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Letters to the Editor

NPV is an idea whose time is right now

The Preamble to the United States Constitution begins with the following words: We the People. We. The. People. Such stirring words, and a reminder that our Constitution, indeed our government, bases its legitimacy on the will of the people. Our president should also be chosen by the will of the people. That is why I am writing to advocate for the passage of the National Popular Vote legislation. NPV is legislation at the state level that says, in essence, that whichever presidential candidate that receives the most votes nationally should be elected president. Article II, Section I ...

Bergman, stop pushing us toward default

America faces a looming default crisis, all because MAGA extremists and their leader, Kevin McCarthy, are trying to force through drastic cuts to bedrock American programs —and Jack Bergman voted to help them do it. The impacts of these tactics are far-reaching: funding for veterans programs and our schools slashed, programs like Meals on Wheels and food assistance eliminated for millions, hospital funding in jeopardy, and even payment to military service members and their families in doubt. That doesn’t even begin to cover the risks of default, which would spike interest rates and ...

Township voters need to clean house soon

I think it’s time the township voters elect new board members who know how to make a decision and resolve problems. This ongoing issue with the Alpena City Water and the Alpena Township is a prime example. The amount of tax money these board members have wasted on attorneys and litigation could have been spent on new water pipes into every household in the township. It would have been more cost effective if the county would have just paid the water rates to the city. Money that could have or SHOULD have been spent on the Township Fire Department. And, paying thousands of dollars for ...

Give young girl credit for saving her life, too

There have been many articles published about the bravery of the young man who used his slingshot to protect his sister from an active kidnapping, but many of them focus on the brother and overshadow the work done by the little girl to stay safe. What that boy did to assist in saving his sister was courageous and he absolutely deserves to be recognized for his bravery and quick thinking. He stepped up to help his sister and that is a wonderful thing. However, while we are praising the brother for his efforts, we are slightly dismissing how well his younger sister defended ...

Why is Bergman hesitant to raise debt limit?

Representative Bergman in a recent constituent newsletter, May 23, 2023, writes that “Americans make those tough decisions in their personal lives everyday”, referring to the fact that we stand good for the debts we have incurred in our daily lives. When the bills come in, we pay them as part of our obligation when we bought the groceries, our automobile, electricity, or whatever else we needed to maintain our lives. If our spending pattern is out of sync with our income, we must adjust our future spending, but that adjustment has no bearing on our past debt, it still is due and must ...

Responding to such impassioned criticism

Responding to the impassioned fallout from my suggestion that “enraptured” wasn’t le mot juste to describe the response to David Sedaris’ recent appearance in Alpena, first, kudos to Anne Gentry for having such rabid supporters, ready to leap to her defense. More to the point, before I moved to Ossineke, I’d lived in California, Chicago, Brussels and New York City. But I’ve never lived in a place so defensive, so hostile to different opinions, rejecting “big city ideas” (“big city” being any town with more than 50,000 residents, including the City That Shall Not Be ...