Help homeowners first
To solve the financial crisis, go to the root of it — the insecurity of homeowners’ mortgages. Secure their loans and the complex maze of financial instruments holding them will be secured.
This can be done through a federal home mortgage insurance analogous to the depositor’s insurance that helped in the Great Depression. Congress could enact reasonable guidelines for how much each would be insured for and terms of payment, then it could be administered by local banks the country through whom the mortgages originate.
The result would benefit homeowners who may otherwise lose homes and pay huge taxes to bail out large firms and stabilize the root cause of the crisis, inspire broad confidence and avoid throwing money at opaque accounting disasters.
J. Gray Cox
Bar Harbor
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Fact masquerade
Setting aside the notion that Hayes Gahagan’s opinion piece “Reproduction and responsibility vital to U.S.” (BDN, Sept. 11) comes uncomfortably close to echoing Adolf Hitler’s fantasy of an Aryan nation, his article is so full of lapses of logic and unsupported statements masquerading as facts that it is a wonder it was published at all.
Where, for example, can one find statistics confirming that “the Islamofascists are reproducing at alarming rates in the East”? I checked both the CIA Factbook and the United Nations Population Division but, not surprising, neither source breaks down the figures in terms of Islamofascists or other ideologies, and the population growth figures they do report for the Middle East are not alarmingly high.
Gahagan makes clear his opposition to a nanny-government, yet he is quite willing to have the government legislate reproductive rights because “[e]ach and every individual life has value that is to be preserved, protected and defended.” But only, it seems, if it is an American life — not Middle Eastern or Islamic.
We should celebrate Mr. Gahagan’s freedom to voice his opinion but we should not tolerate such thinly-veiled xenophobia in today’s society.
Gordon Hamilton
Orono
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Earning trust
I’m pretty certain that we’ve seen this movie before. You know, the one where the loveable scamp of a burglar arrives at the realization that the law is getting too close, the risks too great and it’s time to finally retire, but not before one last big score.
The current administration — with a tip of the hat to the Congress — has managed to create an economic environment so bereft of regulation and oversight that the looting of the “people’s money” became all but inevitable, from surplus to deficit. It took some time, but most of us are finally getting wise to the scam. The lobbyists, corporate managers and corrupted politicians recognize that the field is about to change and it’s time to pick up their winnings and leave the table, but not before one last big score — the bailout.
We’re told that this solution must be applied immediately; no time to consider the details — shades of the Patriot Act. Most “experts” and politicians seem to agree that our current situation is the result of too little regulation, but transparency and oversight seem to present stumbling blocks for success in this fix. Let’s simply give $700 billion (or one trillion plus?) to the administration to do with as they see fit. Haven’t they already earned our trust?
Oh, and that single mom waitress we’ve been hearing so much of as late? Won’t she be relieved that the system that took her house, denied her healthcare, forced her to give up her car, necessitated that she worked two jobs and kept her kids in failing schools was saved?
Michael Smith
Trescott
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Huber ‘dead wrong’
With all due respect, Sherry Huber’s op-ed, “Obama’s vision, commitment right for Maine” (BDN, Sept. 13-14) is dead wrong. Her support for Barack Obama is misguided.
First, it must be pointed out that Sherry Huber ran for governor as an independent in 1986, so why does she think she can fool anyone into believing she is a Republican?
Second, her claim that John McCain would lead us down the wrong path is without merit and inaccurate. McCain is the candidate with a real record of reform and standing up to special interests — including oil companies. Obama’s record is thin at best — except for his support for tax increases on everything, including small businesses and families making as little as $42,000 a year.
McCain has fought against and voted against tax breaks for oil companies. Obama supported those tax breaks. Voting records speak louder than words. Huber must not have done her homework.
McCain is the man with a plan to reduce our dependence on foreign oil. He supports an all-of-the-above approach to digging our country out of this hole — including more drilling off-shore and building new nuclear power plants while investing in alternative energy and respecting the environment. Obama says no to drilling and no to nuclear energy. His answer is to put more air in our tires.
These phony endorsements from phony Republicans are election season games. Especially when the endorsers don’t have their facts straight.
Lisa Eldridge
Brewer
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On Palin: ‘Been there’
Without casting an opinion as to how I personally stand on the question of Sarah Palin, I would, however, like to share what my oldest daughter said to me Sept. 8 in a phone conversation.
My 30-year-old daughter lives in Baltimore. She became pregnant at 16 to a boy who was 17. My granddaughter was born while my daughter was still 16. That was 13 years ago. The marriage ended after four years, though my daughter and her ex-husband still remain good friends and are both actively engaged in raising my granddaughter.
I asked my daughter: “So what do you think of Sarah Palin?” She said: “I think she is running away from her family responsibility. She has a 4-month old ‘Down’s baby,’ who needs the love and care of both parents, and she has a 17-year-old daughter who got ‘knocked up.’ I think instead of running for vice-president, her place, right now, is home with her family.”
My daughter knows what it means to be a teen mom living in a family that was known by many due to my very public job position — and my husband’s — at that time. As I said, I am not expressing my opinion, only relating the opinion of a young woman who, as they say, “has been there, and done that.”
Susan Yaruta-Young
Blue Hill