April 17 Letters to the Editor

Problem solved?

I see the county commissioners are still pretending not to have any answers for the current problems at hand. I was an employee of the county for almost 15 years and I can tell you that the solution is well known yet never discussed due to the union strangle hold on the government. Eliminate all nonessential personnel and contract out their jobs.

Most union employees make well above what the average employee for comparable work in the private sector is paid for the same work. When was the last time you heard of a landscaper being paid over $3,000 per month, plus the best benefit package you can imagine? A mechanic? A maintenance worker? You get the point. Most of these positions only make around $10 per hour in the private sector of employment.

Did I mention that the public employees and their families are totally covered at very little cost to the employee? How about your family? The truth is worse yet when you realize that a great deal of these employees are committing gross amounts of time theft at your expense. Thank the unions for protecting their jobs even when they deserve prosecution.

If you contract out these jobs the cost will be lower, and the private-sector employee will be much more concerned about losing his or her job, thereby resulting in more hours actually spent working and better quality work all around.

Matthew L. Price

Kalama

UNFPA money supports abortion

I have to disagree with the editorial which praised UNFPA. In a 2002 probe by the Bush administration, it was found that UNFPA was sending hundreds of thousands of dollars to the Chinese State Family Planning Commission, which enforces the coercive “one child policy.”

A leader in the UNFPA, Arie Hoekman, believes the breakdown of the traditional family is not a crisis, but a “triumph for human rights.” UNFPA has also helped administer forced sterilizations in South America. UNFPA focuses on poor countries to promote sterilizations. Doesn’t this smack of discrimination against the poor? It is not the fault of the poor people, but their country’s government policies which cause people to be poor. How does promoting genocide and sterilizations help people get out of poverty?

The real reason for the promotion of abortion (President Obama just doubled the money going to Planned Parenthood to $900 million, who just reported they are doing more abortions) is the radical environmental movement. They believe that to make the world better for the non-humans, the human population has to decrease. Obama is the most anti-life president in the history of this great nation. It is a shame upon America that our government policy would be to promote genocide around the world. God bless America.

Darlene Johnson

Kelso

Protect borders, ports

Why do all the pro-amnesty groups support killing “e-verify”? Why are two border guards given prison sentences of 11 and 12 years for shooting a Mexican drug runner while he gets amnesty? Why can’t we protect our own borders and ports?

Why are we giving bailouts to super-rich, corrupt insurance and banking groups? Wall Street white-collar thieves. Why do we have banks giving 3 percent interest to CDs and people trying to save and losing 5 percent to 7 percent on inflation? These same banks charging up to 30 percent on credit cards and home loans are up to 10 percent or more. We buy their toxic assets. Now, they can sell them to give taxpayers 50 percent of the profit on sales, but what profit? If they are toxic, no profit is possible.

We used to be the most powerful industrial nation in the world. Now we don’t even make our own toilet paper. Why? Try greed. Corporate America has taken over our government and sold out to cheap foreign labor. The illegal Mexicans have become the new corporate slaves. Why does not the IRS and Social Security Administration check the employers’ records to see if they are collecting or paying taxes on their wages? They should fine the employer if they are doing the fraud ticket.

Why is a rancher in Arizona sued because he arrested 75 illegals that were trespassing?

M.L. Colburn

Longview