Letters to the Editor: Aug. 2, 2024

Positive and constructive

For decades, Starla Pointer has been writing features for the News-Register.

Almost every issue of the paper carries at least one feature written by her. And all of them introduce readers to local people who have special abilities and who do interesting and constructive things helping to make this place better.

She must ask the people she interviews very good questions in order to write such thorough essays painting word pictures of such personal interests and good works.

Everything she writes is positive. There is no meanness or negative charge to be found.

Her articles show off inventiveness and kindness. Article by article, her writing displays examples of human good here in Mac.

Thank you, Starla.

I hope you and the News-Register keep the writing going strong. It’s a community plus.

Charlie Walker

McMinnville

Economic threat

What most folks call “inflation” is not actually an incidental result of the free market at work. It is the intentional result of what our billionaires refer to as “brilliant pricing strategy.”

With the stock market, CEO pay and corporate profit all at record levels, more wealth and power are in fewer hands than ever before. As a result, competition is getting hard to find.

Corporations capitalized on the pandemic price shocks by keeping their prices high even as their costs dropped.

This monopolistic behavior is inevitable when capitalism is unregulated, and since the Reagan administration, the FTC and the Justice Department have put anti-trust efforts on the back burner. So it’s no surprise the billionaire class is taking advantage.

Inflation is the price we pay for that concentration of economic power.

Our would-be dictator wants to up the ante and replace what’s left of our progressive income tax system with tariffs on foreign goods. Despite his denials, that amounts to a sales tax to be paid directly by the buyers of those goods, with the heaviest burden falling on lower and middle class consumers.

Forbes estimates that replacing all income tax revenue would require tariffs of approximately 85%. Every imported item would thus have to recover that much to break even.

Inflation peaked around 8% in 2022, and we are still feeling the shock waves. Imagine the impact if our dictator ran it up to 10% with a starter-package of tariffs on Chinese manufactured goods.

The last time we tried something like that was 1930. I encourage readers to research the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act, one of the principal drivers of the Great Depression.

The billionaire class is looking forward to a depression. For them, it would be an opportunity to buy up the rest of the country for pennies.

Don’t let that happen. Vote for democracy.

Bill Johnson

McMinnville

Are you listening?

If he wins, Donald Trump, candidate for president on the GOP ticket, has dropped any pretense of conducting a normal presidency. Why aren’t Christian MAGA Republicans hearing him?

He has been saying it loud and clear:

“Christians, get out and vote. Just this time. You won’t have to do it anymore. Four more years. You know what? It’ll be fixed. It’ll be fine. You won’t have to vote anymore, my beautiful Christians.”

To me the message is clear:

“Once I am in office, the American experiment in democracy is over. I will be your leader for life.”

What about this don’t Christians get?

One of the great achievements of our forefathers was to establish a country with freedom of religion as a major founding principle.

Anyone thinking a President Trump would do anything special for Christians is deluded. He is using you to obtain the power he has sought from the time he came down that escalator at Trump Tower in 2015.

Our only hope of maintaining a democracy beyond January 20, 2025, is to defeat Trump in November. Christians, please wake up and smell the coffee.

Les Howsden

Amity