Oct. 30

Put nation ahead of personal considerations

Before I retired, the union I belonged to always recommended which candidates we should support to make our union stronger. In the past few weeks, many of our unions have come out to support candidates for the upcoming election. Many have based their support on what the candidates say they will do for unions. Not considering what they will do for our country, home or life to be stronger.

Remember the story of man that had a deformed hand, and ask the Lord to change his hands to be the same? The change may not be the way that you envisioned when you asked for it. Vote for what is best for your country, family, and faith, you will get a better result. God bless America.

Ray H. Bidwell, Albany

If Obama wins, we’ll really need Smith

I support Gordon Smith for the U.S. Senate, because I expect Barack Obama will win the presidency, and moderate Republicans like Mr. Smith will play a key role providing the reality checks necessary to make an Obama presidency successful.

Let me explain:

Both houses of Congress will be very solidly Democratic. Past history shows that the president’s party (whichever party it is) provides little opposition or critical analysis to the president, and the more radical members of the opposition simply get ignored.

As a result, it is up to the moderate members of the opposition party to provide the constructive criticism necessary to make the president’s programs acceptable to the majority of Americans. The president’s effectiveness depends on this.

There are only a small group of people in the Senate who can fill this role. Gordon Smith is one of these people. He should be re-elected for the good of the country.

David Mandel, Corvallis

G-T endorsement of Obama was unconvincing

The Gazette-Times’ predictable endorsement of Barack Obama was as vacuous as the rhetoric that proceeds from Mr. Obama’s own mouth. Apparently the editors knocked back a few shots of Obama Kool-Aid before issuing this pap. Consider two of their points:

They note Obama is “a little thin on experience” but then rationalize their support, saying that the long campaign has helped him grow. By this logic, the late 1960s comedian Pat Paulsen would have made a great president! On election day, Mr. Obama still will have no executive experience, no military experience and no business experience, unlike Sen. McCain and Gov. Palin.

With only 143 legislative days in the Senate, Obama began his bid for the White House. This is exactly why Joe Biden guaranteed that within six months a President Obama would be tested by a major international crisis — because he has no experience!

The G-T asserted “Obama is better equipped to handle … world economic challenges.” Really? Mr. Obama’s economic plans center on massive tax increases and wealth redistribution, and he threatens to renegotiate NAFTA. As the U.S. economy teeters on recession, Mr. Obama consciously intends to make the same mistake that Herbert Hoover made in ignorance: at the beginning of a recession, Hoover increased taxes and started a trade policy of protectionism — and the Great Depression followed. It’s no coincidence that the stock market is tanking as Mr. Obama’s polls rise.

No amount of rationalization can disguise the fact that Barack Obama is not ready to be president.

John D. Jones, Philomath

Obama lawn signs have attracted theft

Two Obama lawn signs have been stolen from our families’ property off of Highway 99W and Lewisburg Road within the past two weeks. One lasted a little over a day; the other less than a night.

Apparently, whoever chose to abort our freedom of speech doesn’t have much to do with their time. I would suggest those involved might look into doing something useful in our community, such as volunteering at a food bank, a school or senior center (especially since the Bush administration has left so many in dire straits).

I have one question for the offender(s): What is it about democracy that so disturbs you?

Change is coming, and maybe we can all live a more civil society.

Angie Davenport, Corvallis

Respect everyone’s campaign signs

I’m a supporter of Obama/Biden, but I have seen in a few places around town where a McCain/Palin sign has been crossed out with a silver X and this bothers me. Come on now, act like adults. Doing something like this really doesn’t make anyone look that great, now does it? Vote for who you choose and let folks put up whatever sign they want for the candidate of their choice.

Kim Berry, Corvallis

Are McCain and Obama the best U.S. offers?

In every presidential election, the candidates tell us what they are going to do, and voters pick one of them assuming that if that person gets elected, they will follow through on their promises. But it’s Congress, not the president, that passes laws.

So there is no assurance that anything either candidate promises will become law.

We all hear that most Americans are fed up with Congress and its inability to get the nation’s business accomplished without all the political fighting and pork. The $700 BILLION to stabilize the economy had huge amounts of pork added to it to get it passed. Yet no one will vote out their own congressional senators and representatives because they want the pork, too. How many public buildings and programs did Oregon get when Sen. Mark Hatfield was chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee? Many. Politicians and lobbyists know this.

