Making being poor illegal

I saw an article in The Gazette that has me deeply disturbed because I have seen it before only in a different place: “Downtown ban raises alarm.”

This same tactic to remove homeless from the city streets was used in Grand Junction, thus making the plight of the poor that much more harder then it already is.

Combine that with numerous articles just like it and you have a national move to make being poor illegal.

Eric Severance

Colorado Springs

Sold the country a bill of goods

Six years ago we voted for a president we knew nothing about. His words were pretty, but his deeds were not. In other words, he sold the country a bill of goods!

Since Day One this whole administration has lacked honesty and transparency. Obama’s former senior advisor David Axelrod suggested this administration has never had a scandal. Perhaps they are suffering from amnesia. Do they recallBenghazi, Fast and Furious, IRS and NSA? Let us not forget the ACA when the president said we can keep our doctors. The straw that really broke the camel’s back is when he traded an American deserter for five very dangerous thugs from Guantanamo.

No scandals indeed, not a smidgen. Obama’s policies are not good for this country, but given his narcissistic nature he has been blindsided.

Mr. Obama, it is you that needs to change, not this country. We are an exceptional country that needs a leader not a puppet with a pen and a phone! The question begs, why was this president awarded the Nobel Peace Prize?

Wake up Congress, this president has been given a pass for way too long!

Sara Miller

Woodland Park

What are they conserving?

Why are liberals today afraid to use the L word? According to Webster’s New World College Dictionary a liberal is someone who is “broadminded” and favors “democracy and personal freedom for the individual.” What’s wrong with that?

The work of liberals have given us, among other things, pure food and drugs, clean air and water, fair business competition, insured bank deposits and improved safety in the workplace, vehicles and on highways.

Conservatives, on the other hand, don’t believe in regulation that benefits society. I know this because that’s what they say. One wonders, doesn’t one, what they are conserving.

Am I a liberal? You bet I am, and proud of it.

David J. Baker

Colorado Springs

The definition of a state

The Affordable Care Act (ACA or “Obamacare”) directed each state to establish an health insurance exchange and made tax credits available through exchanges to subsidize the purchase of health insurance plans. The Supreme Court is now considering (in King v. Burwell) whether the law includes exchanges established by the federal government in addition to the individual states (Colorado, etc.).

The ACA says an insurance exchange “shall be a governmental agency or nonprofit entity that is established by a State.” Further along in the law, the ACA itself defines “State” in a section set aside for definitions. Title I, Section 1304 (related definitions) says, “the term ‘State’ means each of the 50 States and the District of Columbia.” That clearly doesn’t include the federal government. There are numerous additional clues in the law’s wording to reveal that the federal government is separate from a state, but the ACA’s own definition should be sufficient to settle the matter.

I expect the Supreme Court will rule in favor of the ACA but if it does so, it will be because of ideological politics and not because of clear and carefully written law. If the words in a law don’t explain what a law intended, then who can ever know what the law requires or how to comply? Why do we employ lawyers as politicians, with their own staffs full of lawyers, if they can’t write laws that mean just what the words say?

H. Wayne Hall

Colorado Springs

Reliance on Social Security a problem

The other day I read a letter to the editor in The Gazette saying how we should all try harder to save for retirement so as not to be reliant on Social Security, when the time comes. I don’t think the author really understands the scope of the problem. For many it is impossible.

When established by Congress in 1935, the Social Security (SS) program was never meant to be one’s only source of retirement income but a supplement to one’s own retirement income as a means to maintain a more decent standard of living. People in general at the time were experiencing widespread suffering brought about by the Great Depression and as a result retirement incomes, if available at all, were extremely low. Prior to SS, most elderly retirees routinely faced the prospect of poverty living. In addition, the program was also meant, as today, to provide benefits for aid for dependent mothers and children, the blind and the physically handicapped. The program is financed by a contribution tax on both the worker and the employer and it functions basically like an insurance annuity – a trust fund managed by the government. Even though the government distributes the funds it is not a government-financed program but one financed by employers and their employees.

Today, as then, saving for retirement is still a serious problem for a major part of our population and we are still facing an even bigger retirement crisis in this country and in the future as our population has grown. For people on the upper end of the income scale saving for retirement is not considered a problem but for people on the lower end of the income scale it is a major one. Other things beside wages that affect saving for retirement are extended unemployment problems, catastrophic health problems, student loan problems and lack of employer retirement programs, to name a few. Workers are having to rely more and more on 401(k) accounts for their retirement as companies drop their own company sponsored pension plans. According to one study, the average retirement account for those 60 years old who do not have a 401(k) is about $141,000 – not enough to survive a 20-30 year life expectancy, with its associated health problems. As a result, for many people entering retirement today and in the future, SS is still going to be their only source of income and that is poverty living and a burden on our society.

Because of our shrinking working population, the trust fund is currently expected to be completely exhausted by about 2037. However, couple of studies and surveys have indicated that an increase in the SS tax by a quarter of a percent and the removal of the income cap for paying into the program could eliminate the problem possibly forever. This idea has been heavily supported by surveys of the general public, but Congress isn’t listening at the moment. We need to get them our attention.

David Harmer

Colorado Springs