To the editor:
Americans are now living with higher prices, an increasing gap between the rich and everyone else, unnecessary foreign wars, attacks against freedom of speech, loss of respect from allied countries, hidden Epstein files, unpopular AI data centers, the purging of high-ranking military officers, cruelty toward immigrants, exaggerated culture-war talk, the pardoning of rioters convicted in connection with Jan. 6, government corruption and greed, and a nationwide strategy to divide us, all caused or favored by the current administration and the controlling political party in Congress.
Government words and actions are chaotic, dishonest, incompetent and becoming more authoritarian. Our national leader talks and acts like a wannabe king.
But this November, we can start changing how our federal and state governments work and how they treat people. Vote only for politicians, regardless of party, who admit our country is heading in the wrong direction and who will fight back by correcting the damage done.
A few actions such politicians can take are:
• Get more Americans to vote and make it easier to do so; stop the White House from interfering with the states’ constitutional rights to run elections themselves; oppose false and unproven accusations that elections are rigged.
• Negotiate to end the military conflicts with Iran and eliminate most tariffs, both of which cause prices and inflation to increase.
• Protect Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and other so-called “socialist” programs, all of which help people and work within our capitalist system; they are not communism, as propagandized. Increase SNAP benefits for schoolchildren, approve child care programs and work to keep rural hospitals open.
• Legislate to lower health insurance rates, especially for the millions who have been priced out of needed Affordable Care Act coverage.
• Pass legislation so the wealthy pay their fair share of state and federal income taxes.
The current executive branch and the Congress it controls have failed us. We need a change. Vote for federal and state politicians who will take these actions, and others, to make our country and lives better.
Carl A. “Bud” Bodey Jr.,
Springfield
