Flocking to the government handouts

To the editor:

Have you ever put out a bird feeder and noticed as time went by that more and more birds gathered to take advantage of the free food? Why would they go out and spend a lot of energy to forage on their own when they can come to the bird feeder where the living is easy? As long as the food is there, the birds will come and forget about trying to make it on their own.

Sen. Barrack Obama's tax plan will result in the same kind of behavior. Taking money in the form of taxes from one group of citizens and handing it over to another group will do little to induce the recipients to go out and work harder to try to make it on their own. Chances are that, just like the birds, there will be more people hoping to take advantage of the handouts as time goes by. You can steal only so much from the people who are productive. Why produce more when the government will just take it and redistribute it to those who don't produce? How this can be of benefit to the economy is a mystery to me.

If Obama gets elected, we will be well on the road to socialism. What is happening to the America we used to live in?

Bill Dirkse

LAS VEGAS

Fox and henhouse

To the editor:

What if you were a coach of a team and you discovered that members were cheating. Would you turn them in?

Or what if you owned a company and found out relatives were stealing from you. Would you press charges?

How about if you were the chairman of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee and knew that members of your political party were the main causes of the financial disaster that now effects all Americans. Would you investigate?

Former President Clinton admitted that it was congressional Democrats who stopped his attempt at regulating Freddie and Fannie. They also stopped President Bush and Sen. John McCain's attempts at the same. Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., who is the leader of this oversight committee, is aware of this. He has already investigated AIG and Lehman Brothers -- small bit players. But his investigation of Freddie and Fannie, the primary cause of this meltdown, will not start until two weeks after the presidential election. Why the delay? Could it be an attempt to protect Democrats such as Barney Frank, Charles Schumer and Christopher Dodd? Or is it to protect Barack Obama, who coincidentally received more campaign money from Freddie and Fannie during his short three years in the Senate than any other senator except for Sen. Dodd?

Call me cynical, but I believe if Rep. Waxman could hang this around the necks of Republicans, the investigation would already have happened.

Robert Gardner

HENDERSON

Bad guys

To the editor:

I'm glad to see the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms and local law enforcement agencies cracking down on an outlaw motorcycle gang ("Local Mongols held in sweep," Wednesday). The article in the Review-Journal stated that the ATF put a lot of effort into infiltrating the Mongol gangs in the past 40 months. U.S. Attorney Thomas O'Brien (Central District in California) promises aggressive measures in his prosecution of the Mongol motorcycle gang.

I just hope they have a better result than we did here in Nevada. Awhile back, the U.S. attorney in Las Vegas stated he had a "slam dunk" racketeering indictment against the Hell's Angels motorcycle gang after ATF agents had infiltrated their gang and were even honored with the gang patch. Through poor jury selection and case management, he lost on the racketeering and other more serious charges, resulting in just a few of the gang members pleading out to lesser offenses.

After reading the book "Angels of Death," which outlined the Hell's Angels criminal racketeering activity and led to their prosecution in Las Vegas, I find that the Las Vegas U.S. attorney was less than competent and should have been removed from office.

I hope the California U.S. attorney is not another "chest beater" with a lot of threats and has a better understanding of federal prosecutions and can take these bad guys off the streets.

Eric Snow

LAS VEGAS

DNC payroll?

To the editor:

For as long as I can recall, the esteemed and haughty members of the Fourth Estate have always railed against elected officials who are "double dippers." So it's time for your staff member, columnist Erin Neff, to make a decision.

Does she work for the Review Journal or the Democratic National Committee? Her articles should really be supplemented with the imprimatur, "This is Senator Harry Reid, and I approve of her message."

DANIEL S. MAXIME

LAS VEGAS