Questions for Trump
Is the firing of federal workers charged with protecting our nation’s nuclear weapons a smart move? Is shutting down efforts to fight pandemics just as a deadly Ebola outbreak is spreading in Africa good for us? What about the purge of talented generals, diplomats and spies at a time when rivals like China and Russia are trying to expand their global reach—a good move for our national security?
Does anyone really think deleting tributes to the Tuskegee Airmen by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth makes us more safe? Is the closing of embassies and consulates enabling China to open more new embassies and consulates around the world? China now has more than the United States. Compared with military action, isn’t diplomacy cost effective?
Should top administration officials share military plans on a commercial messaging app? Can we taxpayers afford to buy Greenland? Will American citizens support a hostile takeover of Greenland?
The administration has fired or defunded thousands of scientific researchers. Isn’t science a force for good? Hasn’t it contained disease? Won’t it help us in the competition with China? Doesn’t it attract the kind of immigrants the president says he wants?
How does revenge and retribution help the needs of ordinary folk? Is the administration focusing enough on lowering prices?
If any reader of this newspaper has answers to some or all of these questions, please respond.
Peggy Perkins
Winder
Collins Offers No Evidence
U.S. Rep. Mike Collins claimed during a kind of phoned-in town hall that federal employees are lazy and stupid (Apr. 5 Flagpole City Dope). I won’t tell you what the congressman reportedly said about bathroom breaks for federal employees; it’s too disgusting.
Here’s the thing: Extraordinary claims like that demand extraordinary evidence, but Collins offers none. It’s not my job to disprove the improbable, but let me try. I retired after 53 years working with EPA and armed forces personnel, nearly all skilled and dedicated. So I emailed Collins in early May asking for anything resembling evidence, but he hasn’t responded. His aide called me to say that the congressman is very busy, you see, so he may not get around to it. Perhaps Collins’ disparagement of federal civil servants should flow in the other direction.
Duke Geddis
Athens
Trump Should Play by the Rules
In childhood, we learn rules on what is permissible and what is not. We learn rules on handling sharp objects and crossing streets. We learn that games have rules, and that violating rules is not an acceptable way to win.
Eventually, we learn the Constitution provides the rules governing our country; that the president, members of Congress and judges take oaths to follow those rules, and that the president, specifically, “shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed.”
In his first 100 days in office, President Trump signed 145 executive orders directing officials in the executive branch to take or stop actions related to policy or management. Hundreds of lawsuits were filed challenging the legality of these executive orders. At least 185 courts issued rulings that temporarily paused these executive orders or, in many cases, found President Trump’s actions were unconstitutional or otherwise illegal. These rulings were rendered by judges appointed by seven different presidents, including President Trump. The legality of many of President Trump’s subsequent executive orders is also being challenged in the courts.
President Trump has reacted with vitriolic attacks on individual judges and denunciations of the Federalist Society and Leonard Leo for providing the candidates for the judiciary which he appointed who are now ruling against his executive orders. This rhetoric has given rise to an unprecedented number of credible threats to the safety of our judges, their families and staff.
Apparently, not everyone believes that rules were made to be followed.
Robert Covi
Bogart
Big Bill Isn’t So Beautiful
It sounds crazy, but imagine that a president and his party in Congress (call them “the Scammers”) support a massive transfer of federal funds from life-saving health care and food assistance to needy Americans, including children and the disabled, to the richest people in the country, plus a massive increase in the national debt.
Suppose the Scammers’ plan would increase the federal debt by $3.8 trillion dollars, and double interest costs between 2024–2034 to $1.8 trillion; reduce health care for the neediest Americans by $698 billion, with 8.6 million people losing health insurance (including 200,000 Georgians), 22,000 deaths and nearly 100 rural hospitals being closed; decrease the household resources of the bottom ten percent of Americans by 4% and increase household resources of the wealthiest ten percent by 2% by 2033; give the top 1% of earners a gain of $390,000 per year; with benefits cuts and tax cuts, cause those earning between $17,000– $51,000 to lose about $700 a year; and pay $1.1 trillion in tax cuts to people with income over $500,000, in part by cutting $268 billion from food assistance to needy Americans.
Then imagine that congressman Mike Collins enthusiastically supports this massive transfer of wealth from the poorest to the wealthiest Americans.
Actually, you don’t have to imagine it. This is the “big, beautiful bill” endorsed by President Trump and passed by the House Republicans with the full-throated support of “our” congressman Mike Collins.
So, who do you think congressman Mike Collins actually represents?
Bruce Menke
Athens
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