Leave self-interest behind on Election Day

To the editor:

I'm an 80-year-old man. My wife and I survive entirely on my small Social Security benefit. We're both well aware that it would be in our best interests to vote for liberal Democrats. We both know that they will always look out for the elderly and that we'd be "taken care of" as long as they're in control.

So it would be in our best interests to support them. And we would -- if all we cared about was ourselves. But we both feel that the stakes are much too high to think only of ourselves. We don't want to be "taken care of" at the cost of freedom for future generations.

We honestly believe that freedom will be in jeopardy if liberal Democrats control both the House and Senate and we have a far-left president who fills Supreme Court vacancies with liberal justices -- like the ones who made property rights a privilege subject to the whim of local politicians. We will then no longer be a nation of free people.

We believe that such a Supreme Court would slowly and gradually modify the meaning of the Constitution in order to give the president the power -- not the right, mind you, but the power -- to rule by decree.

All for our own good, of course.

Bill Cramer

LAS VEGAS

Printing press

To the editor:

It is truly mystifying to observe people's reaction to our government spending money.

The government loans $85 billion to an insurance company and $700 billion to we don't know whom. We are relieved that something is being done. But where does the government's money come from?

There are only two sources for real money. The first is from taxes. The second is to print it.

Taxes are taken from us. Thus our supply of money is depleted. Printing means they create new money. When they create new money it reduces the value of whatever money you may have left. Our money is worth less.

Who wins?

Problems caused by government intervention cannot be solved by government intervention.

W. Brent Hardy

LAS VEGAS

Animal rights

To the editor:

I read Saturday's cynical editorial against California's Proposition 2, which would prevent ranchers from confining animals in cages so small that they cannot even lie down, while visiting my parents here in Las Vegas. I was amused by your wishful thinking that if the proposition is passed, California's meat and egg industry might move to Nevada.

This state has been prostituting itself for profit for more than a century, so I suppose this is nothing different. What is different is your gall in opining on another state's politics. You should mind your own business.

Fortunately, your kind of backward thinking holds little sway in California.

David L. Fiol

NOVATO, CALIF.

Congressional hearing

To the editor:

After Enron's collapse, former CEO Jeffrey Skilling, then-CEO Ken Lay, and then-CFO Andrew Fastow were called before Congress to testify about their company's accounting shenanigans, then sent off to prison while having their spouses liquidate all their personal assets to help defray the costs. Because Enron's collapse could be tied to President Bush's friendship with Ken Lay and Republicans in general, the Democrats in Congress convened a special investigation.

According to the Business and Media Institute, Fannie Mae's and Freddie Mac's overstated earnings were 20 -- that's 20 -- times larger than Enron's fraudulent numbers.

My question is, when can we expect Congress to call the former CEOs of Fannie and Freddie, Jim Johnson and Franklin Raines, along with Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., Rep. Charlie Rangel, D-N.Y, and Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and the rest of Fannie's and Freddie's enablers to testify?

Could it possibly be that because these corrupt officials are all Democrats and big donors to the Democratic Party, Congress won't bother convening a special investigation?

I'm sorry, that's two questions. We know the answer to the second question, but I really would like an answer to the first question.

Mike Niederberger

LAS VEGAS

Market socialism

To the editor:

Once again, capitalism is being blamed for the current government-induced fiasco. But contrary to the popular socialist commentary, this is not the case. Nor has it been for nigh on more than 70 years.

I defer to a more well-spoken Web site owner at Usagold.com:

"What we have witnessed over the past several months has not been a breakdown in capitalism. Capitalism was shunted aside in the 1930s, when market socialism was introduced in the United States, Europe and elsewhere, never to return.

"The current economic crisis is a failure in market socialism. Whatever solutions the world's political leaders have in store for us, you can bet they will have little to do with the free-market approach. Instead, capitalism will be blamed as the culprit. A higher degree of market socialism will be promoted as the remedy when, all the while, the real culprit was market socialism in the first place."

I couldn't have said it better myself.

Andy Jensen

HENDERSON