“manufactured anger”

Dear Editor,
A writer last week spoke of “manufactured anger”. He went on to try to manufacture some of his own through the usual means, half truths and untruths. Washington/Congress is abysmal these days, true enough. But it is a reflection of the electorate, us. People like this writer see no middle ground, and there are many like him on both the “left” and “right” and that’s just what Congress reflects; extremism in deference to each member’s constituency, fueled by extremists distorting the truth.

Congress and state legislatures occasionally do things which turn out to be unconstitutional; but until the Supreme Court says so, they aren’t; statements that they are serve only inflammatory purposes and show lack of rational arguments.

Why isn’t the writer truthful about what Obama really says? It is more inflammatory to write that our constitution is “nothing but a charter of negative liberties.” The truth is that in speaking of Supreme Court rulings regarding civil rights he said “that generally the Constitution is a charter of negative liberties. Says what the states can’t do to you. Says what the federal government can’t do to you, but doesn’t say what the federal government or state government must do on your behalf.” Simple. True. What’s wrong with that? Not quite so inflammatory, though, is it?

Common sense told the Hoover Administration that fighting a deficit and balancing the budget was best and put us in the worst depression; the deficit spending of the Roosevelt administration worked toward getting us out of it and in the wake of that deficit spending left us a treasure trove of national infrastructure that we still enjoy 70 years later as beneficiaries. From improved national parks, to electricity for rural Americans to a number of projects that still serve us in our own immediate area. Of course, those were Real Democrats who spent the money to buy infrastructure to build the future rather than just cutting taxes for the rich so maybe the rest of us would get some of the excess drops trickling down. Today’s Democrats are, largely, where the Republicans used to be 50 years ago.

One might also remember we had a budget surplus and were in sight of paying off the national debt when George Bush took office and, with a Republican Congress, promptly BORROWED MONEY to finance TAX CUTS for the wealthiest Americans and paid for a war of choice with debt while still borrowing to cut taxes even further for the wealthy; a BIG beginning to our deficit.
Frank Dutton
Many, LA