Speakout 9/16

I have a suggestion. How can a guy go to a war for four months and get four Purple Hearts and then turn around and talk bad about Bush and then he sits there and tells everybody everyone wants to jack their taxes up. Bush is wanting to cut taxes. Kerry is the evil one; he wants to raise everybody's taxes, gas, property tax and everything else, just like the Democrats have done for years and years. Everybody knows it's the same old thing. I guarantee you, if you vote for Kerry, you might as well pack your bags and move to China because he is a communist too. Anybody who fights in a war and comes back and protests against the Vietnam War, Jane Fonda has to be a communist. If you vote for Bush, you're voting for a man with morals, values and respect and dignity.

I have a message for Kerry. "Conniving Boy" because Kerry is for the war one day and against the war the next day. He is a big old flip-flopper. We don't need a scary Kerry in there. We need Bush, a man with still voice and dignity. By the way, everybody who reads this in SpeakOut, support your troops. Always believe in your troops because the troops who are fighting the war in Iraq are fighting for your freedom, just like they did in World War I, World War II, the Korean War and all the wars we've ever fought. So when you're thinking of voting, vote for the right man and holler, "Hey, George! You're doing a good job."

How can the poor people survive another four years of Bush? He raised the Medicare premiums again. Some of us only draw $500 a month and now he has raised the premium. The prescription plan takes another chunk out of it and we still have to pay for part of our medicine. That doesn't leave much for food and to pay our taxes. I worry every month if I can make it. I think he would like for all of us old people to die. He has no compassion for the elderly or the middle class people who live from paycheck to paycheck who have no health insurance at all. A lot of families don't have health insurance at all and can't afford to go to the doctor. I don't go like I should for the same reason. He started the war in Iraq and is spending money like it belongs to him. People in the United States could use some of that money. Look at all our boys and girls who have been killed in Iraq. Bin Laden is the one he should have been after but he's still out there. We live in constant fear in the United States every day. This war was very unnecessary. He is a very cruel and cold-hearted person.

Does anyone appreciate the effort it takes to keep our city parks looking nice? It's a lot like housework on a monumental scale. It's a never-ending job and one person cannot do it alone. It takes the cooperation and collaboration of many others to achieve the goal of making our city parks attractive and safe places for people to enjoy. Even with the best of efforts, all sorts of stuff ends up on the ground. Does anyone ever wonder what happens to all that trash? Do you think it just blows away in the middle of the night? I am not condoning littering, but the upside to this is that several employees of the Sikeston Sheltered Workshop are transported daily via van to the various parks to pick up the trash left behind by others. It is their job. Do you know who picks up after you when the rodeo is over? The Cotton Carnival? The workshop employees are the wind in the middle of the night. They are the unsung heroes. They do the work most of us would not and they are in part responsible for the attractiveness of our city because I believe it starts in our parks. On Sept. 1, the workshop employees arrived at a west end city park for clean-up duty and some men who were doing some heavy-duty partying in the park apparently became threatening and hostile toward them. The workshop employees were immediately removed from the area for their safety. My child was in that group and it is my understanding that the workshop will no longer pick up trash in that park because of that incident and the primary concern for the safety of the workers. I know that my child certainly won't be going there again. There are a lot of good people living in the west end and I hope that somebody or some organization will assume the responsibility of keeping that particular park cleaned up, because we all know that when trash piles up, besides being unattractive it attracts the scum of the earth. Sikeston doesn't need any more high crime areas.

Regarding the Red Cross, I would say that in October 1944 during the first few days of the invasion of the Philippine Islands, on the island of Leyte, there was an airstrip and at one end of that airstrip the Red Cross was selling a cup of coffee for 50 cents and at the other end of that airstrip the Salvation Army was giving away free coffee. This is one of the reasons why a lot of service men weren't too eager about the Red Cross.