Letters 09-10-2012
Sept. 9, 2012
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The War on Women
Personally, the "War on Women" has been an ongoing issue with the Republican Party. This is the dying party of the white dynasty. Since the last census, the white population of this country is becoming a minority.
In fact, I find the Republican stance on abortion and birth control rather fascinating. In some ways it would seem that the "Grand Old Party" would want women to have access to preventive health care - but, wait a minute - that might mean they could get educated and try to obtain upward mobility for themselves and their families.
The Republicans are patronizing, bitter, white people losing their followers. The hollow words of Republicans and their ideological stance on abortion and birth control are archaic. Last week it was made public that a dying cardinal accused the Catholic church of being 200 years behind the times.
The last few months have seen the nuns on the bus who have toured the country defending their ability to care for the poor, the sick and the needy. The Catholic Church is attempting to curtail their activities and place them under the auspices of a bishop because they advise women and families on birth control and help them obtain abortions if necessary.
These are dying patriarchal institutions attempting in their last gasping breathes to retain their misogynist rule over women so they can stay barefoot, pregnant and poor.
Before Rowe vs. Wade, women of means went to other countries to have abortions or had willing gynecologists who would perform D & C’s for women with female "ailments." The only women who suffered were the young, or those of meager means, so they suffered through the pregnancies, and were stigmatized, or had illegal abortions by well-meaning mid-wives, some doctors in after hour clinics, and self-trained people who understood and sympathized with their difficult situation. Or, better yet, families sent them off to "visit" relatives or they were sent to a home for wayward girls to wait out their pregnancies.
The Republicans are not a party of ideals or ideas - their’s is a party of the wealthy protecting their wealth. It is not inclusive of anyone who disagrees with their backward ideology. It cloaks itself under religious umbrellas that are antiquated. If it really was a party of lesser government, then the place they would begin their crusade would be to stop interfering in people’s personal lives.
Christine Verdon - Northport
Ann Romney’s "˜ick’ factor
I am offended by Ann Romney’s "I just love you women. I love women" speech at the Republican Convention.
Did you ever hear a man say, "I just love you men. I love men"?
It is clear Ann Romney does not identify with women -- she stands outside (of women’s issues) like women of the 1950s and ’60s. As if to say, I am different, I am not like most women, but I love them. Indeed, I just love women. Ick!
Mary Sutherland - Glen Arbor
Women suffer from P.M.S.
No, no, not that P.M.S., but one engendered by national and state Republican legislators. amplified by that paragon of moral authority, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops! It is nourished and spread due to the apathy of women who do not speak up. I am speaking of the Patronization, Misogyny and Sexism started by the titular head of the Republican Party, Rush Limbaugh, with his "slut" comment about Sandra Fluke.
The Republican Party Platform would eliminate a woman’s right to an abortion, even in the case of rape, incest and yes, even if there is a threat to her life. Personhood amendments that would make certain forms of contraception illegal. Bills trying to re-define rape, co-sponsored by Paul Ryan and Todd Akin, and even crazy comments about the likelihood of pregnancy in cases of "Legitimate Rape" (Todd Akin). Forced trans-vaginal ultrasounds, unrealistic waiting periods and on and on in over 16 Republican state legislatures.
The Taliban would be proud! I would hope that women will wake up for themselves, their daughters and their grand daughters.
To paraphrase a very conservative Republican, "˜Extremism in the defense of women’s rights is no vice’ Do something.
Nick LaRose - TC
Wealthy puppet-masters
In case you missed it, you can’t vote Republican any more!
That is, you can’t if you want to vote for someone like Eisenhower, Milliken, or even Reagan -- he raised taxes! Often!
That party, the Grand Old Party is, as Ernie Harwell used to say, long gone! In its place we have, in the words of a respected conservative observer of our politics, an "insurgent outlier -- ideologically extreme ... scornful of compromise."
Although the change was already underway, the Supreme Court speeded things up with its infamous 2009 Citizens United decision. The conservative justices may have felt they were doing the GOP a favor by opening the floodgates for political contributions from longtime Republican supporters --corporations and wealthy people.
But the actual consequence has been to deliver the GOP to a small group of billionaires and strategists whose political ideology and tactics and vision for America are all at odds with traditional Republican (and American) ideals.
And make no mistake: cash has meant control. The Super-Pacs funded by these anonymous donors are much more than just the sources of those noxious attack ads. They basically select and finance the campaigns of "representatives" who have pledged to follow the Party line. This new well-funded, topdown Republican Party structure --which also includes think-tanks and legislation mills -- enforces uniformity of ideology and strategy. Compromise is out.
We all know the stated aims of these anonymous billionaires and their strategists -- oust Obama, constrict government, cut taxes on the wealthy, eliminate regulation, wipe out unions, etc. But what are their unstated goals and values? For clues, look at their campaign of voter suppression in the swing states:
1) They don’t like democracy. Too messy and uncertain. And 2) They believe the ends (winning the election) justify the means (intimidating legitimate voters).
Ron Tschudy - Central Lake
No hysteria in NRA
Trust a liberal to label his opposition as "hysterical" (re: "NRA hysteria unfounded," Letters 8/27). All that libs can do is name-call.
Anyhow, the NRA was and is anything but hysterical in its warning about Obama and the Left being bitterly opposed to an armed citizenry. The fact that they spent their first-term political capital almost exclusively on getting Obamacare through does not mean that they have given up on the basic leftist goal of suppressing the people’s right (guns don’t have rights) to be armed. Also, Wayne LaPierre’s salary is closer to $600,000, after 35 years with the NRA.
Lastly, if you are going to call the NRA a branch of the Republican Party, which it most decidedly is not, why not point out, far more truthfully, that the Trial Lawyers Association, now laughably renamed the American Justice Association, is one of the biggest direct financial supporters of the Democratic Party? SEIU (can you spell ACORN?) comes next, and the teachers’ unions, whether their members want their dues used this way or not.
At least the NRA is patriotic.
Charles Knapp - Maple City
GOP's Medicare disaster
Our Republican candidates want to repeal Obamacare and replace Medicare with private health insurance vouchers for all of us younger than 55. Mitt Romney, Paul Ryan and U.S. Rep. Dan Benishek promise that "nothing will change for current Medicare beneficiaries or for those between the ages of 55 and 65."
They are lying. For our current seniors, repeal of Obamacare would reopen the costly "donut hole" for prescription drugs and eliminate free preventive care. Those of us between the ages of 55 and 65 would never receive those Medicare benefits.
A less easily understood problem -- the Republican plan would stop enrolling new Medicare beneficiaries just 10 years from now. As with private insurance, younger beneficiaries cost the Medicare program less on average than older ones. With no new beneficiaries coming in, Medicare’s cost-per-person would rise dramatically as the pool of remaining beneficiaries grows older and older.
Make no mistake, under the Romney- Ryan-Benishek plan everyone aged 55 or older will get fewer Medicare benefits and the program will become ever more dependent on taxpayer subsidies every year.
Jay S. Johnson - Empire