Governor Ritter in a picture from the official Colorado Governor web site, with "honest Abe Lincoln's" likeness close at hand.
An open letter to Governor Ritter and other U.S. Governors...
The Roman Catholic priest at Mass this past Sunday held up a newspaper article about a proposal to raise property taxes.
He clearly was disturbed.
He tried with all the verve he could muster, to get across the idea that such a property tax increase would badly hurt the lower classes, including the disabled, the poor, the working poor, and seniors.
Father had a clear right to be upset.
I for one, should property taxes be raised, would find myself on the receiving end of a bill I might not be able to repay on my monthly, fixed income.
Many states are near bankruptcy. PBS during the upcoming week, showed on television images of parking lots, comprised of hundreds of acres in California, where there's thousands of new automobiles unsold, and unwanted, and the rental space priced beyond the resources of either Oriental car manufacturers or dealerships.
The "Governator" apparently has no answers. He can only promise ominously, ""Ahh'll be bahck!"
Where do the answers to such dilemmas lie?
I have stood by impotent, as social services have given me assistance, all the while running up a tab I don't know I can ever repay.
Medicaid, for instance runs on a system of look-backs, if one is to be able to access it. That time used to be only three months. Then, in the course of last two terms of George Bush, that period was extended to six months, then twelve, and afterward eighteen months. Now it has become a horror show, requiring the shedding of all assets--insurance, real estate, savings, and automobiles--for a time going back six years!
An uncle and aunt of mine were in the green at one time, with their home paid for, plenty of cash in the bank, and quite happy to do their gardening, visit family members, and shop from store to store.
An auto accident ended that time of relative peace and prosperity.
It left my uncle in a hospital bed and then a nursing home, with little or no memory. Now pretty much a vegetable, he is on Medicaid. But it was a truly trying task for his children to comply with all the red tape.
Meanwhile his wife, left behind with mind intact after the accident, complained of her state of life. She tired in the course of year, often saying that she would just as soon go home to God.