I think the most sobering observation of the American political system is that in a nation of over 300 million, the best we can do is have the two current people as the major party candidates for president.

Sen. Obama, an honorable man, is a first-term senator with little political experience. Sen. McCain, also an honorable man, who paid a high price in service to his country, seems past his prime.

Where are all the great Leaders in the country who would make great presidents? That’s an easy one to answer. We don’t elect Leaders to be our president; we elect politicians.

Terry Brown, Corvallis

Somebody needs an anger management class

I put up a McCain-Palin four-foot sign on the end of Highland at Lewisburg Road. Within 48 hours, it was smashed and scattered. There was still a big enough piece to tell what it was, so I left it for a few days to illustrate the character of the opposition.

I put up a new 4-foot sign. This one was smashed, ripped, torn, and shredded and scattered. Some shreds are still hanging on the post.

I put up another one further up the hill among the poison oak and blackberry bushes. I am waiting.

The large McCain-Palin sign on Highway 20 and Granger was also smashed.

The large signs between Third and Fourth Streets north of Buchanan were spray painted.

McCain-Palin signs were stolen from in front of the Republican headquarters.

Property owners who display political signs are exercising their constitutional right to express their political opinion.

Perpetrators entered private property for the purpose of destroying the owners’ property. They were trespassing. They were also depriving the owners of their civil rights.

In passing, and maybe not germane, there are many Obama signs that have been up since before the primary election, but I have yet to see one that has been bothered, and I drive a lot of the county.

Charles R. Nelson, Corvallis

Who decides who’s living in ‘real’ America?

My father was a proud man. Perhaps the greatest insult of his life was that his name was not on President Nixon’s “enemies list.” As an active New York City liberal who had publically opposed Nixon’s narrow-minded view of America, he thought he deserved to be recognized.

We who live in Corvallis must contemplate a similar loss of face. If we are brutally honest with ourselves, we may find that we live in Sarah Palin’s “real” America, not its fake alternative.

First of all, Corvallis is a small town. Subtract the transient student population, and we only have 35,000 or so permanent residents.

Small towns are big in “real” America. Our next problem is that we are hard-working and patriotic. Uh-oh; what’s next? “Real” Americans are people with “goodness” and “courage.” People who “teach our kids” and “grow our food” and “fight our wars.” Hmmm. It would appear that we are doomed to be “real” Americans. But wait! We love our lattes.

Corvallis citizens of various religions and no religion get along with their Muslim neighbors. People with different sexual orientations, different ethnic backgrounds, and a wide range of points of view manage to coexist and to actually engage one another in meaningful dialogue and actual friendship. Whew! I think we can safely say that we do not live in the “real,” small-minded America of today’s Republican Party. We live in a place that could be anywhere in the 50 states; the America that Abraham Lincoln and Ronald Reagan believed in; the America where our leaders appealed to the “better angels of our nature.”

Seth Bernstein, Corvallis

Don’t trust Obama to cut taxes for middle class

Obama has promised to “cut taxes for 95 percent of Americans.” There are problems here besides the fact that Obama has only ever increased taxes.

First of all, not all 95 percent of these households pay taxes. This plan is merely welfare without work. Why does he return to this failed socialist ideology?

Ironically, Obama admitted the successes of the 1996 welfare reform act at Saddleback. But it is the involuntary and anonymous nature of this approach that is detrimental to our culture. It is when people reach out on a personal basis to others is where a real and lasting difference is made.

Of course, taxes would go up for the other 5 percent of households and for businesses. What has Washington done to earn America’s trust that citizens would issue them more money?

There are hidden costs associated with all these tax increases. The culture of greed, corruption and incompetence of Washington literally turns dollars into pennies. Wouldn’t it be better for these dollars to be circulating in the marketplace, paying employees, funding charities and starting businesses? Obama’s assumption must be that businesses are going to absorb these increases in cost. No! Everyone will pay for these tax increases through fewer jobs and higher prices. That handout just evaporated.

Governments by nature are prone to tyranny and must be constrained. The more authority, wealth and power given to Washington, the worse it gets. John McCain is the only candidate who has led to restrain government.

Alan Hansen, Corvallis