Liberals just don't get it

6/15/2010

A Congress led by a community organizer “fixes” the economy, then “fixes” health care. Now David Kushma, the editor of The Blade, wants this same community organizer and Congress to fix energy (“Angry at BP? Pass an energy bill,” June 13).

Can liberals ever learn? I am convinced that it is not possible for a liberal to understand conservatism. Only if the fix for an energy policy is to talk it to death would Congress help.

If you think the economy is bad now, wait until President George W. Bush's tax cut expires in 2011.

Terry Sommers

Hill Avenue

The carbon tax that Mr. Kushma proposes is not the answer. It unfairly hurts the lower economic classes that liberals say they are trying to help.

The answer is drilling on land and in shallower water, where accidents are more easily remedied.

Dan Petersen

Curtice

Can you imagine the response we would get from the federal government if Asian carp ever get into the Great Lakes? It has been almost two months since the oil spill began in the gulf, and it still is not contained.

If Asian carp get into the lakes, we can forget about having them as a natural wonder for recreation and for sport and commercial fishing.

It's about time U.S. Rep. Marcy Kaptur and her useless associates in Congress start doing something. The Asian carp have the devastation of Hurricane Katrina and the gulf oil leak written all over them.

Clyde Appleby

Ottawa Hills

I've been a mechanic at Toledo Edison's Bay Shore plant for 31 years. Many of my jobs are in the so-called killer-screen house.

In the past few months I've been paying attention to the number and species of fish killed by our screens (“Fish kills cost region $30 million annually; Bay Shore plant in Oregon blamed,” June 3).

I can count on one hand the number of perch or walleye washed up on our screens. The majority are sheephead, with an occasional carp or catfish. With the new louvers Edison put in the intake channel, there haven't even been many of these fish killed.

To lose 200 jobs in this depressed job market, to lose the tax revenue paid by Edison, to lose the megawatts generated by Bay Shore by closing the plant, as has been suggested, is a lot of rambling. Sheephead are not worth $30 million.

Scott Meinhardt

Millbury

The June 14 Readers' Forum letter “St. John's to make teachers part-time” was full of inaccuracies. In fact, none of what the person wrote is true.

Here are the facts:

• The faculty is receiving a 2 percent raise this year.

• All full-time faculty members have a complete benefits package.

• We have not eliminated any teaching positions.

• We have fewer part-time faculty than we have had in the past, less than 10 percent.

• Teachers have always been prefects at school events, including dances and games.

To uphold our mission of forming “men for others,” we staff the school with the best possible teachers we can find: educators who are dedicated to the vision of St. Ignatius Loyola, fine people who can address the needs of the whole person. Our teachers are excellent, professional educators.

Anybody can write a letter about any organization and make assertions that are patently untrue. I hope that in the future, The Blade would check the facts before it decides to print such a letter.

Joaquin O. Martinez, S.J.

President

St. John's Jesuit High School & Academy

Airport Highway

Rave Motion Pictures is closing the profitable Cinema De Lux 18 on Conant Street in Maumee (“18-screen theater complex to shut by summer's end,” June 11). Rave hopes to drive moviegoers to its less profitable theaters at Levis Commons, Fallen Timbers, and Westfield Franklin Park.

Does that make sense? This moviegoer is trading in theater attendance for an armchair and a rental movie, and I'm inviting all of my friends in for free popcorn.

Earl Bennett

Pinelawn Drive

It is just like a big company to make a purchase, and then say: “Since we don't have to pay rent on this property, we're going to close it down.”

This movie theater was always busy. Now if we want to enjoy a movie, we have to go to Levis Commons or Fallen Timbers, which are too far away. So like the Showcase Cinema (which sits boarded up) and Southwyck Mall (which was torn down), now Maumee 18 will close.

I hope some company comes in and blows Rave out of business.

David E. Mize

South Byrne Road

U.S. Rep. Bob Latta (R., Bowling Green) arrived last week at Shiloh Christian Union Church in Delta with an entourage (“Latta, Brown applaud volunteer cleanup crews,” June 12).

The church was filled with hundreds of volunteers of all ages, who had been working tirelessly organizing the cleanup effort. Had Mr. Latta arrived alone, his concern might have been believable.

If Mr. Latta is so concerned about his constituents, he could stop being a part of the Republican bloc. Attempting to make the Obama Administration fail does not seem patriotic or in the best interest of his constituents.

Those who received help from the workers have expressed heartfelt appreciation. The volunteers could teach Mr. Latta what it means to make a difference.

I have not heard one volunteer who was not satisfied with this acknowledgment. But they aren't politicians running for office.

Virginia Bamonte

Archbold

I'm not here to defend Ottawa Hills or its police. Still, I find it impossible to believe that someone's car was stopped “every day” for going 1 or 2 mph over the speed limit (“Village cops stop black motorists,” Readers' Forum, June 10).

A couple of times, maybe. But perhaps if you drove 1 or 2 mph under the speed limit, you wouldn't be stopped.

The implication is that all blacks are not welcome in Ottawa Hills. I wonder whether all blacks are welcome in the letter writer's home.

She claims that if the motorcyclist who was shot by an Ottawa Hills police officer was black, it wouldn't have made a hiccup in the news. Experience suggests if that had been the case, we would have been visited by the Revs. Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson, and protesters monitored by another host of media.

Joseph E. Pflager

Maumee

President Obama is a cross between former Presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton. He throws the middle and lower classes a few bones, then sides with the oil, medical insurance, and banking industries, and any other industry that will throw money at the Democratic Party.

It's too bad the middle class and the poor don't have that kind of money to throw around.

Frank W. Fulkerson

Wildwood Road