Letters to the editor

Employees unfairly targeted Dear editor:

Politicians in office and running for election use civilian federal employees as the whipping boy to influence uninformed voters. In 1946, there were 2.2 million civilian federal employees, one employee per 46 people. Today, there are 1.8 million employees, or one per 182 people. This low number is in spite of the U.S. population increasing by 200 million people with more federal programs, laws and regulations to administer.

The Office of Management and Budget determined that for every civilian federal employee eliminated, state and county governments have to add four employees. We have a dumbing down in America, but even the 50 percent of the population with below-average intelligence should be able to understand these implications.

The federal employees keep the government functioning in spite of inept politicians elected. They are the best value taxpayers have and it is not the employees running up the national debt. Employees and program budgets have been declining for over 25 years. Some agencies have difficulty functioning and meeting requirements set by Congress. Services have been cut, campgrounds closed, educational programs eliminated and enforcement of health and food safety is inadequate. Blaming federal employees for the nations budget woes, by even the president, is an indication of an uninformed person that needs to mentally adjust such thinking. They do not know what they are talking about. Jerry Wayne Davis Hot Springs

‘Pork it Forward’ Dear editor:

I knew last year when the Hot Springs Board of Directors wanted the people to vote for a sales tax and bond issue to pay for road improvements that they’d find a way to spend the money on something else.

In your front-page article on June 24, you wrote that the city plans to spend its share of the $54.6 million bond issue for “road improvements” on expanded parking and for wider sidewalks so downtown businesses can set up sidewalk tables. Neither of those projects sound like road improvements to me.

I guess the city leaders’ memory must have faded during the last year from when they asked us in June 2016 to tax ourselves five-eighths cents to “Pave it Forward” that really they meant “Park it Faster” or “Pork it Forward.” The images we were provided was that potholes and streets would be fixed in our neighborhoods, not expand parking and dining areas for tourists.

I wonder why it was that the city board had to rush last Friday (June 23) into a hastily called “special” meeting to consider spending our money. Was this a way to keep down the public’s comments and try to slip another boondoggle through?

I really question whether spending is allowed since the bond issue allows bond funds to be used for “new … and … existing, roads, streets and related structures.” I didn’t read anything in the bond documents about parking structures or outdoor dining structures.

I also didn’t read in your newspaper whether the city checked with their bond counsel to determine if they could actually spend “road” money for parking and sidewalk cafes.

This is just the latest example of how City Manager David Frasher has been using the taxpayers’ money to pay for improvements for the tourist areas, rather than in the neighborhoods.

Remember early this year, after crime increased so high, that he promised tourists that everywhere they looked they would see a Hot Springs police officer. I just hope no tourist looks in any of our neighborhoods, because all they will find are people breaking into our homes and vehicles.

Once again, Frasher and the board members are showing its citizens and taxpayers that they will only be welcomed to Hot Springs if they don’t live here.

W.R. Cowan Hot Springs

Cherry picking words Dear editor:

The writer of a recent letter (“Right of secession,” Monday, July 17, 2017) cherry-picks a cherished document from the American Revolution in an attempt to justify the traitorous rebellion known as the Civil War. Because the Declaration of Independence justifies separation from a tyrannical state, the writer claims equal right for the Southern states. Although the two events can find no equivalent moral justification in that document, they were both, in fact, rebellions.

The great difference, however, is that the Founding Fathers knew it and won. When the British surrendered, the United States of America was shortly thereafter recognized by other nations as an independent state.

The rebellious confederation lost and was never recognized by a single nation.

According to University of Virginia historian Edward Ayers, “No respected historian has argued for decades that the Civil War” was fought over anything but slavery. Four million slaves, worth billions of dollars, in fact.

The writer claims secession is legal. The Constitution does not mention it, but Article IV, Section 3(2) says, “The Congress shall have power to dispose of and make all needed Rules and Regulation respecting the Territory or other Property belonging to the United States.” So the claim of legality must fail.

The writer objects to the term, “traitorous rebellion.” U.S. Constitution, Article III, Section 3(1), “Treason against the United States, shall consist only of levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them aid and comfort.”

The writer may also wish to read Article I, Section 10 (1), “No State shall enter into any Treaty, Alliance, or Confederation,” etc.

You may say as you like, hold whatever “opinion” you wish. You may not pretend unsupported assertion is the equivalent of documented fact.

Stephen Orr Manning Near Hot Springs

Have we learned nothing? Dear editor:

Neocons win. They control both parties. Same old SOS: perpetual war, militarism, American interventionism, regime change, nation-building.

All fig-leafed as “defense” and “protecting democracy” and rah-rah-rah jingoism masquerading as “patriotism.”

Yes, wave the American flag. Salute it. Whip up emotions. “Honor” it!

And then desecrate it with innocent, red blood spilled not in a “just” war, but for corporatism’s green bottom line.

The military-industrial complex: the tail waving, directing, America’s military dog. Have we learned nothing?

Nothing at all?

Answer: No!

Nor shall we.

Maybe it has always been such in all ages: brother against brother, clan against clan, religion against religion, nation against nation?

Wars and rumors of wars, and all such, the end being near.

Or here.

At least for those heathen, “others” all, apocalypsed by genocide and ethnic cleansing to purify unholy lands or to manifest our destiny at Wounded Knee and other sacred, victorious killing fields.

Because we, as a species, have learned nothing, nothing at all, since that time, long ago, when our Neanderthal grandfather shambled from his smoke-filled cave one serene, nascent morning, picked up a piece of wood, swung it tentatively, and his pea-brain registered not the word “weapon” (because he lacked a word for such an idea), but its concept, its insane, implacable idea:

Kill!

And so it has been. And is. And will be. Whatever weapon we discover, however horrific, we use because we are a certifiably, committably insane species, more hellbent than ever on self-immolation.

It will take more than a two-by-four.

So is my judgment of, on, the human race.

Cliff Jackson Hot Springs

The ‘real’ Trump Dear editor:

I have a lot of confidence that Robert Mueller’s council will be able to give the people of America some truth about who the real Donald Trump is. And I have always thought that “to follow the money” would produce a valid explanation of Trump’s connection with Russia.

Craig Unger has written a very interesting expose’ for The New Republic. Read his article dated July 13, 2017, entitled “Trump’s Russian Laundromat.” If you want to get a preview of what is going to be exposed by Robert Mueller’s council, read this article about how the Russian mafia and Russian oligarchs have made it financially possible for Donald Trump to become a billionaire and to succeed to the presidency. In short, Trump properties have been used by Russia as early as the 1980s and extending to the present as money laundering devices for the Russian mafia and Russian oligarchs. All the pieces are starting to come together.

Finally, the ties that Donald Trump has to Russia are being seen. His lies are being divulged. How can you believe anything he claims? Did he collude and conspire with the Russians? Did he do acts of treason? One has to wonder. It seems he would if it would allow him to succeed to the presidency.

Many of us have suspected that Donald Trump would eventually be exposed as the fraud he is. For what could explain Donald’s love of Vladimir Putin and everything Russian? Why wouldn’t Trump allow us look at his tax returns? It is all becoming clear. It will only be a matter of time before the facts of his corruption come to the fore.

So, what then? The lies that Donald Trump will continue to spew will have to be denounced by all. His presidency is a disgrace. The sooner we get him out of office, the sooner we will be able to try to right the ship. America, it is time to fess up.

Bill Wiedmann Hot Springs