Finishing A Stoplight Conversation
Dear Editor,
Recently, while driving my 11-year-old pickup with the Biden-Harris bumper sticker still attached, I was stopped at the red light waiting to enter Lowes when a panel truck pulled beside me. A young man leaned out of his window and pleasantly, perhaps unbelieving, said, “Did you really vote for Biden?” Absolutely, said I. He said he voted for Trump because he created jobs and lowered taxes, although he did not like Trump’s character. I didn’t have time to speak the truth to him before the light changed.
The fact is Trump had the lowest job creation rate of any president, actually losing about 3 million jobs. True, he had the pandemic to deal with, but he failed on that too. Actually, when he lost the election, unemployment was over 13 million people. Readers may not believe this, but check the record at the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
As for taxes, whatever tax cuts might have accrued to working folks will expire 2025. His tax bill is complicated, but on the whole, low-income families received the least savings, and high-income families saved the most. Middle-class families saw mixed results. The biggest winners from Trump’s tax cuts were probably big businesses. I personally could not see any difference in my taxes.
The young man is apparently another victim of Trump’s lies. I hope he reads this. I’d like to continue the conversation.
James Bennett
It is amazing how Trumpers will see no faults with a leader full of faults. It took the his failure to respond to the Capitol riots to convince my father that we could no longer look past his failings and have any hope for America. As a now registered independent, I hope more have seen the light and we can restore the Republican party to a party of honor.
The truth shall set you free, if you know it. The real truth is that they voted for anybody-but-the-Lip-Trump. What they got was DOA. We are in worse doo-doo than before. Can you say “President Harris”?
strike that second ‘you’…My comment should read:
So, please tell us why you voted for Biden and feel free to add any special things he’s done so far that have made you glad you did.
You poor soul ….and you announced it too .
Let’s all remember Mr Bennet in a year from now. Atleast you voted , thank you for that.
James
Has your gas bill gone up since Mr. Biden was elected?? Has your food bill gone up?? Who do you think will have to pay for this 1.9 trillion dollar Biden supposed to be Covid bill. I’m so sorry you took the Democratic’s bait. That hook you swallowed with not rust away for a long time. You can bet we all are going to have to pay higher taxes and higher prices for everything we buy going forward.
Gas was 2.95 a gallon here in the summer of 18 and check out the prices for April 19. Trump had some high fuel prices. Food prices went up under Trump as well. Funny how people can just tell blatant lies
Before the election of Biden, gas prices were down the most in many many years. We were “energy independent” and were a net exporter of oil to other countries.
In comes Biden and he puts a stop to the north american pipeline from Canada which would have created thousands of jobs, but the save the earth people got Biden to issue a stop on the pipeline. Where do you think Canadian shale oil is going now? Why to the west coast of Canada to be shipped to foreign countries so Canada gets to sell their oil to the highest bidder.
You surely can’t blame Biden for that. Because of covid19 and the shut down that is why everything is going up. This was happening long before he took office so stop wanting to blame everything on the new president. If you want to lay blame how about the previous president whom you love so much. Didn’t take this virus seriously waited three months before he told anyone about it then let it get so bad that everything got shut down. Now those businesses have to recuperate loss revenue by going up on prices not because of the current president. Let call a spade a spade if it wasn’t for him the covid19 deaths and people with it would not be going down.
“Didn’t take this virus seriously waited three months before he told anyone about it then let it get so bad that everything got shut down.”
How convenient you forget it was Trump sho shut down travel from China and Europe in January, which Biden and Pelosi screamed about it. Pelosi even went to Chinatown without mask asking people to come to Chinatown and celebrate.
Then a couple of months later, Biden admitted to Trump he was wrong about Trump’s blocking foreign travelers.
Need to get your facts and dates/times sorted to see the truth.
Your contention of being conservative is respected but in reality, you should preface that with “balanced” conservative. Days brought both letters from Trump disciple Dr Jerry Clark and the balancing one masterfully defending support for Biden submitted by James Bennett. You published both.
Our strength as a democracy does not turn on dominance and submission to one view but a respect for most…and some how, some way coming together on a shared one. In spite of division as deep as a civil war, we have done that for over 200 years. Our country is not perfect but there is none better and it demonstrates the worth of a functioning democracy.
Any day now James you can come out from under that mushroom?It seems you have been in Cuba or some foreign country the last 4 Years.Trump is the first and probably the last to say what he would do as President and did it.In his time the overall pay for Americans increased two times.He amassed the lowest unemployment rate for all Americans especially for minority,spainard, and women. However stumbling,bumbling Joe in his first two months has cut more jobs that paid well so they could build windmills.Also Unless you have an electric car you are paying 30-40 cents more for gas.We were a country of Gas Independent to buying gas from people who hate America. Are you aware that in almost 3months Joe has not come out of his bunker/basement to answer more than 1 question as he rushes out of sight. I guess he will come out around summer so he can get that ice cream cone the reporters ask him about last fall .WHO IS RUNNING AMERICA??? JOE is MIA. Are you missing Trump yet!!!!!!
Spaniard? Is that what you think Hispanic or Latinx means?
He’s met with several legislators and been working actively to try to fix some of our problems. I’m not sure what his golf round count is, but I’m positive he’s already worked more full days than the last guy did in all 4 years.
He’s giving a speech this week. To your dismay, it won’t be a 140 character incoherent Twitter rant. He’ll use words and sentences. Make sure you study up to prepare.
Biden doesn’t work full days. He doesn’t even get up until about 9-10 am, and is in bed by 8 pm. Don’t you think it’s odd that Biden has not held a press conference? I don’t. . . . .his handlers are cringing at the thought of Biden answering questions as they are asked, so they have planted “reporters” in the audience to ask him questions he’s been coached to answer.
