I am duly shocked by Chris Jacobs’ “no” vote on additional funding for the United States Post Office.
He claims his vote was a mistake. Well, it was or it wasn’t. But either way, he is clearly showing his incompetence in his role as our Congressman for NY27. The Post Office is a vitally important service at all times, but more so in an election amid the Covid-19 pandemic. There are many voters who will be dependent on absentee ballots.
If a mistake, how can he be as irresponsible as to error when voting on this imperative issue? My understanding is a vote is made by pressing the Yes or No button. The result is shown on an overhead screen and the Congress person is afforded an immediate opportunity to change the vote if it is wrong.
If not a mistake, then it is a vile affront to his constituents by supporting a Trump position and then saying “oops, I didn’t mean it.” We have a right to know his platform without lies or hypocrisy.
We need real representation in Congress and Nate McMurray will provide it. He will work hard for the people of this district emphasizing visibility and communication. He is a moderate Democrat. I note that most of the anti-Nate ads and statements are simply wrong.
This election is vitally important. Do your research to get the facts and above all, vote. Our democracy depends on it.
I was asked to share a copy of my letter to Congressman Jacobs, Senator Ortt, and Assemblyman Hawley along with the photo:
Dear Sirs,
Provided photo: Cindy Burnside said three turbines in the proposed Heritage Wind project would mar the view in her backyard.
This email is regarding frivolous spending at the cost of our schools and our students’ education.
The attached photo is of our field. We love the wide open spaces here in our town. Please, look at the picture again, only this time imagine 3 of 33 wind turbines just beyond the tree line in the back. 680 feet tall—that is more than 3 NYS Capitol Buildings stacked one on top of each other. Imagine them with blades spinning at well over 220 mph. They would tower into the line of the lower clouds. I did not move and build here to see monstrous structures, but if Governor Cuomo has his way, whether we want them or not, he will have 3 placed there and right now, at the extreme cost of education. We do not need the Heritage Wind Project, that money needs to go to our schools right now!
While Governor Cuomo sits on millions of our tax dollars, our school budgets have been cut and he is causing, on purpose, the schools and children to suffer…by his own hands with my money.
His dream of forcing his delusional “green” energy down our throats, here in this rural farming community, is appalling…meanwhile our schools and students suffer!
He is sitting on OUR money to fund a proposed wind project in our small town and yet our schools are financially hurting. With the COVID-19 mandates he put into place, there are many, many families and students without internet access in our area or even adequate ability to connect.
He cut the funding to schools and placed mandates on the schools for reopening which in turn causes the students and families to suffer—all while he sits on our money for frivolous projects that are not needed right now! We do not need wind turbines or solar panels right now!
Our school systems and the families that are being forced to stay home in the attempt to teach their children need this money! This is how I want my money spent-it’s my money, don’t I get a say? What is wrong with this picture?
The funds that he is sitting on needs to be filtered to the schools instead of being frivolously spent on a project that we DO NOT need. We supply more than enough energy from Niagara Falls for THIS area. Our town is only 50 square miles and if the majority of the citizens do not want the proposed project by Heritage Wind, LLC/Apex…33 towers at 680’ each! At the cost of education! It is wrong!
Please, do not allow this project, or others like it, to continue its dark journey while sending schools, children, and their families to the gallows. Stop him-he is ruining our educational system and it all starts with defunding these projects, opening up that money bag, and filter the funds to the schools that need it instead—stop the frivolous spending of my/our money.
No turbines! Not now-not ever-it’s a very bad deal!
I would like to respond to Mr. Harker’s letter from Aug. 29. I am a liberal so perhaps I can address some of Mr. Harker’s concerns.
As a liberal, I condemn violence and criminal activity and all the liberals I know also condemn violence and criminal activity. Mr. Harker writes: “In NY, I could not go to church for weeks. I could, however, loot, rob, destroy in the name of ‘change’ if I so chose.”
Mr. Harker, it has always been illegal to loot, rob or destroy property and despite the Covid-19 inconvenience those activities are still illegal.
Mr. Harker comments that cities that have been run by Democrats for decades now have protest and violence. Mayors and city council members are elected by the citizens. Citizens generally want smooth roads and good schools and safe neighborhoods.
Since Democrats keep getting elected it is reasonable to assume that Democrats are providing services and delivering safe neighborhoods better than Republicans. When Mr. Trump became president, crime in major cities in 2017 was down according to FBI statistics. Because of Covid-19 infections, unemployment is at an all-time high and especially affects minorities.
