What a year this has been. Vote nearly straight R and get called liberal and lefty; turn 60 and get cited for ageism. What a world :)
I apologize
I apologize that I want my grandchildren and their grandchildren to enjoy freedom and not socialism and to take responsibility and never expect the government to take care of all their needs from housing to health care to employment.
I apologize that I want a smaller, not a continually growing and expanding, fiscally irresponsible government. I apologize that in my house, spending more than I make doesn't work — I live within my means. I apologize that I think this should be true for the government.
I apologize that I don't get it when progressives say we need to spend more in order to prompt the economy — I haven't seen it work anywhere. I apologize that I think those who work hard and are successful should not pay proportionally higher taxes than others.
I apologize for thinking, and I apologize for not being able to fathom the shallowness of the letter writer's reasoning.
WILLIAM HARDIN
Clemmons
Hope and change
BOB REAGAN
Winston-Salem
The Governor's School has challenged young minds at an intellectual level that cannot be put into words unless you have seen this school operate firsthand.
The Teaching Fellows program has produced hundreds of amazing and innovative educators who otherwise may not have had the opportunity to pursue a career in teaching.
It appears that we will now unfortunately be viewed as a state that does not value education as a priority.
LARRY STOMBAUGH
Clemmons
At the same time this amendment was written, many papers were written by our founders. One such paper introduced the tenet of separation of church and state. These papers, however intelligent and well-intentioned, are not law and should not be applied as such.
TONY GAGLIARDI
Winston-Salem
O.T., how was Ziggy's last night?
I apologize to the writer of the letter "I think" (July 29) and those of like mind. I admit it, I do not agree with the writer.
I apologize that I want a smaller, not a continually growing and expanding, fiscally irresponsible government. I apologize that in my house, spending more than I make doesn't work — I live within my means. I apologize that I think this should be true for the government.
I apologize that I don't get it when progressives say we need to spend more in order to prompt the economy — I haven't seen it work anywhere. I apologize that I think those who work hard and are successful should not pay proportionally higher taxes than others.
I apologize for thinking, and I apologize for not being able to fathom the shallowness of the letter writer's reasoning.
WILLIAM HARDIN
Clemmons
Hope and change
In 2008, Barack Obama campaigned on the promise of "hope and change."
I sure hope my 401k/IRA doesn't change much more.BOB REAGAN
Winston-Salem
A leader in education
I am deeply saddened to see the end of funding for the Governor's School and the Teaching Fellows program. As someone who has had the privilege of teaching high-school students for 17 years, it is hard to adequately describe how much these two programs have benefitted so many outstanding students.The Governor's School has challenged young minds at an intellectual level that cannot be put into words unless you have seen this school operate firsthand.
The Teaching Fellows program has produced hundreds of amazing and innovative educators who otherwise may not have had the opportunity to pursue a career in teaching.
Both of these programs gave North Carolina the reputation of being a state that has been a leader in developing programs to encourage students to succeed at the highest academic levels and to pursue significant career goals.
LARRY STOMBAUGH
Clemmons
Forsyth County prayer
I must disagree with your editorial statement that the ruling by the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond upheld the Constitution ("Latest ruling upholds Constitution," Aug. 2). Nothing could be further from the truth. The First Amendment states, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." This one statement is being twisted to mean that government cannot be associated in any way with religion. That is not what is written here.
I applaud the Forsyth County Board of Commissioners for continuing this fight.
The commissioners are not requiring participation in their prayers. They are exercising their right to pray at their meeting. If Forsyth County elected a Muslim board, it would be free to offer Muslim prayers. I would not object.
Lastly, a judge is just a lawyer who has attained an elevated position in life. Judges are just as likely to be wrong on any issue as they were in their previous lives as lawyers.
Good luck to the board. With hope, the Supreme Court can read this simple language and have the courage to right this wrong.
TONY GAGLIARDI
Winston-Salem
And, did LG take my suggestion from last night, and make an appearance?
ReplyDeleteNo....too many bull dykes and gay bucks roaming around in those places.
ReplyDeleteWell, there's no longer any doubt that America is going down hill after yesterday's S&P credit downgrade.
ReplyDeleteAnd guess what? The Democrats want to spend even more of our money. They're worse than crack addicts.
Still no LTE's for Saturday. Oh well, done with all I can do in remodeling for today. Time to get out a bit.
ReplyDeleteHey, LG, how do you like my temporary avatar?
No thanks....I like mine better. Barney is a fine representative of how hateful and unreasonable some gays can be. I'm trying to get the word out.
ReplyDeleteLet's hope that Gagliardi doesn't teach American History at the Career Center.
