There’s no easy fix for the financial mess we’re in

There’s no easy fix for the financial mess we’re in

EDITOR:

Big problems call for bold solutions. It takes guts to lead the country through the pain necessary to build a foundation for prosperity. Sometimes lobbyist and pseudo experts convince us there are easier ways.

The only true economic stimulus is one that lays a foundation for permanent business growth without saddling the nation with debt. The only way to do this correctly is to pay for the stimulus as we grow our way out of it. We don’t need to outlaw jobs.

One small way to spur business is to repeal the latest minimum wage increase. Those jobs that were outlawed some time ago are beneficial to working families and would stimulate small business creation. With the price of gasoline and natural gas going down, these minimum checks could go much farther than in the past.

One large way to stimulate business is to put an immediate freeze on all federal government wages. With our Senate and House leadership, we can encourage our state and local governments to do the same. That will bring some sacrifice to those government workers, but it would not destroy them like those that lost jobs in the private sector. An index should be created that reduces government wages in relation to losses in tax revenues in the private sector. We should step up our search to end government waste. Government wages should not be increased till we eliminate our federal debt.

These actions can only encourage individuals and corporations to create jobs in the private sector. We need to get back to the day when people worked in government jobs to get experience to get good private sector jobs instead of today where people work in the private sector until they can get a government job.

DAVID SOKOL

Youngstown

What’s old is new again

EDITOR:

One of the consistent complaints about the media is the blur between fact and opinion. The Feb. 18 Cal Thomas column provided a perfect example.

In the second paragraph he states that a new bureaucracy was discovered in the (stimulus) bill that has implications that Washington may decide who gets life-saving health care treatment. My issue is with the word new. In fact, the office of National Coordinator of Health Care Information Technology was established by President Bush, by executive order in 2004. So he starts his opinion piece with simple factual error. He obviously did not research that which he then went on to express an opinion about.

My reaction was to jot off a note to Cal Thomas. At his Web site I found that to comment on his commentary you have to post to the forums on the Web site. What surprised me was that the most recent postings (feedback from readers) were dated October 2008. That makes me wonder about how many read his column, for I would have suspected that his feedback (both pro and con) might have been more active.

So I’m wondering just how relevant is Cal Thomas to the national discussion. Furthermore, is The Vindicator, in printing his column, contributing to problem of blur between actual facts and opinion based facts that are figments of one’s imagination?

BOB ELSTON

New Middletown