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Express Yourself: Letters to the Editor

Foot trouble

EUGENE DRIER

Williamsport

The President’s grandfather came to America from Germany in 1860, just before the Civil War. From then until now, a Trump has never served in any branch of the U.S. Armed Forces.

I guess foot trouble, also known as bone spurs, is inherited and genetic.

Happy days

DAVID L. FAUST

Selinsgrovbe

When President Eisenhower left office in 1961, the top income tax rate was 91% on all income, including capital gains, dividends and interest of the wealthy. Today, the top income tax rate for the wealthy is 15% and the top income tax rate for corporate giants is 21% while the lack of tax revenue is escalating the national debt and the top income tax rate on the ordinary income of working class Americans is an insulting 37%.

What happened?

If you really want to know, check the tax cut legislation that was enacted during the administrations of Ronald Reagan, George W. Bush and Donald Trump, and see what happened to government spending for national defense and discover what happened to the nation’s debt after those tax cuts took effect.

During the Eisenhower administration, taxes were affordable for the working class, spending for national defense was reasonable, budgets were balanced, inflation was low, the economy grew, the interstate highway system was started, the New Deal remained intact,

America was at peace and there wasn’t one military death in a war.

Yes, those were the happy days!

The Electoral College of

the Republic

ROBERT JACQUES

and JAMES STUCHELL

Williamsport

A recent letter to the editor, “The Electoral College,” calls that American institution “undemocratic.”

The writer notes that residents of low-population states have a greater per capita say in selecting the president than do the residents of large states.

So, this is clearly disproportionate and unrepresentative, and therefore the Electoral College is undemocratic.

True. But consider the U.S. Senate. In the Senate, the smallest states get the same number of senators as do the largest states, and therefore a greater per capita say in the Senate. Does that mean the Senate is “undemocratic,” and that it should be eliminated?

Obviously not. Congress intentionally consists of two chambers with different representational interests. The House is designed to represent the people of the United States.

And the Senate is designed to represent the states of the United States. In voting for House members, every citizen is counted equally.

And in voting for the Senate, every state is counted equally. Neither acreage nor population makes Texas one inch bigger in the Senate than is Rhode Island.

With two different chambers in Congress based on two different representations, the people in the House, and the states in the Senate, together pass laws. The election of the president is a similarly combined effort. The president is chosen by state electors who have been chosen by citizens.

Both the passage of laws and the election of presidents are thus joint efforts of American citizens and their states. T

he objection that the Electoral College isn’t democratic is therefore literally true, but I believe it’s misinformed. Neither laws nor presidents in the United States are democratically determined.

But then, of course, America isn’t a democracy. America is a republic.

The Democrats’ deceit in attempting to stamp out the Electoral College will fail, as did previous attempts — which is to the benefit of all liberty-loving Americans.

The writer’s letter ends with a quote from Trump. Trump is certainly no political scientist.

But when Trump says the Electoral College is “a disaster for democracy,” Trump intuitively gets the world right with his great American sensibilities.

The Electoral College is intentionally meant to be bad for democracy — and therefore good for the republic of the United States of America.

Public education

ROMUALD ANDRAKA

Trout Run

The problem with teacher pay isn’t that teachers are paid too much, nor is it that they are paid too little.

The problem with teacher pay is that it is largely divorced from teacher performance.

Because public education pay schedules are set by unions in most Pennsylvania public school districts and agreed to by school boards as part of the bargaining process, principals don’t have the ability to reward outstanding teachers with greater pay, nor to punish poor teachers with less.

I believe there should not be tenure in Kindergarten thru 12.

But there is and that is a big problem that principles cannot overcome.

Purpose for life

TED MAHAFFEY

Montoursville

The majority of people fanatical about manmade global warming-climate change are on the secular left.

I don’t know if manmade global warming-climate change is occurring, but because it is being pushed by the secular left, I have strong reason to question it.

The same majority of people, who are pushing manmade global warming/climate change and the return to primitive living conditions as a remedy, are fanatically supporting abortion.

The recent New York State law allowing an abortion up to the moment of birth was literally cheered by secular left politicians.

In Virginia, a law was proposed by secular left politicians that would have allowed killing an infant surviving an abortion. Barbaric!

With abortion, they are promoting eliminating life. With global warming-climate change, they are supposedly concerned about saving the planet to promote life.

The core belief of the secular left is, in my opinion, we evolved from non-living matter and live in a universe that created itself.

As insignificant descendants of evolved non-living matter, why does it matter if the planet ceases to exist? They believe everyone will permanently cease to exist, there are no absolutes in terms of good or evil, no God, and no purpose for life.

The secular left is always touting their “values.”

I didn’t know values could originate from non-living matter. Though with some of the values they espouse, it would appear to be the origin of some of them.

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