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Open Forum: Let's return to manners and civility
The outburst by Rep. Joe Wilson during the president's address has gotten a lot of coverage. The"apology" issued by Mr. Wilson was grudging and fainthearted at best. It is indicative of the prevailing lack of civility which has become not only tolerated but encouraged by the talking heads in the political media on both sides of the fence.
Wilson's outburst, while not uncommon considering the climate of the town hall meetings covered over the last few weeks, was rude, ill-advised and a definite break with the decorum of Congress. If the rules of decorum are to mean anything, it should be the Republicans, not the Democrats who should insist on the apology from Rep. Wilson, not because they agree or disagree with his sentiments, but because the way he expressed them was unacceptable. They should lead the effort in showing that this should not and will not be tolerated in the houses of government if, in fact, they believe this to be true. Civilized people should be able to exchange opinions and ideas without resorting to shouting or name calling. The volume of an opinion does not determine it's validity.
The sooner we as a society get back to observing manners, the better things will run and the easier it will be to look someone with an opposing viewpoint in the eye without having the urge to blacken it.
Steven K. Anderson
Merrifield
Liberals and conservatives
The most difficult thing, indeed the nearly impossible thing, most people have to do in their entire life is to acknowledge and adopt new knowledge that absolutely refutes their pet ideas that they were taught were absolutely true. This has been the history of humankind.
Liberal, open-minded people who live comfortably with contradiction, ambiguity, inconsistency, and paradox find it relatively easy to accommodate new knowledge and change. Liberals revel in experimentation, exploration and innovation which they find exciting.
Conservatives are terrified of impending change suggested by experimentation, exploration and innovation. Conservatives regard contradiction, ambiguity, inconsistency and paradox as anathema.
Liberals thrive on thinking that is "outside the box." All conservative thought is prescribed and thus, "Inside the box."
Conservatives love the status quo, but liberals recognize the status quo as a cultural cancer that strangles cultural evolution. Conservatives kept us in caves, chipping stone tools, and trembling in fear for over 100,000 years.
The liberals finally succeeded in grabbing the Conservatives by the throat and dragged them kicking and screaming, no! no! no! into a more modern cultural milieu, or Zeitgeist.
Today the liberal/progressives call themselves Democrats, and the conservative/regressives call themselves Republicans.
Which of these do you want to run our government?
Rodney Sheffer
Deerwood
MCCL meeting is Sunday
Mother Teresa said, "The child is God's gift to the family. Each child is created in the special image and likeness of God for greater things; to love and to be loved.
Martin Luther King said, "Our lives begin and end the day we become silent about things that matter."
Edmund Burke said, "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing."
Minnesota Citizens Concerned for Life (www.mccl.org) has planned free meetings throughout the state to help everyone make a difference and save lives. Let's not be silent about things that matter. In Staples the meeting will be Sunday, Sept. 20, 7-9 p.m. at Sacred Heart Church on Fourth Street.
Lorrie Toedter
Staples
Government is the problem
In 1937, under FDR (Democrat), our government decided that the public needed help with their retirement so they enacted Social Security. A system where the employer would contribute to, and the employee would contribute a portion of said employee's wages to, a dedicated fund. Upon reaching 65 years of age the employee would receive a pension until death. This worked well until LBJ (Democrat) decided that he could spend our pension fund on his "Great Society" more wisely then we could on ourselves so he had the dedicated fund transferred to the general fund and replaced it with government IOUs. This started our solvent pension system on it's downward slide. In 1975 Ford (Republican) initiated cost of living to try to shore up our fast dwindling income and every year thereafter we received a small raise in our pension until Obama (Democrat) declared that even though it costs us more to live that does not constitute an increase in the cost of living so for the first time in history, no COLA adjustment for us. Even with our dwindling resources the bleeding heart hand holders now wants to buy votes with our tax dollars by including the illegal aliens in the pension plan that it took most of our citizens a life time of work to qualify for.
With this in mind how can you even consider letting Obama, Pelosi and crew close to our insurance plan? Government is not the answer it's the problem.
Clyde DeBolt
Backus
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