Trump’s proposed budget makes economic inequality worse | Letters
We can see from President Donald Trump’s 2021 budget proposal to Congress that his priorities do not bode well for the middle class and the poor.
First, the proposal is based on a GDP growth of 3% — an overly optimistic forecast.
Secondly, the president’s budget priorities slash entitlements $2 trillion over 10 years.
Over this time period the budget would adversely affect the elderly by reducing Medicare spending by a total of $756 billion, a decrease of 7%. The budget cuts affect Medicaid, the Affordable Care Act premium tax credits, and basic food assistance for hard-pressed families.
It shrinks assistance for people with disabilities, eliminates many low-income housing programs and makes large cuts to the National Institute of Health, to mention a few.
For the wealthy, it would extend the 2017 tax cuts permanently for individuals, including those who confer large benefits on high-income taxpayers and heirs to multi-million-dollar estates.
Most of the individual income tax cuts are scheduled to expire at the end of 2025; extending them would cost $1.4 trillion through the end of the decade, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
One has to ask what the president’s budget priorities do to the vast economic inequality in this country. Answer: They make it worse.
Dolly Kefgen
Bluffton
Democrats and Trump Derangement Syndrome
A recent contributor, apparently overcome by Trump Derangement Syndrome, asserts that “Trumpism” has negatively changed the Republican Party while hope rests with Democrats.
Cited Trumpism shortcomings are someone else’s: “mistruths” (You can keep your insurance. Benghazi, not an Obama Libya policy failure), “conspiracy theories” (Russian collusion), and “corruption” (IRS misconduct, Comey/McCabe cabal’s shameful misleading of the FISA Court).
Facts trump labels, but apparently facts fail to penetrate derangement.
Yes, the GOP has changed and, in some ways, not for the better. But open your eyes. Where is the Democratic Party of JFK, Sens. Frank Church, Daniel Patrick Moynahan and Joe Lieberman, statesmen who would be appalled at resistance at all costs to a duly elected president and the self-immolation of a disgraceful impeachment charade?
Resistance is not a political philosophy but simply a strategy to regain power at the expense of democratic norms and without regard to the well-being of our nation.
Where has the Democratic Party gone when a leading candidate for its presidential nomination is not even a Democrat, but a proud socialist?
Yes, there has been change, but the worst has been among the Democrats. Ignoring democratic norms and unable to accept defeat at the polls, they conjure conspiracies, call names, refuse to cooperate, and dance to the tune of the pied piper, Bernie Sanders.
Francis Dunne Sr.
Hilton Head Island
Lindsey Graham bill would give unchecked access to all your messaging
U.S. Sen. Lindsay Graham has recently introduced a bill called “Eliminating Abusive and Rampant Neglect of Interactive Technologies (or EARN IT) Act.” It would amend Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act. The bill will ask lawmakers to give Attorney General William Barr and the Department of Justice unchecked access to all your messaging, file-sharing, and video-sharing tools.
A commission would be assembled that would develop recommended best practices for providers of interactive computer services regarding the prevention of online child exploitation conduct.
On the surface, this sounds good. However, the recommendations would go to the attorney general, who can approve or disapprove what are essentially new regulations. This means unelected officials would be granted vast power to regulate technology and invade our privacy.
Failure to comply to the “best practices” would result in companies being punished for child abuse and exploitation-related material posted by third parties.
The bill would effectively mean the end of end-to-end encryption, which protects users’ private conversations and data from outside sources on digital services.
This would mean access to anything you send or post on the internet without a need for any warrant. It would give the AG and the government unchecked power.
An end to encryption would immediately cause loss of protection from both foreign and domestic commercial cyberattacks that encryption currently provides.
If you value your privacy, contact Graham’s office to voice your opposition to this bill.
George Casey
Bluffton