Voting rights, everyone has a voice
I am simply baffled by the animosity and morally criminal opposition to voting rights.
Who are we if not the nation others seek to replicate, not for our fancy cars, fast food, and late-night TV, but for our belief that every one of us is equal and has a voice?
We can argue the merits of funding schools, health care, poverty-reducing measures and who should pay to fill that giant pothole around the corner.
Do we really not agree that every constitutionally protected voter should have equal access to that privilege? Do we really believe that state politicians will protect this right? History speaks the truth.
The federal Voting Rights Act was instituted to overcome state action that kept people from the polls. When the act lost its teeth, states reinstated limitations that hurt us all. Our elected officials must bring back real voting rights for everyone. After all, this is all of our democracy at stake.
Jennifer Jones
Downtown
Inflation gibberish
Letter after letter to the Star features a Republican soundbite which is supposed to enlighten us about the causes of the current inflationary trend. All those that blame the economic stimulus package put in place by Congress and the Biden administration would, I am sure, support the idea that the $1.5 trillion tax cut put in place by a Republican-led Congress and the Trump administration in 2017 is also to blame for the current inflationary pressures.
Clearly we all agree that decades of neglect of our infrastructure which makes it more difficult to process and move goods through our docks, rails and roads is also to blame. How about the ridiculous wages that many people in the supply chain have suffered with until they finally have said enough? Also, there is the lack of workers from other countries that helped make our economy go. Our addiction to cheap Chinese goods, whether we need them or not, is also a problem.
Kalvin Smith
Midtown
Right time to eliminate filibuster
Dear Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, I understand you support the filibuster for its benefits for bipartisanship, but surely you would agree we are at a critical point in U.S. history. Bipartisanship should be used to agree on matters of important policy, but when one party is eschewing basic democratic principles, our representatives must act unilaterally to protect democracy.
The Republican-controlled state legislatures around the country, including in Arizona, are enacting laws to make it more difficult to vote. Just as importantly, moves are afoot to sow doubt on the legitimacy of our elections and to allow legislatures to nakedly decide the outcome of votes, to overturn the will of the people.
Our most effective senators illustrated a willingness to change their minds when the evidence suggests it's just. As a Democrat, as a patriot and as an American, I'm asking you to do the same about the filibuster. It's time.
Molly Hunter
Midtown
Hypocrisy on ending filibuster
Democrats in the Senate are the epitome of hypocrisy in demanding elimination of the filibuster, which requires 60 votes for "cloture" and vote of legislation.
In 2017, when Trump was president and Republicans controlled the Senate, a bipartisan group of senators, including 32 Democrats, signed onto a letter to preserve the 60-vote filibuster rule. Among the Democrats who signed were Kamala Harris, Dianne Feinstein, Jon Tester, Joe Manchin, Tim Kaine, Bob Menendez, Ed Markey, and Chris Coons.
Current Democrat Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer sent a letter this week to Senate Democrats urging them to change filibuster rules. In stark contrast to a 2017 letter sent by him to Republican Majority Leader Mitch McConnell saying, "Without the 60-vote threshold for legislation, the Senate becomes a majoritarian institution like the House, much more subject to the winds of short-term electoral change. No senator would like to see that happen, so let's find a way to further protect the 60-vote rule for legislation." A bunch of pathetic hypocrites!
Darrin Styles
North side
Spend more on sports?
Re: the Jan. 8 article "Commish: Invest in facilities, coaches."
Call me old, but I had a hard time digesting the news article which features the new Pac-12 commissioner advocating that its member universities significantly up their spending on major sports programs in order to compete with other conferences. He argues the universities will reap dividends in higher academic standards.
So spending millions on coaches and facilities will produce greater benefits than spending on nuclear physicists for the faculty.
I get where the "Commish" is coming from. It is his job. And despite lucrative television revenue and sometimes lavish alumni donations, it is clear major sports spending in the Pac-12 is at starvation levels.
Has anyone informed the "Ivies," not to mention Stanford and Cal, of this new revelation and its road to academic excellence?
Jim Greene
Oro Valley
Biden at 33% approval rating
On Jan. 12, USA Today revealed a national poll showing Joe Biden having a dismal 33% approval rating. He has low numbers for handling the economy and COVID-19, the latter of which during the campaign he repeatedly promised to end. Biden promised to be a unifier and bring people together. He ran as a moderate and on his 36 years in the Senate as an institutionalist, where he vigorously defended the filibuster, that he now wants to change.
But Biden has been a divider of people. He has completely embraced the leftist agenda. He comes across as a mean old grumpy white guy, who should be in a retirement home somewhere. He ignores the continued chaos at the border happening under his watch. The Senate is split at 50 Democrats and 50 Republicans. Democrats in the House have a slim majority. That dictates a situation for compromise, not one partisan party ramming through legislation that would cause an upheaval to our social, economic and election systems.
Stella Murphy
Midtown
Steller's column on 1st Ave.
RE: the Jan. 12 article "Politics over First Avenue plan could be bad sign."
Someone once said that those that do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it. I put Tim Steller in that category.
His recent column on changing the design of the First Avenue project shows that he has either forgotten, or never knew, why the Regional Transportation Authority was created. Taxpayers used to vote to fund road projects and the politicians used to ignore them and build what they wanted. The RTA was created so that the projects people voted on were built to match what they voted on.
The First Avenue project can be changed, but, as Farhad Moghimi stated, it must first undergo a "very extensive process" before that happens. Steve Kozachik wanted to change the Broadway project without the process and Steller wants to change the First Avenue project the same way. No changes should ever take place in any RTA project unless it goes through a process, so the taxpayers get what they voted for.
Jeff Britt
East side