ReplyDeleteHe, like all the other clueless supporters of this foolish lawsuit are tilting at windmills when they quote the 1st Amendment to the US Constitution. What they are ignoring is over 200 years of decisions handed down by the federal court system regarding constitutional issues.
Those decisions make up what we know as constitutional law and have full standing throughout the nation.
The other part of the problem is that the county commissioners should never allow some outsider partisan group to represent the citizens in the name of the county.
Before I get to Ziggy's, let me address an ageist remark that Stab made yesterday regarding my appearance last night at Ziggy's.
ReplyDeleteA recent study of Baby Boomers showed that their greatest concern is not death OR taxes. What they really worry about is being called "old". I guess that "senior citizen" is not mild enough for them. Perhaps they are looking for a new, more confusing politically correct term. I could suggest "over 19"...that would cover it, wouldn't it? But I won't. How about "post middle aged"?
As for me, I shall stick to the term that I began using in the '60s for anyone over 30 and now quite willingly apply to myself: "old fart".
I think it is quite accurate and has a certain "heft" to it.
That being said, I was far from being the only "old fart" present last night, so LG might have had a problem finding me. He would have been very happy with the greatly expanded number of bathroom stalls though.
Now, Ziggy's. Great. Jay has created something quite good from the (figurative) ashes of the old. More bathrooms, and they actually work. Enough bar space so that you can actually get a beer in under half an hour. Air conditioning. A bigger stage. A lot more room in general.
ReplyDeleteJay has already heard all he wants to hear from some of the "we're going to take back our country (and return to the old Ziggy's) set." We'll miss the general scruffiness, the ambiance, if you will of old Ziggy's. We'll scoff at the sissiness of air conditioning. Some of us will even kind of miss the shattered sink in the men's room in the old member's bar.
But like our fellow Luddites in the TT Party, we will have to face up to the fact that progress is inevitable. (Don't tell anybody, but I actually kind of like the sissy air conditioning.)
Great job Jay...may you live forever. With The Garage, the Arts District already had one of the top music venues in the South. Now we have two.
Oops! I posted the LTE's once, but they now seem to have disappeared. Shall try again:
ReplyDeletePublished: August 06, 2011
» 0 Comments | Post a Comment
I apologize
I apologize to the writer of the letter "I think" (July 29) and those of like mind. I admit it, I do not agree with the writer.
I apologize that I want my grandchildren and their grandchildren to enjoy freedom and not socialism and to take responsibility and never expect the government to take care of all their needs from housing to health care to employment.
I apologize that I want a smaller, not a continually growing and expanding, fiscally irresponsible government. I apologize that in my house, spending more than I make doesn't work — I live within my means. I apologize that I think this should be true for the government.
I apologize that I don't get it when progressives say we need to spend more in order to prompt the economy — I haven't seen it work anywhere. I apologize that I think those who work hard and are successful should not pay proportionally higher taxes than others.
I apologize for thinking, and I apologize for not being able to fathom the shallowness of the letter writer's reasoning.
WILLIAM HARDIN
Clemmons
Hope and change
In 2008, Barack Obama campaigned on the promise of "hope and change."
I sure hope my 401k/IRA doesn't change much more.
BOB REAGAN
Winston-Salem
A leader in education
I am deeply saddened to see the end of funding for the Governor's School and the Teaching Fellows program. As someone who has had the privilege of teaching high-school students for 17 years, it is hard to adequately describe how much these two programs have benefitted so many outstanding students.
The Governor's School has challenged young minds at an intellectual level that cannot be put into words unless you have seen this school operate firsthand.
The Teaching Fellows program has produced hundreds of amazing and innovative educators who otherwise may not have had the opportunity to pursue a career in teaching.
Both of these programs gave North Carolina the reputation of being a state that has been a leader in developing programs to encourage students to succeed at the highest academic levels and to pursue significant career goals.
It appears that we will now unfortunately be viewed as a state that does not value education as a priority.
LARRY STOMBAUGH
Clemmons
Forsyth County prayer
I must disagree with your editorial statement that the ruling by the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond upheld the Constitution ("Latest ruling upholds Constitution," Aug. 2). Nothing could be further from the truth. The First Amendment states, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." This one statement is being twisted to mean that government cannot be associated in any way with religion. That is not what is written here.
At the same time this amendment was written, many papers were written by our founders. One such paper introduced the tenet of separation of church and state. These papers, however intelligent and well-intentioned, are not law and should not be applied as such.
I applaud the Forsyth County Board of Commissioners for continuing this fight.
The commissioners are not requiring participation in their prayers. They are exercising their right to pray at their meeting. If Forsyth County elected a Muslim board, it would be free to offer Muslim prayers. I would not object.
