The needy deserve assistance, not corporations
The United States has had a safety net for the underprivileged since Franklin Roosevelt. Many people believe the safety net is just an entitlement under the guise of socialism. If you take away the safety net, millions of people would go without health care or food and so begins the onslaught of overwhelmed emergency rooms and hospitals. We all pay for that down the line.
Many people are one health event away from bankruptcy, eviction or homelessness. Medicaid assists children, disabled, elderly in nursing homes, people with pre-existing conditions. ACA is used by small businesses, the self-employed and employees. If you feel that these are just being “given” to those who don’t deserve it, then please justify why corporations get billions in subsidies.
Elon Musk received $38 billion in subsidies for his companies. Agriculture, energy and transportation sectors all received billions in subsidies. School vouchers are a subsidy. If subsidies are needed for corporations to build a better future, then why is it any different to help working families who fall below an economic threshold to stay healthy, fed and educated, so they may continue working for a better future? Let’s stop cherry-picking who deserves or doesn’t deserve assistance.
Cynthia Skrocki Oviedo
Even Trump wants to end filibuster
The old adage that “Timing is everything” could not be more evident in Richard Porter’s RealClearPolitics column that appeared in Friday’s paper (“Democrats using shutdown to kill filibuster”). Porter’s premise, that the evil Democrats are using the government shutdown to advance their agenda to do away with the filibuster, just got fact-checked by none other than Donald Trump.
Porter makes several arguments about the Democrats, which seem more like projection than reality. He claims the Democrats are “simply refusing to participate in the normal legislative process,” and that they “have effectively gone on strike against democracy.” He went on to accuse them of gaslighting.
Mike Johnson sending the Republican members of the House home for more than 40 days seems more like a refusal to participate than anything the other side is doing. And can we really talk about which party is actively trying to strike a blow against democracy, with all the ways that Trump and his party are apparently trying to interfere with the midterm elections in 2026?
Oh, and back to the timing issue on all of this hair-on-fire gaslighting that Porter is attempting here, who just put out a statement attempting to end the filibuster? Donald Trump.
Jeffrey Martin Orlando
Is Affordable Care Act affordable?
I have two takeaways regarding the Affordable Care Act:
Anything is affordable when someone else is paying for it.
I believe Barack Obama lied to us.
Ron Blake DeLand
President should listen to reason
President Trump ran on wanting to do so much for the people, didn’t he? Well, I think he forgot about that promise. He has no intention of intervening to try and help end the government shutdown. It might help if he came and talked to both chambers of Congress and work out something to end the shutdown for the benefit of people he promised to help.
The president keeps saying we are the best economy and he’s done the most for the American people than any other president has in the past. Perhaps he needs to tune in to most of the broadcast news channels and listen to some of the things people are saying when interviewed about their need to get food, pay the rent and have lower insurance premiums.
Joy Peeler Mount Dora
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