While Mr. Trump is not responsible for the virus, he is responsible for the response. Other countries have the virus under control enough to re-open their economy including Canada.
While N.Y. State Department of Labor reported: “For the 12-month period ending June 2020, the private sector job count in the Western New York region fell by 80,900, or 14.7 percent, to 470,500.” But just across the border, The Globe and Mail reported (8/7/20), “The Canadian economy added 418,500 jobs in July as pandemic restrictions eased across the country, marking the third consecutive month of rising employment after millions of jobs were lost earlier this year.”
Furthermore, it is wrong to associate the violence during the peace protest with a political fraction such as the left. For example the Star Tribune out of Minneapolis reported: “A masked man who was seen in a viral video smashing the windows of a south Minneapolis auto parts store during the George Floyd protests, earning him the moniker ‘Umbrella Man,’ is suspected of ties with a white supremacist group and sought to incite racial tension, police said.”
The Kansas City Star (6/16/20) reported: “Devin Burghart, president of the Institute for Research and Education on Human Rights, said his organization has found evidence of Boogaloo and other far-right extremist groups at 40 protests related to Floyd’s death, including some in Kansas City and Wichita.”
In clear language committing a crime makes you a criminal regardless of political persuasion. The Trump administration has blatantly violated the Hatch Act and subjected the American government to bribery for the benefit of Mr. Trump. The Trump administration is criminal.
At one time I thought we would be voting about the character of Presidential candidates. Many decided who they thought worse last time.
This year we are voting about what type of person we are. For example:
1. At the funeral parlor do you comfort the family or tell them “all lives matter” and “everyone dies”?
2. Do you believe what people tell you about crime rates or do you look for yourself? (I found NYC in 1990 had 2,500 murders and now under a Democrat and different policing training had 550 in 2019? Not what Rudy said.)
3. Do you think high bids on your stock is more important than unemployment being at a 70-year high with tens of thousands of employers closed?
4. Can you reconcile the federal crime reform law our President brags about which let people out of prisons with his promises to put people in jail?
5. Do you think God delegated golfers, anyone, authority to judge church-goers’ souls?
6. Do you prescribe your own medicine? Do you reject any and all recent medical advances. What about discontinued drugs when the FDA has found bad side effects and taken them off the market?
7. Do you believe the guy who says he wants to give police raises or the guy who will deny them money in the third stimulus package?
8. When mail delivery is down 12 percent, do you think the USPS head should show us the study he says proves cutbacks will work out – particularly as it a study he also testified he has never read?
9. Is your fear of socialism so deep you support doing away with all health insurance because joint buying power is socialist?
10. Are you worried that the Social Security actuaries say payroll tax elimination will cause SS and Medicare to run out of money in 2023?
11. When Rudy Giuliani takes a Russian film crew – One America News Network (OANN), also known as One America News (OAN) – to Urkaine are you going to listen or laugh when he airs his report about that trip?
12. Do you believe in jury verdict? How many does it take for you to suspect a pattern?
13. Do you believe with our death rate and job attrition rates so high we can keep up with countries which do not have those problems?
It seems to me in this 2020 election we are voting about who we are – our morals, our concern for others, our superstitions and our gullibility or lack thereof.
I write in response to Gary Kent’s concerns regarding folks having a “cavalier” attitude toward a civil war.
First, since being offended is so loosely defined and “in” these days, I am offended. I am not a “conspiracy theorist.” I do watch Fox News. His thinly disguised derision of those on the right is not called for, especially since he and others on the left are opposed to stereotyping and profiling. Isn’t that what you are doing Mr. Kent?
One would also have to ask what kind of civil war worries Mr. Kent the most? Left vs Right, Black vs White, Poor vs Rich? Supporters of the rule of law vs criminals?
Mr. Kent rightly states that war kills people. It does. There is violence, hatred, injuries, and death. Not one sane person on the planet would advocate that. It can be said that all these factions are in conflict with the other in some form.
Which is exactly what is happening in large cities across our nation today. Cities that have been run by Democrats for decades. (Yet is President Trump’s fault of course.) The same career Democratic politicians that are conveniently turning a blind eye to the fact that men, women, and children are dying as a direct result of the anti-cop, anti-white, anti-anything patriotic anarchy they refer to as “peaceful protests.”
