I am a Muni operator and proud of it. We at the Transit Workers Union are not trying stop service improvements. We are trying to stop yet another speedup being imposed on us. Remember, safety is supposed to be the first priority. How, then, is forcing us to drive faster a safe thing? We want service to be improved by actually adding more buses, not by imposed speedups. It is time to stop vilifying us.

Michael J. Benardo
San Francisco

 

Sputnik all over again

The news that America slipped down two notches in the world economy reminds us of the day the Soviet Union launched Sputnik while we slept. That shock woke us up and we eventually won the space race and the Cold War.

Slipping from second to fourth in the World Economic Forum’s annual survey is a wake-up call to all our political parties that we are still one nation. To recover prosperity, our political parties need to work hard and keep civil harmony.

Al Ujcic
San Francisco

 

Don’t reward the rich

As an admirer of the tea party movement, I applaud President Barack Obama’s decision to let the windfall tax break for the wealthy expire. It is a great example of limited
government at its best.

It was President Thomas Jefferson who said that government is best which governs least. Obama has taken this wisdom to heart by not interfering with the tax cut expiration. But, unfortunately, House Minority Leader John Boehner doesn’t get it. While millions of Americans stand in unemployment lines, Boehner wants Congress to waste time on new legislation rewarding the rich. Boehner is like a lot of the good old boys in Washington, D.C., who are out of touch with mom-and-pop America. He needs to be replaced by a tea party activist who loves liberty, freedom and down-home American values — like Barack Obama.

Paul Page
San Francisco

 

Obama is to blame

President Barack Obama is directly responsible for America’s current mess. I say this even though it’s true that when he took office things were already on a downward spiral. But instead of putting America on a corrective course, he worsened the problem. Obama should have immediately begun work on the economy.

Add to this the burgeoning influence of unions and environmental lobbies, and it is no wonder our businesses have left California, going either to another state or overseas.

Theodore Carl Soderberg
San Francisco