Letters to the Editor for July 11, 2018

Democrats hypocritical on illegal immigration

Why all of a sudden are there thousands of people rallying for families from other countries crossing our borders illegally with their children, saying “We Care?” Where was all the “caring” during the previous administrations? So where was the paroxysm of rage then?

The more President Trump tries to make things better by (now) keeping families together, the more the left pushes back. Democrats and the supporters on the left are encouraging the families from other countries to flood our borders illegally, causing the problem of separated families and nothing else. Why not encourage families to enter the U.S. legally by going to the ports of entry where many are legally doing what’s right for their children?

Many of the children entering the U.S. illegally are unaccompanied by a parent. Isn’t it cruel and inhumane to send children unaccompanied across several drug-infested countries where human traffickers abuse and take advantage of these children? Where is the incensed outrage for those children against those parents? Democrats, think about where the axiom of your vehement protests really lie.

We all can agree on one thing: don’t separate the children. Democrats, stop the hypocrisy that you are not using the children as pawns for self-gain and help solve the problem of illegal immigration.

It’s our fault, not Trump’s

The American Spirit is infected by a malicious virus. Mass shootings at American schools? This is just another sad feature that the United States alone occupies in the world, along with the only industrial nation without universal, single-payer health care and free higher education.

The American Spirit did not catch this virus from a foreign power. We did it all ourselves, by the highest leaders of this country, by the government agencies designed to protect us, by fighting and perpetuating too many unjust wars. The signs of this illness is greed, materialism, narcissistic preoccupation to social media, and indifference to others.

Impeachment of Donald Trump will not cure the disease. He is just the most outrageous, most virulent expression of this virus. If he leaves, others will follow, just as others preceded before him. Exploding a few fireworks this July will not cure America’s disease. Proper treatment will begin when we pull our faces off the cell phones, stop reading our friend’s Facebook post, and start changing our way of thinking.

Nunes no ‘champion of medical access’

Yesterday’s mail was interesting. I received a mailer that stated that Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Tulare, was the recipient of the 2018 Champion of Medicare Access Award. I thought this was strange, didn’t he vote to repeal the Affordable Care Acat (Obamacare)? I looked further, it was Alliance for Patient Access that was awarding it. Who are they, I wondered, so I looked them up on the Internet. Wow, it seems they are financed by pharmaceutical companies who have campaigned for less oversight on opioids and banning medicare bargaining for drug discounts. Perhaps they should change their name to Alliance for Pharmaceutical Access.

Who does Nunes represent, pharmaceuticals or patients?

Treatment of immigrants doesn’t fit crime

In response to the letter from David Paul Davenport justifying our country’s treatment of asylum seekers as being in accordance with the rule of law, Mr. Davenport seems to believe that all laws are the same. In reality, some infractions are minor and are punished lightly, while others are serious and punished more severely.

Is seeking asylum illegal? Even if the answer is yes, the crime being committed is known as illegal entry and is a misdemeanor, subject to a fine of between $50 and $250. Surely a misdemeanor offense should not carry the punishment of indefinite incarceration or separation of parents from children.

Mr. Davenport compares this “crime” with larceny, manufacturing meth, and child abuse. That strikes me as intellectually dishonest.

This story was originally published July 16, 2018 at 4:04 PM with the headline "Letters to the Editor for July 11, 2018."