Hernando Today, Thursday, June 18, 2009

Don’t you just hate it when someone moves into your neighborhood and wants to change the face of it to suit themselves? I feel like this is what’s happening these days because of the socialists of this country.

If they like socialism that much, they should move to a country that has it.

The United States was not founded on that, and I am sick of people trying to change it. The likes of Brian P. Moore ought to sell their house, take their money and get out. There are so many countries to choose from.

Moore says that under capitalism, all decisions are made by the owners of the companies or a small group of investors or an elite board, and the workers have no say.

I submit that it is not capitalism’s fault it’s like that, it’s the Democrat and Republican politicians that he keeps voting into office.

On voting day it seems we go back and forth between the two-party system and always get more of the same. When will it end?

Neither party respects the Constitution, and this president, along with the last, has shown just how much they despise that document.

Jane Kukla was right when she said that we lose the war when we trash the Constitution. The terrorists love that. It is what they work for, don’t you know?

Buffy Dawson

Spring Hill, Florida 

Letter-to-Editor by Harry E. Chamberlain, in response to Brian Moore’s indictment of capitalism for world hunger

Spring Hill, Florida

Editor:

The connection between capitalism and world poverty and death can be explained in one simple reference: Jean Ziegler, the Geneva sociologist and former United Nations Rapporteur on the “Right to Food” wrote in his book “Empire of Shame” (Editions Fayard, 2005) that about 36 million people die every year from hunger and malnutrition.

Even without going into details about the effects of global corporate rule, capitalism is responsible for those deaths by the very fact it is a world economic system that embraces all countries worldwide. Ziegler accuses the global corporations of maintaining (Third-World) famine, of destroying nature and of subverting democracy, and that these capitalist corporations extend their influence over the world.

If Stathis wishes not to accept Ziegler’s figures or accusations, then why not consider Columbia University Professor of Economics Jeffrey D. Sachs, who also is a special adviser to the United Nations secretary-general and consultant to a number of foreign countries in matters of international economics. Sachs authored “The End of Poverty” in 2005 and stated a more conservative figure of “eight million people who die of poverty and malnutrition each year, because they are too poor to stay alive.” Sachs reported that World Bank economists Shaohua Chen and Martin Ravallion estimated that roughly “1.1 billion people were (also) living in extreme poverty in the year 2001.” The economists added another 1.6 billion people, who were living as “moderately poor.” Sachs does not blame capitalism, nor does heabsolve it either. If one acknowledges that world economics is based on capitalism, how can this system escape responsibility?

As for Stathis’ question of why Cubans are fleeing their country for the U.S, it is because we have imposed an economic embargo on Cuba for 50 years and on other countries that wish to do business with the Cubans. This has caused Cuba and its citizens to struggle in its economic survival and to live in great poverty. Cubans have admirably survived, despite the unconscionable embargo conditions America has imposed on Cuba’s women, children and senior citizens. It is the monied interests of the Cuban-Americans in Miami, mostly Republicans, who have caused the Republican Party (and the Democrats as well) to kowtow to the Cuban-Americans’ selfish political and economic interests, at the expense of Americans and our country’s own economic benefits.

Yes, there is more freedom under socialism, because the citizens and workers set policy, retain authority and ownership and make all decisions for the community and workplaces. Under capitalism, all decisions are made by the owners of the companies or a small group of investors or an elite board, and the workers have no say in the matter. How democratic is that?

Granted, there may be more political rights in the U.S., such as free speech and assembly, but once again, that is because of the imminent military threat of the U.S. and its constant efforts to undermine Cuba’s government. Can you blame the Cuban government’s effort to protect its survivability when it experienced the Bay of Pigs attack, ongoing Radio Free America interference programs to Cuba, harassing plane flights and our numerous CIA efforts to assassinate its former leader, Fidel Castro?

You are the one living in denial.

Brian P. Moore

Spring Hill, Florida

Sunday, May 10, 2009

http://www2.hernandotoday.com:80/content/2009/may/10/nanny-state-nonsense/news-opinion-editorial/

While Brian P. Moore touts the benefits of socialism in the May 7 edition of Hernando Today, I’d like to tell him why capitalism doesn’t work.
If our government would stop interfering with everything under the sun, capitalism would work out quite well. What they need to do is stop tweaking the economy or offering tax cuts to employers who regulate our lives on and off the job and quit coming up with ideas to further undermine the citizenry.
Our founding fathers would be appalled at all the things our government says and does today. They were for isolationism, which gives the individual the right to decide if they want to give to a cause or not. We could do quite well under that system, but politicians got greedy and knew that the nanny state would line their pockets with money out the ying-yang.
I’ll tell you what, if we go to a socialist state where America is robbed of its foundation, we will have lost the war on terrorism again, like we did in October 2001 when President George Bush came up with the Patriot Act that robbed citizens of every right known to man! I say this because that is why we were attacked on 9/11.
The terrorists wanted to scare Americans into wanting a police state. Don’t believe me? Go to www.youtube.com and type in New World Order.

Jane Kukla
Spring Hill