A once united nation is being torn to shreds before our very eyes. In NY, I could not go to church for weeks. I could, however, loot, rob, destroy in the name of “change” if I so chose. Any thinking person who denies that this is a mockery of what our forefathers envisioned is disingenuous. When the left is in control our Constitution is “evolving.” Evolving to favor their favorite big government scheme of the day.
Black Lives Matter of Chicago INC (a for profit organization) claims violence, robbery, looting, and other types of the crimes being committed are simply “reparations.” Really? It has almost become cliché that if they honestly are advocates for black lives why are they silent on the rampant rate of black-on-black crime?
Mr. Kent, I do not believe we are on the verge of civil war. I do believe that November’s election should decide our future. Ideally one party or the other will come out with the Presidency, the House, and the Senate. At least that would at last determine which path we take. The stakes are high, the division clear.
Regular readers of the Hub’s Letters section already know who and how I will be attacked in response to voicing my differing opinion. From those of the “all inclusive” party.
In closing, I implore every US citizen, get out and vote. In person. With ID.
The very last sentence of my last post should have read: “I believe the extreme right wing has become a force for evil and the mostly Republican politicians who ride their coat tails should be ashamed of themselves.”
I absolutely do stand by my use of the word “evil”. For the last month New York State’s daily death rate has been less than 10. NYS’s population is almost 20 million. The USA total is about 320 million.
If the rest of the country had done what NYS did (credit Cuomo here), the country’s daily death rate would have been a bit less than 200.
Instead the national death rate has been about 1,000 a day. I believe the force behind the death of the additional 800 is evil.
Many voters will have the opportunity to vote by mail in the upcoming election this fall. This is an extremely bad idea on several counts. It does not take any imagination to believe that the process of requesting, filling out and returning a ballot is clumsy, subject to error, loss and yes subject to manipulation and fraud.
Much additional handling is involved in a mail-in ballot before it actually gets recorded as a vote, as opposed to an in-person vote. A mail-in ballot has to be requested, mailed, opened, filled out, mailed back, opened and recorded, a process that involves considerable time and handling, at least six times. There is ample opportunity for error, mistake, and loss. There also the opportunity to vote twice once by mail and once in person.
The claim is being made most recently by noted liberal columnist Mr. Steven V. Roberts in his local publication of August 15th that there is no evidence of manipulation and fraud. Not so, Mr. Roberts is so blinded by his dislike for President Trump that pertinent facts are being deliberately ignored.
Ballot harvesting, finding uncounted absentee ballots in the trunk of a car, and most recently the voting fraud in Patterson N.J. in May, wherein a revote must be taken, are all evidence that fraud and manipulation can take place.
The potential for fraud, abuse and mistakes are greatly enhanced by mail-in in voting. Further the ballot must be mailed early, depriving voters of the opportunity to involve themselves in the complete election cycle
The most disturbing aspect of mail-in voting is the potential for a substantial delay in declaring a winner. Both parties will have a field day claiming victory and accusing one another of fraud and suppression of votes.
There will be endless controversy over the legitimacy of many a mail-in ballot. Was the signature messed up? Was the correct envelope used? Was it mailed on time? Was it post marked? etc., etc., etc.
We may not therefore know for several days or more, who actually won the election. The public is entitled to a speedy election result particularly in these days of unrest where demonstrators and protestors regularly take to the streets, attempting to short circuit the democratic process. It would be far more productive if they volunteered at the voting booth.
There is risk in going to a polling booth in the midst of a raging pandemic. I submit there is no more risk and possibly less, than going shopping, going to the gym, going bowling, going out to dinner and the like. The greater risk lies in compromising and confusing a critical election. President Trump is correct. Vote in person on election day and assure that your vote is counted. Our democracy depends on it.
I would like to congratulate Mr. Harker on cracking the code on mail-in voting. It is certainly not a coincidence that “blue” states would offer options that expand voting opportunities.
That, of course, is in stark contrast to the President going on the record with Fox News in April saying, “[Democrats] had levels of voting, that if you ever agreed to it you’d never have a Republican elected in this country again.”
I will say that I appreciate the concern for ballot rejections, which highlights the need for voter education. Far from a reason to suspend an option that would expand the opportunity to vote.
Now is a good time to call attention to the fact that the House passed the Voting Rights Advancement Act in an effort to enact sweeping voter reform. The bill, which was reintroduced recently as the John Lewis Voting Rights Act, has been sitting on Mitch McConnell’s desk since December 2019.