Lastly, a judge is just a lawyer who has attained an elevated position in life. Judges are just as likely to be wrong on any issue as they were in their previous lives as lawyers.
Good luck to the board. With hope, the Supreme Court can read this simple language and have the courage to right this wrong.
TONY GAGLIARDI
Winston-Salem
The writer teaches at the Career Center. — The editor
"I apologize that I don't get it when progressives say we need to spend more in order to prompt the economy — I haven't seen it work anywhere."
ReplyDeleteWell, it did get the western world out of the Great Depression, so there's that.
All we've gotten out Obama's stimulus program is Silas Creek Parkway paved. We could've done without that.
ReplyDeleteObama says his priority is now jobs. What was his priority back in 2008? Spending taxpayer dollars?
Let's face reality. He's the worse president since Jimmy Carter. America needs to move forward. The quicker we can get Obama out, the better.
Or Mr. Hardin, look at it this way:
ReplyDeleteThe interest rate on 10 year treasury bonds is now 2.5%. Say we borrow a trillion dollars next year and use that money to put unemployed people to work on infrastructure projects, or whatever.
For 10 years anway, the annual cost of servicing said debt would be 25 billion dollars. Which would be more than offset by increased tax revenues paid into the system by people who would otherwise be unemployed, and paying no federal taxes. And that's not even talking about the personal and societal costs of long-term unemployment.
I'm not saying fiscal policy is always appropriate to bring unemployment down, but now's a perfect time to do it.
Well, today the Journal's Letters to the Editor section set a record: not a single comment as of now. But their new policy had nothing to do with that.
ReplyDeleteWhat happened is that someone forgot to add the link for Saturday's Letters to the LTE page. I found them by clicking on the "Opinion" link at the top of the page and there found the link to the Readers Forum: Saturday's Letters.
I agree with Arthur. Most economic historians agree that the main reason that the Great Depression lasted as long as it did was that FDR and others did not spend enough on projects like the WPA and the CCC.
ReplyDeleteThe current situation is lingering because no one except the rich is spending enough money. It is a vicious circle: consumers don't spend, so producers do not expand production, so the economy does not expand fast enough to provide new jobs, so the number of consumers does not grow, so the remaining consumers cut back spending for fear that they will become unemployed.
This creates what economists call an "unbalanced" economy, in which makers of luxury goods (Ferrari, Mercedes, some boat builders, etc) see record demand, but the mom and pop businesses that are frequented by the average consumer see no or little growth.
The rich can only spend so much. The middle and bottom parts of the economy, which are the only truly important segments, being caught up in the vicious circle, do not expand enough and the economy stagnates.
People who argue against increasing taxes on the rich and against government regulation of business simply don't know what they are talking about. It is the LACK of government regulation of the financial segment that got us into the current mess.
Good evening, folks!
ReplyDeleteLG: not that it matters, but Silas Creek Parkway was pretty badly alligatored, so repaving is a good thing.
Arthur: I could be persuaded by your argument re the 2.5% treasury bonds, but isn't it likely that interest rates are now going to rise?
O.T.: The financial segment helped us into the current mess, but we as the government and as consumers borrowed our way into the mess also. We created an economy predicated on borrowed money, and when we consumers got to the point that servicing our debt was now impairing our ability to spend and we could obtain no more credit, our spending slowed. We can slam Congress (a Congress that at one point contained our current President), and well we should. We can slam several Administrations, and well we should. But, we must also slam ourselves, and well we should. Slamming done, it's time to get to work and do the unpleasant, and well we must.
OK, what do we do that is unpleasant? Some of this I hate to say, but . . .
ReplyDelete1. Raise taxes on them what can pay. I think $250K is a bit low, besides we're going to hit them another way, so raise the level at which high marginal rates increase. $500K? This doesn't rule out a major rework of the tax system, as long as the rework collects more dough.
2. Do away with tax dodges that allow people to be compensated without dealing with income tax rates.
3. Take the income cap off Social Security taxes. This affects everyone being paid over $106K/year. And apply the increases to the aforementioned tax dodges.
4. Start ratcheting federal and state fuel taxes upward. Now, everyone is paying more in taxes, either directly or indirectly. So much for the 50% allegedly not paying taxes. We're going to have raise fuel taxes anyway. Fuel mileage standards are going up, with vehicles using less gasoline and diesel, or none at all (from pumps, anyway), as all-electrics and fuel cell cars hit the road.
5. Kill Davis-Bacon and project labor agreements.
6. Enact term limits for DC pols, both elected or appointed: 12 years total federal service, no more than 6 years in elective office, period (exempting judges), including Presidents. Ban former pols from serving as lobbyists and former lobbyists from serving as pols (and tighten rules over who is considered a lobbyist).
