Rebuild and replace is key to effective stimulus plan

Rebuild and replace is key to effective stimulus plan

EDITOR:

The stimulus package as it now stands will do little good and may do much harm. While I am for paying less taxes, I know that the few hundred dollars I get back in taxes will not make up for the millions of jobs that have been lost. A cash payment may give the economy a shot in the arm, but the trickle of money from a tax cut will not help in the least. It would help more to use that money to bring down the debt and pay for the repairs needed in America.

If the money is used to rebuild, replace and build new infrastructure it will bring a new age to America. If it is just given away it will in the end just be wasted or worst cause runaway inflation. There are many things that need to be done in America to bring it up to the standards of other countries. We need to completely replace our electric grid. It needs to be buried under ground to protect it from storms and attacks. It would be nice to have an electric supply that did not fail with every wind or ice storm. This alone would put many people back to work and would also improve our country. This is only one of many things that need to be done. Will it, or will the money just be given out to make some people richer or to appease the rest of us into thinking we got a piece of the pie?

PAUL SHANABARGER

New Springfield

The right wing’s philosphy: If Obama’s for it, I’m not

EDITOR:

For the past several months, readers of this page have been subjected to letters from a gentleman from Poland usually espousing a conservative point of view. The latest one was about how President Obama is a socialist and we better all beware. First he was a terrorist and now he’s a socialist. They can’t seem to get their whacky labels straight. I usually get a chuckle or two from reading the letters. As many people know, the only admitted socialist in our government is Rep. Bernie Sanders (I) of Vermont, and he has some pretty good ideas about how to fix many of our problems.

What people like the Poland gent, Limbaugh, Fox News and the right wing talking heads need to realize is that we tried it their way for the past 8 years and it was an unmitigated disaster of historic proportions. It didn’t work. Just take a look around and you can clearly see the results. Why do they think President Obama won? Bush left office with an approval rating lower than a Steeler fan in the Dawg pound at Browns Stadium. Now they want Obama to continue to do things their way in the spirit of cooperation? Are they insane? Bury the body of Reaganomics. It’s over. Their idea of a stimulus is more tax breaks for corporations to move whatever few jobs are left out of our country.

It always puzzles me that when a Republican wins an election even by a slim margin, they claim a mandate and you either go along with their plans or you`re unAmerican. But now that President Obama won almost a landslide they want him to become Republican lite. They have no great ideas outside of opposing whatever President Obama wants to try. Their policies are the main reason we are in this mess. Hopefully the president resists the failed economic policies of the past and gets his plans implemented quickly. Every day sinks us deeper into the abyss.

TIM O`HARA

Austintown

The 2,400-year-old search

EDITOR:

Athens, Greece, 380 BC: Diogenes searches the city looking for an honest man. He couldn’t find one.

Washington DC, 2009 AD: President Obama searches the city looking for an honest man. He can’t find one either.

JOHN ZEDAKER

Poland