Dear Senator Mark Kelly
RE: Representing the Interest of Arizonans
Dear Sen. Kelly:
Although I was born in Phoenix, I spent most of my life living in California until I moved back here in late 2013. One afternoon early in 2012, we had a knock on our door at our home in Livermore, California. The person who knocked at the door introduced himself ae Eric Swalwell, and told us that he was running for Congress in our district. He promised that he would go to Washington with a moderate mindset, vote his own convictions, and work across the aisle with Republicans. He didn’t.
When I heard your advertisements that you would represent the interests of Arizonans, I had visions of Mr. Swalwell in my mind. I didn’t believe that you would represent Arizonans and that you were too indebted to special interests outside the state, least of which is Chuck Schumer.
Your support of the latest Covid-19 “stimulus” is a prime example. Most people who would receive a $1,400 stimulus check do not need it. If you were to offer people $100 to vote for you, it would be illegal. But collude with a bunch of politicians who want to tell everyone how they helped them with big checks, it is no problem. The State of Arizona does not need a federal bailout because, for the most part, it has kept its fiscal house in order. Why are you supporting a bailout of the states like New York and California who have totally mismanaged those states in exchange for votes?
Now let’s look at all of the pork:
• $86 billion to rescue 185 or so multiemployer pension plans insured by the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. Managed jointly by employer sponsors and unions, these plans are chronically underfunded due to lax federal standards and accounting rules. Yet the bailout comes with no real reform.
• Elementary and secondary schools get another $129 billion, whether they reopen for classroom learning or not, while colleges get another $40 billion. The CBO says that since Congress already provided some $113 billion for schools, most of which has not been spent, it expects that 95% of this new money will be spent from 2022 through 2028, after the pandemic is over.
• This being Congress, Members are also slipping in pet pork, such as $1.5 million for the Seaway International Bridge, which connects New York to Canada and is a priority for Chuck Schumer (NY-D). Don’t forget the nearly $500 million for, as the CBO puts it, “grants to fund activities related to the arts, humanities, libraries and museums, and Native American language preservation.”
There is more, but hopefully you get the point. Congress, especially democrats, wave these dollar amounts around like they are just sitting there in a vault, ready to be spent. More than $1 trillion of this bill is going to things totally unrelated to the pandemic.
Where does this many come from? It is basically a tax on the children of people who have not even been born yet! This was once called “Taxation without Representation.” Of course, they cannot vote yet, and you and I will be long gone before their turn to pay the piper comes up.
I cannot end this without mentioning the $15 per hour minimum wage. This will be of no benefit to Arizonans, and will actually harm more people then it helps, especially seniors. Higher minimum wage will result in more unemployment and higher costs for everyone. Do you really think that someone making $15 per hour now will be happy to continue that rate when people he or she is supervising starts making that much? Are seniors going to receive a higher social security check to match the additional costs that they will be face with?
You said that you would represent the interests of Arizonans. I would request that you start doing it.
