Mail-In Voting Invites Fraud

Dear Editor,

Voting is an essential activity in a democracy. It must be taken seriously. If a state deliberately develops a secure process, openly evaluated by all interested parties and approved by pre-designated legislative pathways, they have the right to implement universal mail in ballots. The decision should not be hastily instituted by one person in silence. No party should be allowed to implement it under COVID emergency powers.

We live in an extremely polarized period.   It is too easy to excuse injustices to win an election. People steal identities for a growing list of reasons once thought impossible. If someone will steal an identity to pay for electricity, why not to vote? Erosion of checks and balances increase stakes. If you truly believe an opposing politician and their supporters are “evil,” you might do anything to protect yourself. It’s easy to target neighborhoods more likely to disagree, go house to house stealing mail-in ballots, to increase opposition voting difficulty. It’s also easy to use those stolen ballots to vote for your candidate. If you think the stakes are too high to not vote and you cannot convince someone sympathetic to your side to vote, you might be tempted to vote for your friend who dislikes every candidate enough to refuse to vote. You may be tempted to vote “on behalf” of your uncle in the hospital to sick to communicate a choice based on a cryptic conversation three years ago that he also dislikes the same candidate. But did the uncle really agree with you? Or was he so tired of the argument he only agreed to move on to another subject?

COVID fear has already resulted in policies that ignore safety and security concerns. As an example, many hospitals, nursing homes, and childcare facilities prevent all visitation. Advocates, known as families, have been denied access to the vulnerable. Reduced transparency invites abuse and neglect. When these entities stopped all visitation, states should have increased surprise state inspections. Not only did states not do this, many jumped on the bandwagon to prevent all visitation to every similar facility. We will see numerous examples of negative repercussions emerge over time. This lack of transparency prolonged the danger in New York state’s tragic nursing home policy. Advocates were in the dark about the degree of repercussions too long. We need to stop rushing policies that ignore security/safety issues in the name COVID.

Alan Burke

 

Oppose Raise For Gibsonville Employees

Dear Editor,

I am appalled at what occurred at the Gibsonville Board of Alderman meeting on Monday, May 18, 2020. During the FY2021 Proposed Fiscal Year Budget presentation, the mayor and Aldermen approved a 2 percent cost of living increase costing the taxpayers $78,000.

Since there are insufficient funds to pay for it, they support using “reserves” that cover emergencies or one-off expenditures. This increase was not included in the original proposal presented by the town manager due to uncertainty of revenue levels impacted by the coronavirus pandemic. 

This is so irresponsible and short-sighted on many levels, including:

More than 30 million Americans have filed for unemployment. Did they even consider the Gibsonville residents who have been affected?

If the economy is slow to return to previous levels, will that force a tax increase in next year’s budget?

The BOA did not follow their own priorities made during their Feb. 15 budget retreat. The merit increase and the Town Hall American Disabilities Act Improvements were a higher priority with lower cost than this decision. Is the budget retreat just for show?

The town has invested heavily to meet health standards required for the coronavirus that continues. There are no guarantees expenditures will be reimbursed by the CARES Act from the federal government.

Approving an across-the-board increase is a slap in the face to employees who consistently exceed expectations. 

I am thankful for the talented and dedicated employees of Gibsonville. However, we are not promised a rebound. I strongly encourage the board to reconsider its decision. 

There will be a public hearing for the Gibsonville budget on Monday, June 1, 2020. Gibsonville residents, please make your voices heard by contacting the town leaders before this hearing.

Citizens are invited to share their thoughts and priorities by:

Email: bbaxley@gibsonville.net

Phone: (336) 449-4144

Beverly Ross

 

Chickens Coming Home To Roost

Dear Editor,

The wicked witch of the west Pelosi has proposed a $3 trillion boondoggle and has given it some touchy-feely name. This is not just putting lipstick on a pig, it’s putting Chanel No. 5 on pig droppings. It’s a socialist’s wet dream. 

Part of it is to give money to states and cities to offset the loss of confiscated income (aka taxes) to allow them to continue to pay government workers because many have run their state and/or city into the ground. And they specifically mention police, fire and EMS, implying they would be cut or reduced. My answer to that is this: Before one police officer, one firefighter or one paramedic is let go or furloughed, every government office better be empty. Every bureaucrat, every clerk, every supervisor had better have been let go or furloughed first. If not, I hope there’s run on pitchforks and torches.

This is a classic example of chickens coming home to roost. Our overlords and ladies have done everything they can to destroy the backbone of our economy, that being small businesses, while making sure their sources of income, package stores for example, and their selected favorites like the big box chain stores are able to pretty much continue to operate as normal. 

The other thing has been how the original mantra was flatten the curve, and somehow morphed into we have to have a vaccine first. And by the way ignore the fact that the death numbers are bogus having been manipulated by those same overlords and ladies as a tool to control us through fear. Regardless of the actual cause of death, if they can connect it to the virus, they count it as a virus death. What horse hockey pucks. And they put out numbers showing the number of infections going up and up. Well, when you increase testing and it includes asymptomatic people of course the number will grow.  And how long have they had the virus? 

They are playing people like a toy piano. They depend on people being uninformed and willing to accept anything they say as gospel because they can’t or won’t think for themselves. Notice how the people that stand up and speak common sense are attacked and accused of wanting people dead. I have been and have chosen to ignore them.

Why encourage fools.

Alan Marshall