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Inflation, stock market worry despite SS hike
www.theactiveage.com Kansas’ Largest Newspaper
November 2022
‘It’s rough out here’
By Amy Geiszler-Jones Living on a fixed income with the current inflation means Wichitans Wakeelah Martinez and Jim Lichlyter are making some tough decisions. “I eat only one meal a day,” said Martinez, 72, a full-time caregiver for her mother, with whom she lives. The pair live on $2,000 a month. “Thank goodness Mom has Meals on Wheels.” Martinez said because she doesn’t eat meat, the meals offered through the program aren’t an option Photo by Fernando Salazar for her. Lou Sheets has put off restoring a vintage car due to concerns Lichlyter, 69, a disabled veteran about inflation while Wakeelah Martinez, right, is saving money by only eating one meal a day. and retired state worker living on his pension and full Social Security enough food for two days rather than on driving to visit friends, mainly benefits, has made changes in his deal with rising grocery and utility keeping company with his cockapoo eating habits, too. He said he’s found costs to cook his own meals. Daisy Mae, and has put off doctors' it cheaper to go out to eat and order Lichlyter said he’s also cut down appointments — a decision that
caused what was recently diagnosed as spinal stenosis to worsen. He maintains a list of errands to run so that he Martinez can consolidate those trips into one day every week or two. “It’s rough out here,” Martinez said. She’s not wrong. Inflation is reaching record highs. According to federal figures released in mid-October, consumer prices rose 8.2% for the 12 months ending in September. Increases in housing, food and medical care costs were the biggest contributors and were partly offset by a decline in the gasoline index, according to the See Inflation, page 6
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Revisiting 'Rolling Thunder'
McConnell pilots were the hunters and hunted in Vietnam By Joe Stumpe McConnell Air Force Base has served many missions through the decades, from training bomber crews and maintaining intercontinental ballistic missiles to its current focus on air refueling and military intelligence. No task proved more perilous to the pilots stationed there than its stint as a home to fighter squadrons during the Vietnam War. “It was a period of distress at McConnell,” said Ed Sykes, who flew 118 missions in southeast Asia. “There were a lot of guys getting shot down, and their wives were back here with their kids at McConnell. It was not a pretty sight.” Sykes recalled the period during a talk last month at the Kansas Aviation
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Museum, focusing particularly on a failed 1965 operation known as Spring High, which was part of a larger, multiyear bombing campaign known as Operation Rolling Thunder. President Photo by Joe Stumpe Johnson authorized Frank "Frosty" Sheridan and Ed Sykes, seen Rolling Thunder in the here at th Kanas Aviation Museum, lost fellow ultimately unsuccessful McConell airmen in Vietnam. attempt to keep Communism from going over there,” Sykes said. “They all spreading to South Vietnam. got a shot at it. None of them wanted The Air Force had located fighter it. They all got shot at, too.” squadrons at McConnell several years A trap is set earlier. As part of Rolling Thunder, In July 1965, as U.S. planes they were sent to bases in Thailand. See McConnell, page 7 “Squadrons would take turns
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