Like I said just a moment ago, it's great to be on a winning team! In fact, with Obama and McCain leading their respective primaries, the country is the real "winning team".
As a fan of politics, schooled by Chris Matthews and the in's and out's of BSBI, I have not been very productive during this exciting primary season. I apologize profusely, especially to myself.
Not that you are short of interesting political coverage, but I should at least throw my hat in the ring!
Actually, Stewart and Colbert are still my favorite providers of incisive political updates. I read Time, and every now and then one of their articles gets me all shook up.
Take this one, from the "Curious Capitalist" on the question of presidents and the economy: Do presidents matter? (As improbable as it may seem, this is clearly not a question limited only to BSBI!)
To which I wrote the following letter . . .
. . . and got a complimentary reply.
Letter to Time: The Curious Reader
Do Presidents Matter? asked Justin Fox, the Curious Capitalist (Feb 28).
In Canada, unemployment is at record lows, exports are in demand, there is no hint of a subprime mortgage crisis nor any signs of recession. This in a country with higher taxes than the US and universal health care to boot. In UN quality-of- life surveys Canada beats the US by miles. Canada, it seems, has struck a balance: that is, government is responsible to collect taxes and to provide necessary services and distribute them fairly. In contrast, the US has Reaganite Republican dogma, corporate welfare, tax cuts for the wealthy, and the decimation of public services and infrastructure. Further, the Republicans left corporate America without the
necessary oversights, leading to job out-sourcing and financial collapses like Enron, MCI and now the mortgage crisis. Indeed, it matters what presidents do!
P Rosenthal Charleston SC
ps do you really pay for people to write such pap?
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and the reply?
Dear TIME Reader,
Thank you for writing. We welcome timely, insightful reactions to material we have published, and we can assure you that your observations found an attentive audience among the editors. Should your comments be selected for the column, you will be notified in advance of publication. Again, our thanks for letting us hear from you. We hope that you will write again should you discover something of particular interest in the news or in our reporting of it.
Best wishes,
TIME Letters
_____________________________________
PPS - The Forum Editor will keep you posted!
Update 2-24-08: Time published the letter with minor changes and, naturally, they left out the barbs. See the follow up piece to this, and follow all the links, back and forth.
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