Letters to the editor April 6

Stop the crazy

To Sens. Steve Daines and Tim Sheehy:

With great respect for the office, I respectfully request that you think deeply about what President Trump is doing to U.S. citizens.  

These tariffs are created for the rich man and not for the common man. Are you not able to think or understand the problems which are caused by Trump imposing these terrorizing tariffs placed on us. 

My husband and I taught middle school our entire careers, along with raising five kids, and all of the expenses that go along with raising a family. I also taught piano after school and my husband worked two other jobs on weekends and during the week. 

To make it simple; we worked hard for what we have. Please have a moment of compassion or thought or understanding of what your elected position means to you and to your constituents and to all American citizens’ lives. 

I implore you to do what you are able to stop this crazy.

— Lela Newey, Whitefish

GOP is dead

If it wasn’t before, it’s obvious now: The national Democratic Party has lost its way. It’s wandering, looking for a signpost, a map, a compass; a clear view of the sun and the stars. Anything that can offer direction.

Its leadership is old and tired. Poor old Joe: what must he think about his party and all his good work? And Chuck Schumer? He’s doing the best he can to lead the old fashioned way (emphasis on old), by governing. But it’s nearly impossible to lead, let alone govern, without a seat at the ruler’s table.

That said, being lost is better than being dead. The Republican Party is dead. It just doesn’t know it yet. But the corpse is stinking up not just the United States, but the world.

The split between the House and Senate Democrats over the just-passed funding bill shows that while the party is lost, at least it’s alive. As Republicans in Congress cede responsibilities to the richest man in the world and the worst president in U.S. history, a handful of Senate Democrats reveal they are the only ones who understand the value and necessity of government and governing.

The funding bill is awful. As crafted by Republicans, it gives away even more power and authority to cut agencies and programs approved and funded by Congress and, as written, may withstand Constitutional challenge. It’s understandable, even laudable, that House Democrats and most Senate Democrats opposed the bill. But the alternative, no government funding for as long as six months would have been far worse.

For example, take the jewel of our local tourism industry, and the precious resource that is Glacier National Park. The ability to hire some 350 seasonal employees to work in the park’s campgrounds, roads, trails, entrance stations, etc., was already set back with Trump’s hiring freeze in the early days of his administration. The park’s ability to open and operate, already severely hampered, would have been put to a breaking point with a shutdown.

This is no way to run a business. That’s because (and sentient Republicans take note,) government is not a business.  

I have confidence that Democrats will again find their way to power and restore the balance left with the death of the Republican Party. The rot, stink and damage left behind by Republicans will require new leadership, not only from Democrats, but also from whatever rises from the grave of the Republican Party.

— Roger Hopkins, Columbia Falls

Waste and fraud

I was impressed with the seven titans of industry interviewed along with Elon Musk this past week by Bret Baier. As the liberal left continues to scream about Musk’s teenagers destroying the gears of our laughable well-oiled bureaucratic machine in Washington, these seven CEOs, CFOs and scientists presented fact after fact of the real ineptitude of agency after agency and the hundreds of millions of dollars of waste and fraud that these bureaucrats, the drive-by media and liberals seem heal-bent on defending to the death.

While the space limitations of this page prevent me from providing a comprehensive accounting of their alarming findings, I will present the most egregious.

• 40% of daily calls to Social Security to change destinations of direct deposits are fraudulent resulting in actual loss of social security payments as opposed to the Democrats constant false claim that DOGE will take away benefits.  

• $600 million of Small Business Association loans went to applicants who were, in fact, under age 11 or over age 120 years. The youngest was 9 months old.

• The NIH has 27 centers with 27 chief information officers and 700 IT systems, none of which talk to each other. 40% of NIH grant money to scientists at universities goes to the institution for “administration” not to the research.  

• There is a cave (yes, an actual cave) in Pennsylvania with 22,000 filing cabinets handling all government retirement paperwork, unchanged since the 1950s. Attempts since the 2000s to computerize this system went overbudget and were cancelled.

I am sure that Flathead liberals will declare all of these patriots as liars and deny their facts without any justification, but I urge all fair-minded readers to watch the 50 minutes or so and decide for themselves who is truthful: Well-qualified patriots or lying media and politicians. I choose patriots.

— David Myerowitz, Columbia Falls