Letters to the editor

I know many feel the revulsion I do when they drive by the big blue sign on U.S. 29 north at Faulconerville that screams out “JOIN OUR FIGHT-SAVE THE SECOND AMENDMENT, Amherst County Republicans.”

As a boy growing up in Amherst, I spent many happy hours hunting squirrels, rabbits and birds. I still own those guns (kept secure in a gun cabinet) and I don’t fear for one minute that those small caliber guns are going to be taken away from me. What I do fear are Republicans nationwide refusing to support common sense gun reform.

A leading cause of death for our children in America is due to guns. America leads all western nations in our homicide rate.

Some Republican congressmen have such a fetish for the AR15 that they wear a replica of one on their coat lapel when they come to work in the morning. The Tennessee congressman who represents Nashville even posed proudly with his wife and children each holding an AR15 for their Christmas card.

No less a figure than the deceased Chief Justice Warren Burger said the second amendment and its well-regulated militia clause has been grossly misinterpreted.

Amherst County Republicans, reword your sign to “Join our fight — save lives with common sense gun control.”

After Trump’s return to national television last evening I have a suggestion for the Republican Party. Nominate George Santos for the 2024 VP spot on the ticket. Then we can at least be entertained by trying to decide who is lying the most. Trump demonstrated he is still a great danger to the country as he has no knowledge of or respect for our history, international reputation, or democratic goals.

He is still just a thug trying to acquire power in any way possible and support for this empty vessel shows the utter vacuum that is the present Republican Party. They have no constructive plans or platform to better the world, country, or even their respective communities.

Locally, that was made obvious in 5th District Congressman Bob Good’s email letter last week. He starts his letter by admitting he has no concept that the “climate” is global. What we do here affects others and what happens elsewhere affects us. The climate knows no border and the quicker everyone recognizes that we are all in this together the better off we will be. The 5th district has no Atlantic shoreline but parts of Virginia do and those parts are already feeling the ravages of sea level rise caused by a warming world. Our fossil fuel addiction is driving that warming.

The congressman then incorrectly blames the Biden Administration for high fuel prices. Like the rest of the lying Republican Party he neglects to mention that the higher fuel prices came from fossil fuel corporations, not from the government. They set the prices at the pump and made record profits. Those record fossil fuel profits were the primary driving force behind the recent inflation. Blaming the present administration is just Republican dishonesty.

Incidentally, nowhere in his letter does he mention what he is doing to address the impending catastrophe of a US default on our debt. Good mouthed “fiscal responsibility” but didn’t mention where Social Security funds will come from if the country defaults. Every person receiving SS payments should be demanding that the Republican House members, including Good, stop the games and pass the debt ceiling increase to pay past debts before making budget demands for future spending.

Finally, Joe Biden was the winner of CNN’s Trump debacle last night when he tweeted, “It’s simple folks. Do you want four more years of that?”

Let’s do better. Joe Biden in 2024.

Tell me if you have heard this one before so, Clarence Thomas is at the gas station pumping his own gas and Harlan Crow drives up and says, “Let me get that for you, Thomas.” What is not a joke is the debt ceiling crisis and the predicted apocalypse it portends. The Republicans have won in some respects because everybody assumes that Biden will have to make cuts. What if he said we have to spend more or even better spend it on different things. That was Bernie Sanders’ answer when somebody asked him what he would cut.

For there are some basic questions we all could use some answers to. What is the purpose of government? What should we be spending our taxes on? How much should we tax to fund the government? The Reagan Revolution basically said government is always the problem and that money spent on the social safety net was money transferred from people who deserved it to people who didn’t deserve it. Inside the philosophy of libertarianism is greed plain and simple. If we all have the most extreme freedom, we are all going to get filthy rich. The Reagan Revolution also brought us a few other things like all these guns, the restricting of voting rights and the restricting of reproductive rights.

But it is about played out and we still are arguing about government, the budget and taxes. You can’t take government spending out of the economy or we are all going to be a little poorer. Even Exxon will be poorer. When Biden talks of building the economy from bottom and middle up, he is taking about a complete different economic philosophy than the Republicans. And with the coming AI revolution it is possible the American people are going to need even more help.

What might happen come June when the Treasury runs out of money will be similar to what happened in 2008. The economy was failing apart, and some Democrats and Republicans came up with a rescue plan. But some Republicans defeated at the first vote and stock market lost half its value which scared the holdouts into voting for it. Hold on to your hat folks.

So Bob Good wants to reduce government spending as a pre-condition for raising the debt limit. Where was this desire during the Trump era when the debt limit was raised three times? Where was reducing spending when fat cats received massive tax cuts, thus expanding debt? Utter hypocrisy! I pay my bills. Where does Bob Good stand?