Sad we do not have a commander in chief anymore.
I certainly must ask that Mr Bennett keep his updates on statistics open. New updates are becoming available daily as to the FACTS, which are not assumptive opinions from main stream forgot their orgins news 15 minutes of fame seeker so called reporters or journalists. Proff in lawbreaking before, during and after the US election 2020 has been being established, legally. Of course the Conservative sources are not usual for those following opinion glory seeking main stream media’its.
Just because you disagree with someone, there is no license to be ugly about it. It’s called civil discourse.
It looks something like this: https://www.bing.com/images/search?view=detailV2&ccid=KvrdOKcX&id=B49DA8AD73D31A1502E598046C2DFC053DE629D1&thid=OIP.KvrdOKcXravSznOKqb2M1AHaDt&mediaurl=https%3A%2F%2Fcontribute.nrcc.org%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2018%2F11%2FSEO-2019card.png&exph=600&expw=1200&q=gop+membership+card&simid=608042867426263507&ck=403C4727919BC67460964A5B3ABB7575&selectedindex=4&form=EX0023&pc=EMMX04&vt=4&sim=11&adlt=demote&shtp=GetUrl&shid=3d76e5ca-465d-4559-b9af-b5bde5773c4a&shtk=MjAxOSBOUkNDIE1lbWJlcnNoaXAgQ2FyZCAtIE5hdGlvbmFsIFJlcHVibGljYW4gLi4u&shdk=Rm91bmQgb24gQmluZyBmcm9tIGNvbnRyaWJ1dGUubnJjYy5vcmc%3D&shhk=Q%2B0S2xj0HT0f5%2FWni%2FT35LdMF5V9zX0H8KKt6pNOJgI%3D&shth=OSH.Lx3fj%252BwiiuhG9vUNwgXl%252BQ
Your comment about “His tax bill is complicated, but on the whole, low-income families received the least savings” is in error.
Trump created the best conditions for people of all races, and his tax cuts ushered in a booming economy where those most in need of jobs got them.
He also exempted the first 25,000 of income which meant those earning 25,000 paid zero income taxes, or those earning 50,000 paid taxes on 25,000. He also limited the tax deduction on real property and the millionaires hated that since they couldn’t deduct the the huge property taxes they paid to local governments and states.
Trump’s idea was to let people decide how and when to spend their money and get the government out of their lives. Sadly, the current liberals in our country STILL think they know better on how to spend your money than you do.
James Bennett writes of wishing he had been able to complete a red-light conversation with a Trump supporter. Bennett would have “informed” the poor misguided young man of the “truth” about Trump’s record on the economy, tax cuts, and COVID. Or perhaps the young man would have imparted some of these facts:
According to Yahoo! News:
“About 1.6 million, or one percent of all taxpayers, bore 40 percent of the income tax burden due to the federal government…
So here are the results of the Trump tax cuts:
–The income tax burden for high earners increased $16 billion to 40 percent of the total owed.
–The income tax burden for middle class earners decreased by $31 billion to 13 percent of the total owed.
–The income tax burden for low wage workers decreased by $4 billion to 1 percent of the total owed.
Doesn’t sound much like a tax cut for the wealthy.”
From Snopes: “According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the country’s unemployment rate dropped to 3.5% in fall 2019 — the lowest rate in about 50 years, since December 1969.”
From FactCheck.org – (October 2019-pre-pandemic):
“Since President Donald Trump took office:
· The economy added 6 million jobs, and the unemployment rate dropped to the lowest level in nearly 50 years.
· Median household income rose 2.3%. Average weekly paychecks rose 2.8%. The poverty rate and food stamp rolls declined.
· Stock prices rose: The S&P 500 index was up 29.8%. Single-family home prices rose nearly 23%, hitting a record level in June.”
To be sure, not all financial stats were as favorable to Trump (deficits were up even before the pandemic).
Speaking of the pandemic – Did Trump “fail” in his COVID response as Bennett claims?
· Jan 7, 2020, The CDC set up its coronavirus incident management system
· Jan 29, 2020 Trump formed the Coronavirus Task Force
· Jan. 30, 2020 The Trump administration had a conference call with state governors and produced an action plan for the outbreak.
· Jan 31 2020 He put in place a travel ban from China,
· Feb. 24, 2020 The Trump administration requested $2.5 billion from Congress to fight the Coronavirus
· All of the above were before the first US COVID death on Feb 29, 2020
· He worked with businesses to begin ramping up production of needed medical supplies for healthcare workers.
· There were also a number of executive orders passed to tear down government restrictions that blocked businesses from manufacturing products outside their designed purpose.
· Not a single patient in need of a ventilator was denied the use of one due to lack of availability.
· Established a COVID hospital in NYC and dispatched hospital ships to NYC and LA.
· Operation Warp Speed resulted in two vaccines being available before the end of 2020, with almost 1 million vaccinations per week by the end of Trump’s term.
· In sworn testimony in Congress, Dr. Fauci testified that President Trump’s COVID response saved lives.
“Dr. Neil M. Ferguson, a British epidemiologist…is regarded as the preeminent source on disease outbreak modeling. He … came up with high-and-low end estimates to what the United States was likely to face. He stated there was a possibility of 2.2 million deaths, in his worst-case scenario…… if all went well the U.S. would ‘”only” see about 1.1 million deaths.”
Of course, the real number was much less. So far total deaths (under both administrations combined) is about half of Dr. Ferguson’s *best-case* scenario. So apparently Trump’s “failure” saved between 500,000 and 1.7 million lives.
Good post C Smoot!
“There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics” which was used by Mark Twain, and I think James may have fallen victim to the quote.