Purpose of a minimum wage?
According to C.J. Boyd, the campaign manager of Tucson Fight for 15 in an interview on Arizona360, the minimum wage was meant to provide the income for a person to afford "an average two-bedroom apartment."
I thought the minimum wage was a starting point. An entry level wage meant for an unskilled worker to begin building their skills. If passed, this initiative will 1) increase prices for retirees on a fixed income, 2) price teenagers out of jobs they need to build employment skills, 3) increase costs to the working poor for day care, food, clothing and housing. There are more unintended consequences in this initiative that outweigh any benefit that a $15-an-hour minimum wage will provide.
Carlos Ruiz
Northeast side
Shopping cart dilemma
I am appalled at the number of abandoned shopping carts I see in my neighborhood. Donβt the people who take these carts realize when they remove a cart from the store's property they are stealing?Β
Searching the internet I find these large metal shopping carts cost $165 and up. I am sure the cost of these lost carts is passed on to the consumer with higher prices. When you allow thieves to steal they think it is acceptable and will do it all the more.
Why don't the police stop and fine these cart thieves? I have a simple cure. Make a healthy dollar fine for stealing carts and give the arresting police officer a $50 bonus for each shopping cart fine they collect, maybe this would get the police more incentive to stop these thieves.
Sterling Kopke
Northwest side
Another loss for America
Congratulations America, we lost another war and destroyed another country.
After 20 years of war, countless American lives lost, thousands wounded and maimed, trillions spent, we end up losing once again.
Who's responsible for this? We are. The American public put the so-called war out of mind and did not raise our collective voices in protest of this unimaginable folly.
It dragged on for 20 years. Then we pull out and turn the country over to zealots.Β
They beat us with fewer soldiers, fewer large weapons and zero air force.
We all should be embarrassed and ashamed.
And note: My fellow baby boomers, this is on us. We made a mess not only of this so-called war but of our own country. There is no generation behind us that can clean up the mess we made.
Good luck, America, and I hope we have finally learned our lesson about getting involved in useless and pointless wars.
Robert Diedrich
Northeast side
Afghanistan shows ineptness of Biden
Former CIA director General David Petraeus calls situation in Afghanistan "catastrophic".
It's just one more example of the ineptness of the Biden administration. When will America wake up and get rid of him, Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer and Barack Obama?
Vernon Stedronsky
Northwest side
Irresponsible behavior with COVID vaccine
I believe people have the right to make choices about their health, as longer as it impacts only themseves. When your decisions hurt others you forfeit that right. As a retired ICU RN, I worry about patients with heart attacks, stroke, trauma, elective surgery and more not being able to receive care because the beds are occupied by COVID patients who refused vaccination. If not for the burden the unvaccinated place on others, I would be willing to accept this as Darwinism.
Craig Miller
Northwest side
Mask mandates and "freedom"
In the Aug. 15 guest opinion column "Stop comparing Holocaust with vaccinations," attorney Maurice Goldman correctly criticizes those who equate mandatory mask ordinances with Nazi laws requiring Jews to wear yellow stars.
The purpose of the yellow star was to enable the Nazis readily to identify Jews so they could be rounded up, forced into ghettos where they were starved and brutalized, then sent to death camps like Auschwitz.
Comparing the loss of "freedom" to go maskless (and thereby to spread the virus to others) with Nazi totalitarianism is worse than a mere false equivalency, however.
It's a devious form of Holocaust denial and anti-Semitism. Moreover, those who claim that mask ordinances unconstitutionally abridge individual "freedom" are ignorant of American law. In the 1905 case of Jacobson v. Massachusetts, the U.S. Supreme Court held that laws requiring vaccination against smallpox are a lawful exercise of government's duty to protect public health. Mask mandates are no different.
Stephen Saltonstall
East side
New motto for the GOP
Regarding the Aug. 16 letter in which the writer suggested a new motto for the Republican Party: "Corruption by us isn't really a crime, and crime by us isn't really a problem," I have a two-word response: "Andrew Cuomo."
Carmen Wiswell
Foothills
Better solutions than desalination?
The Aug. 14 article about a $4.1 billion desalination plant gives helpful pros and cons. I'm struck by how much we'd depend on that lifeline. If it fails β for instance, the natural gas pipeline next to the proposed water pipeline explodes β we could have a water emergency in Tucson that might last for years.
Could the estimated $60-$90 monthly water bill increase instead be used for other ways to save water that most of us don't do yet? How many of us have a grey-water system? No "luxury" shower heads that gush water? Low-flush or no-flush (waterless) toilets?
As we wait for hot water to come out of a faucet, do we collect the cool water and reuse it? How about a high price and/or limits on swimming pool water? Cars that aren't always spotlessly clean? Let's find ways to be much more water-efficient. Tucsonans can do it if we see the need.
Jerry Peek
Midtown
Let's make it a democracy!
After 58,000 American dead in the Vietnam conflict, 4,400 killed in Iraq and 6,000-plus in Afghanistan and trillions spent on foreign conflicts, when are we going to learn the lesson that America can't solve everyone's problems?
Following an attempted coup in our Capitol and one party favoring an autocracy, perhaps we should spend more time to clean up our own "house" rather than occupy others. When are we ever going to learn?
Roger Engels
Oro Valley
The way not to ditch
If you're going to ditch, you get your friends and allies out first, then you ditch. You don't ditch and leave them in the lurch. The first time I agreed with Sen. Mitch McConnell: This is a stain on America. It's worse then Trump abandoning the Kurds and it's similar to Saigon in the way it was handled. These guys are murderers and rapists. Thanks Joe. I hope Liz Cheney runs for president in 2024.
David Tammer
Midtown
Troops, thank you
The departure from Afghanistan is a debacle. To be kind, I would say it was poorly planned, if there was any planning at all. There is debate as to when the administration knew that the Afghan government would quickly fall following the announcement that the Americans were pulling out.
I can only imagine the thoughts and feelings of the current members of the military and the veterans who served in that country. I cannot even begin to comprehend the emotions of the Gold Star mothers and widows who lost their beloved family members over there, as they view the chaos that is ensuing.
So many of our brave men and women were injured, losing limbs and suffering emotional damage from what they experienced in Afghanistan. Let me say that, in my opinion, your sacrifice was not in vain. You served your country well, and I, for one, appreciate that service. Hold your heads high and know that there are many of your fellow citizens who want to say thank you.
Lois Boehl
South Tucson
