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> SOUTHERN INDIANA —
Tea Party member tells voters: ‘take back our country’
While we, Hoosiers, tightened our belts and spent less than we took in, federal domestic spending increased 16 percent in 2009 and is the largest since the Census began compiling data in 1983 — $3.2 trillion.
Overall, the largest chunk, 46 percent went to Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. Programs that are only going to grow. ObamaCare is going to cost the state of Indiana at least $3.16 billion over the next 10 years. We will have to restructure Hoosier Healthwise for children and pregnant women and the Healthy Indiana Plan for uninsured low-income adults we already have in place, thanks to the mandated ObamaCare. The Stimulus is a failure. Small business is dying. Entitlements are growing. Our freedom is being choked out. Stop the madness.
Vote in November to take back our country. To quote our Governor, “Vote for change that believes in you."
— Kelly Khuri, Clark County Tea Party Patriots, Jeffersonville
Reader says workers are fed up
The flight attendant who cussed out a rude passenger and abruptly left the plane raised the issue of whether or not passengers, and the public at large, are ruder than ever before. Is that the correct issue, though?
Maybe the issue should be working conditions. How many hours and how many breaks do attendants get? How many passengers are there per attendant? How many hours between layovers do flight attendants receive?
Since Ronald Reagan’s presidency and the stock market first hit 10,000 (whatever that means), global enterprises have used layoffs to boost their bottom line and raise the value of their stock. This trend of layoffs to raise profits has divided up the work of those who were laid off with those who remained. That’s correct, folks, people from IBM to pizza restaurants are now doing two peoples’ jobs for the same pay and expectations of quality. This has meant that customers from airlines to drug stores are seeing a drop in service because of understaffed enterprises, and thus, rude customers and disgruntled employees.
Not long ago, a fed-up employee was called, “going postal,” because of a number of incidents at post offices. Today, it’s not just post offices, but disgruntled employees can be found in any enterprise, because these companies are seeking excess profits and using layoffs to enhance the bottom line.
Until there is a balance found between enterprises, profit and laborers’ working conditions, there will be more incidents like the one above. Until there is some protection for laborers in the workplace, whether it is IBM or the floor of a factory, the song “take this job and shove it,” will still resonate with the majority of workers in America.
— Steven Fetter, Jeffersonville
