Forum Letter to the Editor
THE BUGLE JULY 12, 2012
Guest Columnist
Other avenues for When help hurts resident comments In the letter of June 28, 2012, Eric Poders castigates people who run after rumors. I believe he is referring to the introduction of a Tilted Kilt Sports Bar in Morton Grove. I do not consider this a rumor, as the Economic Director and President of Morton Grove both commented on this plan in a recent interview with the Chicago Tribune. Rumors themselves can serve a useful function to bring issues to the attention of the general public. Pursuing rumors is part of the democratic process and keeps our government on an ethical even keel. Mr. Poders wants every
resident in Morton Grove to conform to his modus operandi and spend half our lives attending all the meetings of Morton Grove. There is such a thing as public opinion, and it need not be restricted to ‘official’ channels. In fact, the way to get residents to attend these village meetings is to stir them up and give them a head’s up about what is coming down the road. We hopefully live in an open society where issues can be discussed both formally and informally. Sherwin Dubren Morton Grove
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Our government has imposed a series of “solutions” meant to help that instead make things worse or only help a few at the expense of the many. Is it OK to hurt people if your intention was ‘good’? Remember Cash for Clunkers, the program where government paid to destroy perfectly good used cars? Edmunds.com determined it cost taxpayers $24,000/vehicle. Sadly, the average price for a new vehicle about this time was $25,248 after the average rebate. Worse, it raised prices for used cars, hurting poor and middle-class buyers. Then there’s the current Operation Twist in which the Federal Reserve forces down long-term interest rates and forces up short-term interest rates. Normally interest rates reflect the time risk and are higher for longer duration loans. The goal is to help banks and real estate to recover, but what’s the harm? This punishes longterm savers with ridiculously low interest rates. Worse, it hurts employment. Most businesses
don’t take out longterm loans, but loans of short duration mostly under a year. Interest payments are an expense and if they’re abnormally high you cannot pay to employ more people. More recently is the decision to “legalize” hundreds of thousands of children born to illegal immigrants here in America. It may appear to be an act of kindness, clearly the children aren’t at fault, but it actually causes more harm. In a bad employment climate like now it further marginalizes legal Americans with newly legalized low-wage workers.Worse it sends the wrong message, essentially saying, “You young people are lucky. Your parents decided to cheat the system and break the law and because they cheated you get to win!” What about all the children of those currently
caught up in legal immigration, the ones whose parents followed the law and didn’t cheat. Now they get cheated because of the honesty of their parents. Next consider our welfare system. We know it’s riddled with cheaters – people who don’t belong on the program or who actively scam it. Should you be able to buy liquor and cigarettes or even gamble with your government welfare money? Welfare is made available to illegal immigrants, which simply encourages more illegal immigration. The children of illegal immigrants even have special opportunities and grants unavailable to legal immigrants and actual US citizens. Now, this is not a general condemnation of immigrants, but it is a general condemnation of government action. Politicians don’t do a good job in picking winners and losers. They celebrate the seen while ignoring the unseen. Next time you hear, “Somebody has to do something!” remember that government help hurts and most problems work themselves out.
Guest Columnist
Whatever happened to customer service? Have you been in a store lately and heard an announcement come over the public address system that sounds something like this, “Would Joe Nakanishi please meet your party at ‘guest services’?” (Incidentally, my husband hates it when I have him paged, but some of the stores these days are so big, sometimes I feel like I’m playing “hideand-seek” with him!) “Guest services”? What ever happened to “customer service?” When I
first heard an announcement such as this, I could have sworn I was in a store. And in fact I was. It seems some store managers these days think they’re running some kind of a hotel! This is kinda like when used car sales establishments refer
to “used cars” as “pre-owned”. Really? Who do they think they’re kidding? It was Nicolas Udall who, way back in 1542, came up with the phrase (to) “call a spade a spade.” And it was Gertrude Stein who, in 1935, said, “A rose by any other name is still a rose.” So call us what you will, we really aren’t “guests” in stores - we’re customers. And a “preowned” vehicle is still a used car.