe we should just pay for it off-budget like we paid for conducting a war the past 8 years.  Or maybe by just printing several trillions like we did for 'rescuing' the Wall Street Casino.

 

Sincerely,

Letters to --- WashPost - KathleenParker - ACORN - mismanagement - KBR

Dear Ms. Parker:

Thanks for the column regarding the sloppy mismanagement at ACORN.   It is essential that these groups that mismanage taxpayers' funds be held accountable.  I'm not upset about their linkages to the Unions as they both have the goal of leveling the playing field for workers and common folk like me against the Corporate Barons and Wall Street Casino players.

 

I hope you continue to expose these groups and suggest that you next write about KBR and its horribly sloppy mismanagement that resulted in our military personnel in Iraq being electrocuted.   We must support our troops and hold KBR accountable and not allow them to receive any more taxpayers' funds.  Perhaps you could end the column with - now that's supporting the troops patriotism.

 

I look forward to your next column on mismanagement of funds and holding the recipients accountable.

 

Sincerely,

Letters to --- WashPost - CIA - murder - law

Dear Editors:

 

You recently ran an article that seven former CIA directors urged President Obama to end the investigation of CIA employees because "it would inhibit intelligence operations in the future...".   Based on the limited knowledge we have gained over actions of the past eight years; it would seem that operations should be inhibited.   If the 'cya' classified information was also made available, I'm sure it would be even more demanded.

 

That seven former directors feel that murder should not be investigated - remember these are essentially the only cases that will be investigated - says more about their morality, ethics, and disinterest in ensuring that our nation's actions are based on law than anything else.   It shows the extent to which a certain group of individuals feel that they are above the law and should not be held accountable.   This is reprehensible and is a solid indication that we need a through investigation from top to bottom.   Where is Congress?

 

Sincerely,

Letters to --- WashPost - ombudsman - reporting bias

Forgive me, but on reading your piece I had to laugh.   After a summer of stories about anti-healthcare reform quotes from conservatives repeated ad nauseam, after the unbelievable coverage of 'their day' on the mall, to say that they don't receive 'coverage' is absurd.   I don't remember that much coverage of other 'marches' or whatever.   The Post did have a few stories about the need for reform lately but it is too late as the repeated negatives are set in peoples' minds now.   One has to wonder what the situation would be if the Post had devoted as much space/time to examples of people without healthcare as to the anti group.   Isn't that more substance than just wild quotes?   Where were the indepth pieces on why 45,000 people die each year because they don't have insurance?   Where were the stories of 100,000 people dying each year because of medical errors?  Where were the stories of a majority of physicians and nurses wanting a public option?    If these stories had been repeated as often as the negative anti-reform pieces, people would understand why the push to reform the system.  

 

Regarding Van Jones, did the Post draw attention to the contradiction in the conservative push to get Van Jones because of past activities resulting in his resignation but the pushback against considering candidate McDonnell's past activities as being important, let alone his withdrawing?

 

Last week there were several articles about candidate Deeds - all negative.   The front page article had leads to other articles in the paper with the leads themselves being negative.   It wasn't until near the end that it was acknowledged that some business people had doubts about McDonnell.   Where was the question about what the 'net' benefit over 10 years of selling the liquor stores would be and what that would buy in transportation?   Where does McDonnell think he can put toll roads in Northern Virginia?   McDonnell doesn't think he will have to take funds from education because the economy will grow - huh?   The Republicans hit Kaine hard on having a 'rosy' outlook.

 

I have always loved the Post as a paper of record.  It is with dismay that I see what it has become.   I used to spend several hours reading Outlook because it had really solid pieces on substance not just the 'politics'; now I don't spend more than 10 minutes.   I'm not sure how long I'll feel like subsidizing the Post web site as it gets news that doesn't appear in print and it's free.   Now there's an idea for an article on the changing news picture - base it on the 'tragedy of the commons' as found in development literature.

 

Sincerely,

Letters to --- The Nation - food - Africa

Dear Editors:

 

Thanks very much for your last issue on Food.   There is so much of it that I agree with based on my thirty years experience in Int'l Agriculture in more than 30 countries.   Every time that I entered a country for assessment, evaluation, or design; I would ask myself what would happen if the farmers were guaranteed world prices and in US dollars and in most cases the problems wouldn't be production or technology.

 

In Mali, one year the farmers couldn't afford to haul their millet to market because the price was so low.   The next year they didn't have a crop and food aid was required.   In India, there was a major impact when a million acres of new irrigation had been developed.   Less publicized was the fact that they lost almost that much irrigated land to salinization and drainage problems the same year.   Dependence on contract seed and high tech agriculture will require large operations and monocropping - what will happen to the small farmers displaced?   Jobs are not available and, for example in India, we're not talking a few million farmers moving to urban areas in search of livelihoods but hundreds of millions.

 

More effort must be placed on raising the average yield of the lowest yielding farmers - so they can stay on the farm - rather than increasing yields at the top.   Increasing yield from half a ton to a ton per hectare for these farmers will have a much greater impact on food, social stability, equity, and sustainability than increasing yields from 5 tons to 7 tons per hectare at the top.  It is, however, more difficult as it requires learning changes in cultural practices rather than just using fertilizers or water which too frequently result in long-term detrimental effects.

 

Sincerely,

Letters to --- WashPost - deficit - healthcare

Dear Editors:

 

I liked your idea of an increase in the federal gasoline tax.  But your adoption of the 'chained CPI' seems flawed.  So if a family dilutes its milk with water to decrease costs that should become their new 'standard of living'?   If a family substitutes cheaper less nutritious food - that should become their new standard of living?   Haven't you heard of the obesity problem?

 

I have a better suggestion.   Rescind the Bush tax cuts immediately.   That will pay for the deficit or for a healthcare reform package over ten years.

 

There.  Now, was that so hard?

 

Sincerely,

Letters to --- The Nation - Van Jones - Republicans

Dear Editors:

 

Can anyone explain why the Republicans were able to get by with saying that Van Jones activities in the past were so important that he had to resign but in the case of McDonnell running for Governor of Virginia saying past activities - his antiwomen thesis - was not important and irrelevant?   Where is the Democrats' voice?

 

Sincerely,

Letter's to --- WashPost - life settlements - hope Grandma dies fast

Dear Editors:

 

After all the trash talk about death panels etc. and forcing Grandma to die, we now have Wall Street Casino players taking bets (life insurance settlements) - hoping - that Grandma will die before she's supposed to.   Where is the up-roar?   And of course the people raking-in like bandits (actually they are bandits) are the 'middle persons' - the slicers and dicers of paper (securitizing?) - as they collect fat fees at zero risk.   The next bubble?  Change in Wall Street behavior?    They have no shame.

 

Sincerely,

Letters to --- WashPost - Kristol

Dear Editors:

 

For William Kristol to say that "There is no health-care crisis... good health-care system." only indicates the lack of basic morality in his outlook.   That he can be ignorant of the people who were denied coverage after-the-fact by insurance companies and died is incredible.   That he apparently considers the fact that California private insurers denying 1 out of 5 claims is OK indicates his 'I don't care' attitude.   Is this the moral basis and principled stand that Republicans are always talking about?   Shame on them.

 

Why does the Post continue to give people like Kristol space to spread their 'know-nothing' and 'I've got mine' ideology?   Surely there are people that can contribute reasonably and effectively to the discourse on the Post's pages.

 

Sincerely,