The law prevents state and local governments from making last-minute, discriminatory changes to voting practices either at the polls or during early voting periods. So, I wonder why one would oppose this legislation unless the goal was to encourage widespread voter suppression? I suppose it is coincidence that such legislation is stalled in the Republican-controlled Senate.
Now, from the voter fraud standpoint, voter fraud is as American as apple pie. Voting in colonial America was often reserved for white, land-holding males over the age of 21, which excluded a large portion of the population (both free and enslaved). During Reconstruction, poll taxes and literacy tests sought to disenfranchise African Americans and poor whites. Less “systematic” measures marked by violence and carried out by organizations such as the Ku Klux Klan of course suppressed voting in the South. Today, states purge voter rolls, limit early/absentee voter options, and enact ID requirements, which are a modern-day form of the poll tax. Perhaps the biggest example of modern-day voter fraud is the Electoral College, which in the past two decades has awarded us a president who failed to win the popular vote. Halting the possibility of universal mail-in voting is just another tactic by the minority to retain control; add it to the lengthy list of voter suppression tactics.
Ultimately, I am left befuddled that Mr. Harker asks what the Postal Service should do with $25 billion in anticipation of the November 3rd election. Why should Americans have to demand that tax dollars go towards rectifying a manufactured crisis? Trumped up conspiracy theories peddled by the President that mail-in voting leads to fraud were insufficient. So, a loyal donor to the President’s campaign was planted at the head of the USPS to systematically dismantle it in the months leading up to the election. Another nail in the coffin that the GOP has carefully constructed for the Postal Service, starting in 2006 with mandates to pre-fund retirement benefits.
In closing, I will head off the expected Trumpian response; the U.S. Postal Service is just that, a service. It was never intended to turn profits like a business. What is most concerning is that many in rural WNY fail to fully understand the significant role that the USPS plays in your lives. There is a specific reason why the USPS delivers Amazon packages. The company’s profits would drop to an unacceptable rate if an Amazon van showed up at your doorstep, as it does in larger metro areas.
A recent letter indicated Republicans are a forces of evil because of the questions that have arisen regarding the Covid-19 virus.
Certainly the writer has to admit that health experts have waivered and changed direction on this Chinese coronavirus. This would include wearing/not wearing masks. Lockdown or not. Destroy the economy then cry for a bailout or not. Allow all hospital procedures or just abortions. Limit gathering sizes except to protest. Close travel to Europe and China or not.
More than likely the writer would have labeled the travel ban as a Republican racist policy. Questioning why the need to take certain liberties away while allowing others is not evil.
Mr. William’s letter is spot on. And I should know. In a photo of a recent class reunion in Medina, I’m the guy with the hat, white beard and cane. I (almost) always wear my mask when entering any public place.
I had my mask on when I got out of my car to join the group but when I saw that none of my classmates had a mask on I took mine off. I was the last one there and I figured they’d all agreed not to wear their masks and who am I to get in their faces?
I was wrong not to keep my mask on. I do take issue with Mr. William’s opinion that wearing a mask is just a matter of public health. There is an extreme right wing in this country that wants to take the country back to 1956, the year me and my classmates graduated.
In my opinion this right wing has made mask wearing a political matter. It is their way of expressing their opinion that Covid is a hoax and the number of Covid deaths is a liberal fabrication.
One last point. I believe the extreme right wingers, and the mostly Republican politicians who ride their coat tails, have become a force for evil.
As we face the continuing coronavirus pandemic, we must do so united in the goal of taking care of ourselves and each other.
The photographs of community members without masks in public, as seen on the Hub, are very alarming. Each person in the pictures has a duty to themselves and each other to wear a mask. The photographer should not take photos if the subjects are not wearing masks and the photos should not be published if they are not wearing masks.
The science has become clearer that a properly worn mask protects the wearer, as well as others. There is no evidence that doing so causes any harm whatsoever.
This is not a political issue about personal freedom. This is a public health issue, and people’s lives and livelihoods depend on our commitment to wearing masks. Doing so will slow the spread of the virus, thus sparing businesses (which should make sure their employees and customers properly wear masks) from permanently closing, and preventing more of our loved ones from dying. Please, let’s all come together on this issue.
In regard to Tami Martin’s letter, there are four states that are mail-in voting only: Colorado, Hawaii, Utah and Oregon. These four have either been traditionally “blue” or are tending left since mail in voting has been implemented. Coincidence?
