LTE: Are we better off?

In a Friday 'Letter to the Editor' (LTE) in the SI Advance, the writer poses the question President Reagan once asked, are you (we) better off now than you were seven years ago.

Look, if you're cutting taxes for the benefit of your real constituents, the top 5 percent of the country's wealthy, something has to give -- like the Department of Veterans Affairs, Federal Emergency Management Agency, air and port security, air and water quality, health care and Social Security.

Read the whole piece here.

LTE: Fossella favors privatizing Social Security, revisited

In a Tuesday 'Letter to the Editor' (LTE) in the SI Advance Roy Moskowitz reminds Staten Islanders that Rep. Vito Fossella and Craig Donnor his communications director continue to mislead the public on where Fossella really stands on Social Security;

First, he forgets to mention Fossella favored the deadlines and penalties imposed on seniors as an "incentive" to sign up for the Medicare prescription plan, written by the pharmaceutical industry, which was among his campaign's largest donors. Fossella favored punishing those not signing up by the May 15 deadline with a six month waiting period and increased costs. Why does the congressman wish to punish the elderly not meeting bureaucratic deadlines? Nobody benefits from delaying coverage and increasing costs for those not acting quickly enough. This is another example of Republican heartlessness.

SNIP

[The] socialsecurity.org Web site continues to link to Fossella's 2002 appearance on CNN as a Bush administration privatization spokesperson (socialsecurity.org/sstw/sstw08-26-02.pdf). During that appearance, Fossella says Bush is on the right side of history on Social Security.

Read the entire piece here