7. Rework campaign financing to end all non-individual contributions (and that mean in-kind, too).
8. Legalize drugs, end the lost war on drugs, tax the drugs, severely punish distribution to minors.
9. Ratchet upward the eligibility for Social Security, phasing in the ages as has been done previously.
10. Bring the boys (and women) home. We cannot police the world, and we have profligately fought at least one war that we should not have. We are subsidizing corruption in Afghanistan, and Iraq can take care of itself.
11. NC should extend the sales tax to things not currently covered, including professional services other than medical, and fuel.
12. NC should avail itself of toll booths in places, particularly transcontinental highways like I-95.
Enough for the time being. Good night.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteI agree with all but two points.
ReplyDelete6. Occasionally we accidentally elect a truly gifted politician, who can, because of those gifts, make an enormous, long term difference. I'd hate to discard them because voters are unable to tell the difference between class and dross. I'd go with finding a way to make voters more responsible for their choices.
Agree 100% on lobbyists, one of the most sickening parts of our political life.
10. Yes bring them all home, NOW, and do not send them again except in the most desperate circumstance.
However, Iraq cannot take care of itself, at least in the way that US citizens see that term. As soon as we have full disengagement, we will see that Iran is a ruthless dagger in the heart of the puppet government we leave behind. They will not survive a year, and that is an optimistic assessment.
Consider me slammed. Even though I have zero personal debt today, I cannot say one word about the tens of millions of Americans caught up in their own personal debt crises, because I was once one of the worst of them.
ReplyDeletePost WW II the American dream became a reality, fueled by "instant easy credit". And I fell for it hook, line and sinker. By the time I was 30, I had every credit card known to man, all maxed out, at HIGH limits, a magnificent antebellum house with a second mortgage, sports cars, rare book and art collections, purebred pets, you name it.
It took a personal crisis that had little to do with money to force me to embrace Socrates wisest thought as conveyed to us by Plato, that the unexamined life is not worth living. I found my life to be pathetic. And it took 15 difficult years to rid myself of the debt and the toys, which it turned out, owned me, rather than the other way around. I have no pets nowadays, but have been known to befriend the stray alley cat and am on speaking terms with the downtown coyotes.
Of course, keeping in mind how Socrates died, if you take him too seriously, he will drain all the fun out of life, so I always keep in mind Mark Twain's response: "The unexamined life may not be worth living, but the life too closely examined may not be lived at all."
So I cultivate a wide range of very smart friends and pay occasional visits to this blog for a little (usually quite amusing) perspective:
DELETED BECAUSE NOW DEFUNCT. SEE NEXT POST.
Atheists (in my case, agnostics) don't have no songs, but we do have Sundays free. Always trying to look on the bright side.
Forget the blog recommendation. Apparently our boy has finished medical school and abandoned his blog. Most links are now dead. Oh well, there are others.
ReplyDeleteHe had a poll on the blog that had two possible answers to the question "Do you read this blog?" "No" lost out to "Nope" by 36-64%.
One of my favorite areas was called "Brevia". Some samples:
- Like Isaac Newton and the falling apple, Albert Einstein was inspired by the observation that whenever he was at a gathering of relatives, time seemed to pass more slowly.
- In response to a large number of disagreeable policies, many scientists feel that the Bush administration has declared war on science. However, cynics point out that given the President's track record, a war on science would just produce more scientists in the end.
- The Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life has consistently reported that among all professions, archaeologists are the most likely to find Jesus.
Due to the excitement of Friday night, which included an after Ziggy's party that extended into the wee hours, I slept quite late Saturday morning and skipped over some of the earlier posts entirely.
ReplyDelete"No....too many bull dykes and gay bucks roaming around in those places."
Quite revealing. Perhaps my dearly beloved brother Bucky Beaver is afraid that he will mistakenly hit on a "bull dyke" who will take him home with her and subject him to rituals that will leave him scarred for life.
"What a year this has been. Vote nearly straight R and get called liberal and lefty; turn 60 and get cited for ageism. What a world :)"
Ha, ha. The best thing about life is its total unpredictability. Imagine how boring it would be if every day everything happened just the way we expected it to. "Groundhog Day" to the 10th power.
I showed this thread to my Friday night date, who is over 40, but doesn't come close to looking or feeling it. She laughed. She particularly liked the "old fart" part.
You might note that instead of a picture of me, my avatar is a car. Since it is only 52 years old, some years younger than I am, I think that it reflects something closer to my true age.
I own it, but do not possess it, because one of my sons has "borrowed" it for an indefinite period. Not sure I'll ever get it back.