Leaders we ‘hire’ often let us down

First, a little bit about me. I am an 84-year-old veteran of the Korean War. I am an unaffiliated, independent voter. I have voted Republican, Democrat and independent. I was born during the great depression,

Out of curiosity, I looked up depressions and presidents in the encyclopedia It listed the 13 worst recessions/depressions in U.S. history. Below is listed those that occurred after the Civil War ended.

• 1873: Ulysses S Grant,   Republican

• 1893: Benjamin Harrison, Republican; Grover Cleveland, Democrat

• 1907: Theodore Roosevelt, Republican

• 1920-1921: Warren Harding, Republican

• 1929: Herbert Hover, Republican

• 1973-1975: Richard Nixon Gerald Ford, Republican

• 1980: Ronald Reagan, Republican

• 2008: George W. Bush,  Republican

It is history. Don’t take my word for it. Look it up.

It can be argued about when it started and what caused them. But one thing is a fact: We the people (taxpayers) hired these people (elected) to do a job and paid them very well to do it. One of their responsibilities was not to let these things happen (depressions).

They failed and failed miserably. One of the stated causes was deregulation, and that monster greed took over. And it always does.

The trickle-down economy does not work and never will. Big business is greedy and the only thing that matters is the bottom line. They don’t care about you, me or the nation. And they never have enough. They always want more and will do anything to get it.

— James P Williams

Salisbury

Politics & tragedy

In Saturday’s Post, I noticed a headline that raised some questions for me, and it read, “Tillis notes support for increased federal penalties following Dallas shootings.”

My first thought was maybe he was responding to the tragedies by introducing a new bill to make punishment for these crimes more severe, but as I read the article, I was shocked by the fact that what he wanted was for everyone to know his name was on this bill that was introduced in 2015. Talk about politicizing a tragedy.

He praised law enforcement officers in the prepared statement, but never mentioned or offered prayers or support for their family members or the families in Louisiana and Minnesota who are also grieving.

It seems that many think that after similar tragedies, comments about the prevalence of guns, which sometimes are used to kill innocent people, are politicizing the incident. I hope those people are as outraged by Tillis’ obvious need for attention and political points as well.

— Susan Wright Beard

Salisbury

Hillary’s good week

This past Tuesday, the director of the FBI, James Comey, recommended that no charges be brought against Hillary Clinton regarding her email scandal. Despite providing a litany of questionable practices, including extreme carelessness, because there was no actual criminal intent, criminal charges were not warranted.

This decision comes on the heels of last week’s Benghazi report, which raised new, disturbing questions, albeit with no answers forthcoming.

In addition to all this, there is the ongoing Clinton Foundation investigation, where it’s claimed that while Hillary was secretary of state, the foundation received money from foreign countries in the hopes of currying favor down the road. This is, of course, totally illegal. But judging by how the law has been re-defined lately, I doubt the Clintons will be losing much sleep.

Hillary seems to have dodged another bullet. In fact, she and her husband have dodged more bullets than Teddy Roosevelt when charging up San Juan Hill. However, when trying to reach a decision about something or someone, the question of it being legal or illegal shouldn’t be the only basis for that decision. One can be incompetent, exercise poor judgment, engage in careless behavior or just be flat-out negligent and still not break the law.

The question is, do we really want someone with the proclivity to do such things as the leader of the free world? And we haven’t even begun to touch the trustworthiness issue of Hillary, who herself admits is real.

You can be forgiven for being a dope or an idiot. But when your honesty and integrity begin o be questioned, that’s a whole different story. At least it should be.

Hillary had a good week. That doesn’t mean we should have four bad years

Allan Gilmour

Salisbury