Letters to the Editor
ELYDOG
Published Letters: 498 Editor's Choice: 43
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People's Index Funds
[Read the article: The sky must not be falling: Dow breaks 14,000]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]The classic case is the announcement of layoffs by a company, followed by an increase in it's stock price. So what you folks are saying is that if the little guy is taking it in the groin (as he usually does), investing in Index Funds is a sure bet (for the little guy too, I might add?).
We need, I think, a Doug Henwood or some left-wing economist to actually create the 'Bob Jones Index,' as Jim Hightower suggested.
Feed in figures from:
1. Unemployment (adjusted to pick up those actually unemployed, not just registered with the government as unemployed.)
2. Underemployed (see 1.)
3. Overtime worked (mixed signal)
4. CPI (the real consumer price index, including all commodities like college, medical, gas prices, not the government 'fixed' version)
5. Actual Wages
6. Unionization levels
7. Pollution levels
8. Taxes paid for corporate welfare, war, defense and secret police, etc.
9. Tax rates and payments of workers, as opposed to those of the rich and corporations.
10. Health care availability
11. Health care costs for ordinary people
12. Mass transit levels
You get the idea...
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Yes, public transport can suck
[Read the article: We paved paradise]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Anon 1:09 PM,
Yes, public transport can suck. In our spreadout society, it is not possible to take it everywhere, usually just downtown, or along the spurs. I lived in Rogers Park in Chicago, and had to get to Franklin Park every day. No way but driving. Of course, that was hell too.
I did not like Ms. Laurel's response because she sterotyped all the people that are trying to get 'out of the car'. They are all 'young", 'wealthy', 'big city' etc. Not true, as the posters here have shown. This kind of Republican stereotyping actually just justifies the status quo. And the status quo of driving everywhere is not working, or is not going to work, in the future.
As for the amount of comments about the difficulties of commuting out of Washington D.C. on a train/bus or that the whole of 'northern Virginia' is a 'no go' area between 3-7 pm for cars, or the need to beat up thugs on your bus commute, all I can say is - holy shit! This is when living in the spread-out suburbs or commuting any long distance just isn't worth it. I live in a 'livable' city for a reason. Maybe someday you will too.
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Democratic Party should split
[Read the article: How the Democrats blew it]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]If the Democratic Party was serious about peace, it would not take a 'knee jerk' pro-Likud position. There are plenty of peace and left activists in Israel who understand that that country cannot live on a war footing for the rest of time. These are the people the Democrats should talk to, but they don't. They listen to AIPAC, which is closer to Likud than anything else.
Why not? Well, the Democratic party is run by a wing of the U.S. ruling class - the 'clean' wing. Entertainment companies, internet companies, high tech companies, sections of the finance industry, food conglomerates, etc. The Republicans are based on the oil, coal, car and steel industries.
So the Democratic money comes from the this sector of the ruling class (Ms. Clinton on the cover of Fortune anyone?). The rest of you or us then act as the voting cattle, but not really demanding anything for that vote. Because of this tension between the voters and the ruling circles, there is a 'progressive' more populist wing of the Democratic party that is in charge of nothing right now. The center and right controls the Party, and has for years. Still does. Kowtows to the Republicans, etc., the Likud in Israel, while counter-currents try to fight in some manner.
If the progressive wing of the Democratic Party said, we're starting a new populist party, what do you think would happen? First, the so-called 'leadership' would take notice. Second, every element in the country to the left of the Democrats - the Greens, the Labor Party, some Libertarians, the disillusioned, could move to that organization. So this is addressed to the Democratic party 'left'. Stay in bed with the people who are in bed with the Republicans, or do something new in American politics. Time for a real change, and an end to 'bitching.' History is running out of time to just meander around. An attack on Iran will put this country into a massive crisis, and the government will be in the weakest position it has been in, even since Vietnam. I for one want it removed, but hey, can't do it alone.
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Women Soldiers
[Read the article: The 9/11 backlash against women]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I think Traister misses the point when she sees elected or appointed female officials as some kind of feminist 'up.' I get the sense that few of them have much power, or only power conferred on them by the men. Rice is certainly an example of that, and even Pelosi is.
The best thing to come out of the Iraq war, if there is such a thing, is the arming and performance of the female soldiers in Iraq. They have put up with waves of male chauvinist harrassment and rape internally, with a miltary brass that doesn't really care.
But they are learning to be under fire, to handle weapons, to fly fighter planes, to do far more tasks than be nurses. They are closer to combat, or in combat, more than any generation of U.S. women. Like black soldiers in WWII or the Civil War, they will return, and they will not be 'helpless.' And this might lay the groundwork for combat women in the U.S., which the USSR, Israel and others had for years.
And when they are doing this, Iraqi women, under the yoke of fundamentalist Islam, see women who are not veiled or helpless, and are not taking care of children, and wonder...