Unfettered Letters

Government out of control

American International Group bonuses and millions of taxpayer dollars sent to European banks continues to distract us, and the mainstream media keeps it in the forefront while a discreet outrage is going on. The Treasury has the printing presses on overload, printing money and devaluing the dollar. Runaway inflation is next — right before House Speaker Nancy Pelosi bankrupts the U.S.

We, the people, are in charge, and the executive office and Congress serve at our discretion. We need to exercise our constitutional rights and hold them responsible and accountable. Aren’t you sick of the lies?

Do we allow the Congress and executive office to treat us like we are too stupid to recognize that the Constitution is being ripped apart and that the American way of life is being destroyed? Do we allow the mainstream media to continue to occupy us with things that are surely important and maybe even newsworthy while the “behind-the-scenes” strategies continue to erode our economy, our livelihood and the future of our children and grandchildren?

I don’t believe that this out-of-control government has delivered the “change” the country needs. Do you?

J.G. Loman
Kansas City

America less safe?

Former Vice President Dick Cheney’s assertion that America is less safe under President Obama (3/16, A-3) is ironic. On whose watch did 9/11 occur? Did the “shock and awe” hunt for fictional weapons of mass destruction keep us safe or rather kill thousands of our young soldiers, create a terrorist beehive in Iraq and sap more than a trillion dollars from our Treasury?

Has warrantless surveillance of our citizens and other disregard of our constitutional rights made us safer or did it encroach upon our liberties? Did failure to recognize and regulate big corporations’ abuses help save us from bank failures, foreclosures, unemployment and a huge loss of savings?

Did the contemptuous alienation of foreign friends make us safer? Did dismissal of environmental problems make us safer?

The truth is that Cheney helped destroy our safety and Obama is doing his best to restore it.

Byron A. Stewart Jr.
Independence

Fox guarding the henhouse?

Regarding the article “Stopping another AIG; Greater governmental authority requested over the troubled nonbank financial companies” (3/25, Business): How can the government, which is a bunch of crooks and thieves, stop the greedy and inept activities of a global financial company, which is a bunch of crooks and thieves?

Bruce Erickson
Lee’s Summit

Merit pay for teachers

The Obama administration is considering merit pay for teachers as part of plan to revamp education (3/11, A-1, “Top teachers should get better pay, Obama urges”).

Consider the teacher facing 25 students who struggle with poverty, living with single parents who hold minimum wage jobs. Consider the constant threat of unsafe neighborhoods. Remove the principal as support. Substitute a “book” in which to record disruptions. Observe emotionally scarred kids quarreling, vying for attention and lacking basic self-discipline. Observe the teachers, haggard from fatigue and frustration.

Over the past 20 years, teachers have been mandated more parental responsibilities. Before these changes, discipline problems were addressed at home. Today the teacher is expected to parent and can be criticized for a student’s lack of self-control.

Often the merit rests in showing up every day, in caring, in the effort to educate so the cycle is broken. The responsibility for molding self-discipline in a child rests with the parents.

Merit pay might work as an incentive, but the protocol has to include teachers who continue to care, especially in circumstances where test scores might not, or cannot, fully reflect the dedication of those educators.

Pat Antonopoulos
Parkville

AIG bonus debacle

Dear President Obama,

Do not underestimate the outrage toward American International Group and the overall negative effect this is having on the economy, the market and all of your efforts.

Do not tax the bonuses. Delete the amount that is not returned from the next installment. Verbally chastise those who do not return the bonuses and put this to rest.

Finally, there must be mandatory requirements each and every time that federal (or state for that matter) dollars are used to bail out, aka loan, any entity our tax dollars, and this must include no bonuses of any kind or raises for the duration of the loan period.

This is only common sense, and it baffles me that this was not a condition to begin with as I, and millions of others, have asked repeatedly for these types of guidelines.

If our leaders — elected or appointed — do not understand this, then God help us all.

Audrey Casassa
Mission

President Obama’s goal of having a more “transparent government” died a quick death. Washington Democrats have given so many conflicting statements lately that they’re either liars or idiots.

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and Senate banking committee chairman Christopher Dodd have known all along about the AIG bonuses to be paid with our tax dollars. Geithner lied to a Senate committee March 3 when first asked about this but has now admitted otherwise. In my book, that makes Geithner a liar and a cheat. (Remember his failure to pay income taxes?) For years Dodd has been on the very committee that was supposed to be providing oversight of our banking and financial institutions. This mess all came about under his watch.

Stop pointing fingers at the last administration, because it just doesn’t cut it anymore. Everyone in Washington owns blame, and we’re part of the problem. Quit your bellyaching, lying and whining and start earning your big bucks. Or are you representatives in Washington only there to enrich yourselves and feed your own egos?

Buy Geithner a bus ticket home, and kick Dodd off the banking committee now.