In addition, in the recent Presidential Primary, there were more than 550,000 votes rejected (over 80,000 from NY) compared to 319,000 in the previous Presidential Primary. According to the left leaning NPR, the vast majority of these rejections were due to first time mail-in voter mistakes. 550,000 votes not counted due to simple mistakes. If there are mistakes at the polling booth, the ballot is rejected right then and there, giving the voter the opportunity to correct it.
Also according to NPR research, “The numbers compiled by NPR are almost certainly an underestimate since not all states have made the information on rejected mail-in ballots available” and “has raised alarms about what might happen in November when tens of millions of more voters are expected to cast their ballots by mail, many for the first time.”
“Election experts said first-time absentee voters are much more likely to make the kinds of mistakes that lead to rejected ballots,” NPR said. “Studies also show that voters of color and young voters are more likely than others to have their ballots not count.”
In addition, a study by Rob Griffin of FAR left UCLA and the partisan Democracy Fund reveals, “If something goes wrong with any of this, that’s a problem writ large, but it’s also going to be one that hits some populations of the United States a bit harder than others, potentially disenfranchises different groups of folks at higher rates.”
Given the above – all of which come from strong supporters of the left, I submit that an all-mail vote disenfranchises minorities, increases rejected ballots, and increases the chance for fraud. The election is 71 days away from the date of this writing. How will the post office spend the $25 billion it has been awarded to ensure a secure ballot handling process in 71 short days? Thinking that it can is unrealistic.
Republicans are pushing Russian propaganda. Senator Ron Johnson (R-Wis), Chairman of Senate Homeland Security & Governmental Affairs Committee, has opened an investigation of Ukraine interference in the 2016 Presidential campaign.
This is a conduit for Russian dis-information. The U.S. Intelligence Community, (ODNI, CIA, DIA, NSA, NGA, NRO, department of defense of Army, Navy, Marine Corp, and Air Force), the Mueller Report, and now the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, (report issued 8/18/20), have stated that Russia, not Ukraine, interfered in the 2016 presidential election.
The Republican-controlled Senate report stated that Konstnatin Kilimnik, a Russian Intelligence Officer, “Kilimnik almost certainly helped arrange some of the first public messaging that Ukraine had interfered in the U.S. election” (page 108 of the Select Senate Committee on Russian Interference).
This supports testimony under oath by current and former senior officials that Ukraine interference in the 2016 election was Russian propaganda. Including testimony by State Department top Ukraine experts, George Kent, Fiona Hill, and Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman and Ambassadors Maria Yovanovitch and David Hale.
Furthermore, Sen. Johnson has been warned by U.S. Intelligence officials that their investigation could spread Russian propaganda. Andrew Desiderio of Politico.com reported, (2/27/20), that: “In a Dec. 5 meeting, Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr (R-N.C.) told the leaders of the Senate Homeland Security and Finance committees — Ron Johnson of Wisconsin and Chuck Grassley of Iowa, respectively — that their probe targeting Biden could aid Russian efforts to sow chaos and distrust in the U.S. political system, according to two congressional sources familiar with the meeting.”
The evidence is clear; Republican are more interested in spreading Russian propaganda, and lies than solving real world problems.
Mail-in voting is not now nor has never been an issue. Soldiers have used the mail to vote since the Civil War.
Some states use mail-in ballots completely. This is another trumped-up nonsense story. Unless the Post Office is destroyed by the corrupt Republicans, mail-in voting will continue as usual.
Maybe try reading or watching actual news? This helps with critical thinking.
I write to ask the proponents of mail in ballots a question:
If you trust the USPS with the very future of our nation, why is it you don’t trust it enough to send cash through it?
The advancement of electronic payments in the last decade notwithstanding, what about before? Did you mail cash for your mortgage? Utility bills? As a birthday or other gift?
I think not.
This is proving to be the most divided national election day in our history. Why should we change what is proven? I don’t accept Covid as the reason espoused by the left. They know full well that they have the weakest ticket in recent, if not all, history. What is their true motive? Could it be that they are hoping for ballots to come up missing? The left’s response is that the ballots are anonymous and unidentifiable. Not so. Each and every mail-in ballot will have a unique “identification number.” You cannot convince me that this unique identifier will not in some way be deciphered.
As far as voter ID, how does that suppress the minority vote as the left so often recites? You need ID to get any permit, license, or just about any transaction with the government. You need an ID to purchase alcohol, cigarettes. The list of circumstances where you need to show proof of identity goes on and on.
And they continue to repeat that it suppresses voting – especially with minorities.
