Public Forum

Nation must fix the leak

This country’s government seems to keep putting the debt on those high-interest credit cards from other countries that will take a lifetime to pay off. We spend billions of tax dollars to protect other countries and not our borders? We have a leak in our border not even Joe the plumber can fix!

We need to stand in solidarity by telling our government to clean up the mess. It has to start with all parts of government working together.

When a policeman pulls over someone from another country who has never been licensed to drive, that’s a red flag that person has leaked into this country. I like that word better than sneaked! Those people will not be fined, but held with no bond. They are fingerprinted, given a speedy trial and handed over to the federal government. Since they love this country so much, they are given the option to go fight for it in Iraq and learn English, serving four years overseas. If they choose not to do that? Our government hires an airline pays $89 for each of the leakers to be flown back home.

The leakers that have used the government’s tax dollars to eat, provide housing, educate their children or for their children to be born here in America? Then any property, house, business, car, etc. that they own is now property of the U.S. government and will be auctioned off to pay back the tax dollars given. The false or stolen Social Security numbers being used have to be taken out of the system to try to fix the one the leakers have broken. If it can be fixed.

If they can’t fight for this country and choose to go back home and do not want to take their children who were born here in America? The children will simply be put into the foster care program like any unwanted child born here in America. Together as a team, we can fix the leak and clean up the mess. It has to start with our city’s government to be the one to start by holding every leaker it catches. We need to protect this country’s borders, stop the leakers from leaking in and taking advantage of our hard-earned tax dollars.

Let’s clean up America, save billions of tax dollars to help pay off those credit cards!

Lyel Hayden

Logansport



Government shares blame

It was with considerable interest that I read Mr. Hawes’ commentary about the auto industry (Pharos-Tribune, Nov. 23).

Although I worked for Chrysler rather than GM, I saw some of the very same kind of people there that he saw at GM. Fortunately, they were a minority. However, not all of the drunks, deadbeats and boneheads were on the union side of the fence. Management had its share of them, too.

There is one thing that I would like to bring into focus though that he failed to mention. Not all of the Big 3’s problems are of their own making. Our own government is partly to blame, too. Here is just one of the things I saw during my 37 years with Chrysler.

Back in the early ’80s, Lee Iacoca finally got things turned around for Chrysler. They started making money again. He brought to market a Jeep with the steering wheel on the right side as one of his ideas.

The post office loved them.

Lee said since they drive on the left side of the road in Japan, we’re going to compete directly with them and sent 40 of them to Japan. They immediately put a $10,000 “safety inspection fee” on each and every one of them. Needless to say, Lee didn’t sell many Jeeps to the Japanese.

But can you imagine what kind of stink the Japanese would raise if we were to put a $10,000 “safety inspection fee” on every vehicle they sent over here?

All of this happened during the Reagan administration. Ten days after Reagan left office and George Bush Sr. took over, Reagan flew to Japan and got $2 million for a 20-minute speech. Was that part of the deal? We’ll never know.

The past couple of weeks, we’ve heard Congress grill the CEOs of the Big 3 accusing them of poor management over pay, lack of planning, wasting money, just to name a few. Talk about the skillet calling the kettle black.

Come to think about it, I guess there’s no shortage of drunks, deadbeats and boneheads in Washington either.

William M. Gallaher

Logansport



Thanks for random act of kindness

A recent trip to the grocery revealed that there are still kind people in this crazy world. I am writing in hopes to reach a particular young woman who helped me immensely. I decided to go to the grand opening of a grocery store here in Logansport.

When I arrived, I had forgotten that this particular store requires 25 cents to use a grocery cart. I had no cash on me, which meant no cart. No big deal. I found an empty box and started to put my selected items inside.

By the time I got to the back of the store, I had filled my box with a few items — nothing too heavy. A young woman joked with me about the box and wondered why I didn’t get a cart. I told her the story of my forgetfulness and that in actuality, I really probably shouldn’t be carrying a box of grocery items anyway since I was almost four months pregnant. But I assured her that I was not getting much more. She then looked at me and told me to put the box down and watch her belongings.

I said, “Sure, no problem.” The next thing I knew, she had come back with a cart for me and picked up my box and set it inside. I was overwhelmed that a stranger cared enough to do that. She didn’t say much else except that she had had a miscarriage from carrying her own groceries for four blocks and she didn’t want that to happen again to anyone. I thanked her many times, and walked away with a regret that I had not been there for her when she was walking those four blocks.

I just want to say to anyone who reads this that there are such things as acts of random kindness. If not before, I am certainly a believer now. I plan on passing along the kindness I was shown. Thank you, young lady.

Shadi M. Lilly

Logansport

Text Only