Joyce Howard
Lee’s Summit

AIG bonuses

So, the House decides to put a 90 percent tax on the bonuses of some American International Group employees, and the people rejoice (3/20, A-1). The Congress acts outraged, although many of them were aware of what was going on.

Before rejoicing, I think you should give some thought to what other group the government may decide to tax and what if you are in that group. It is disheartening that the government can decide to punish people by making new tax laws at the drop of a hat.

If you think the AIG employees didn’t do their job and don’t deserve a bonus, then we’ll have to tax Congress at 99 percent.

Loretta Childers
Olathe

Those of you complaining about how an American business spends its profits dug your own hole when you agreed to the initial bailout. You can’t mix socialism and free enterprise.

President Obama was wrong to sign the check over. He should have let AIG fail, and a better product from a smarter American would have taken its place. That’s how free enterprise is supposed to work.

Russ Bliss
Gladstone

I want AIG to immediately publish all the candidate names and amounts to whom they have given campaign contributions since 2000. I want those contributions back or a 110 percent retroactive tax on them.

Jim Sissel
Raytown

Put conditions on bailed-out banks

The Star's editorial "Just 'close them down' is dangerous advice" (3/11, Opinion) gives an excellent explanation of why letting major banks fail is dangerous. It also promulgates the false choice between bailing out and not bailing out major banks.

A better choice is either to bail out banks conditionally or unconditionally. One condition should be that these banks terminate the CEOs who mismanaged them into bankruptcy and perhaps pave the way for civil and criminal prosecution of them. New CEOs could not be recycled from other bailed-out companies. Before hiring any new CEOs, bailed-out banks must have them vetted before Congress.

Congressional vetting is not the nationalizing of banks. It is congressional oversight, a duty Congress failed to do when it did not enforce existing bank regulations years earlier.

Holly Slegman
Leawood

Cut out the pork

Halt Congressional add-ons — pork-barrel spending — to federal funding bills immediately. Both parties are mindlessly spending money we no longer have. Congressional add-ons are unregulated and being used to subvert the federal budgeting process. This is practiced deception and corrupts the opportunity to reduce deficits.

Congress should be looking to prepare and pass appropriations legislation by Oct. 1, the start of the annual federal fiscal year. Holding federal agencies hostage to force special projects is tantamount to sedition. Omnibus appropriations are disruptive and expensive to all taxpayers.

If the elected officials are not competent enough to perform the most important budget functions necessary for the continuous operation of government, then they must be replaced. This isn’t a request. It’s a demand for the end of corruption by angry taxpayers. Now.

Carol A. Clopton
Kansas City

Bailing out the banks

The banking industry argues they had to give $18 billion in bonuses to retain top talent. They also bemoan the fact that the industry lost 260,000 jobs in 2008. Exactly which failed bank do they expect their failed “top talent” to defect to?

The rush to infuse banks with taxpayer money has ensured that bankers are allowed to continue making the same disastrous mistakes that got us into this mess in the first place.

Instead of complaining about Wall Street executives using taxpayer money to buy corporate jets, redecorate their offices and pad their pockets with bonuses, Congress should protect taxpayers who are losing their jobs and homes by writing strict laws that prohibit such irresponsible behavior.

Money given to me by the bank always comes with strings attached, and the opposite should be just as true. The time has come for Congress to create some fine print in the terms of use for any bank that took, or intends to take, taxpayer money.

David A. Young
Kansas City

As a one- time community banker and CEO, I give kudos to Kansas City Federal Reserve Bank President Tom Hoenig for his comments concerning a number of major banks in today’s fiscal crisis. He is right on target as to let the banks stand or fall rather than be infused with taxpayer dollars (3/7, Dollars & Sense, “Tougher stance urged”).

This would be tough on investors, but investing always has an element of risk. As for depositors, that is what the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. is all about.

Mr. Hoenig should be our secretary of Treasury.

Phillip J. Zeller, Jr.
Junction City, Kan.

If anyone can get our president’s ear, let him know this. Some weeks ago there was an answer in the New York Times puzzle: “Capitalism without failure is like religion without sin.” The quote was from a noted economist named Allan Meltzer.

Myron McNown
Fairway

We eventually must pay

Apparently President Obama thinks he has an open pipeline to the federal treasury. When is he going to discover that the “treasury” is empty? Really empty! Not to worry, fellow taxpayers — he has the ultimate solution to all the problems of this recession. It is simply this: Print more money.

Naturally it won’t be backed by anything and will represent one of the most brutal forms of taxation, but it may serve to ameliorate, at least temporarily, the misery of those who have lost their jobs and those who, almost daily, watch their retirement plans go down the drain.

Those who will pay for this are well known. That would include ourselves, our children, grandchildren and yes, all of those who have their hands outstretched for a piece of the government pie. Of course the latter group probably doesn’t even care.

Indeed something needs to be done — and soon. A good starting point would be to restore the words “accountability” and “oversight” to the federal lexicon.

Charles M. Henderson
Almena, Kan.