Letters for Sept. 19, 2023

VA patient portal

I will start with a joke: “A doctor calls his patient and explains I have bad news and regrettably worse news. Which do you want to hear first? The patient responds to give me the bad news first. The doctor explains he believes that you only have 24 hours to live. The patient responds “Oh my goodness, what could be worse than that!” The doctor meekly replies, “I meant to call you yesterday!”

Regrettably, this is the status of the VA Care website in Spokane. I had a low dose lung scan taken in December and I had not received the results. In March, I decided I should check the “site” and all I get is a flashing box for my messages. I did call some sort of help site and I had to perform an hour long telephone voodoo-like experience of clearing cookies and going to a dark website which eventually yielded my results. I am going to live, good to know! However, I did not fully document the process because it was so complex and thought this would be fixed shortly, it has not. My messaging is still not working, and I can’t fill my prescriptions.

I’m contacting Rep. McMorris Rodgers. Hopefully she is aware that this is not only frustrating but it could result in 24 hours to live.

Joseph Onley

Newport

Let us arise together

I just finished watching 60 Minutes’ beautiful honor of the Sept. 11, 2001, first responders. It was gut-wrenching. These selfless people literally gave their lives for America. They didn’t dodge the draft, or hide at Yale with a C-minus average. This caused me to compare the unbelievable devotion of these brave souls, and to insert this picture into the reality of today. Where has our selfless devotion to America gone? Can it come back?

In these extraordinarily divided times, I ask: Can we get back to normalcy? To strong opinions open to compromise? To a path where this institution survives?

So I speak to the middle 70%. I believe most of us live there. Yes, I’m liberal. Yes, you’re conservative. But none of us is cuckoo. We need to take a deep breath, and accept that Biden is no cuckoo. And a many few of the GOP presidential runners are not cuckoo. Any, Biden included, is better than the MAGA lunacy. Is Biden too old? Yes. Perhaps the DNC can perform some magic.

So, we need to bite the bullet, resist the cuckoo-clan on both sides of the aisle. We need to vote for the 70%. We need to vote for me. For you. Not for MAGA. Not for the green agenda. Not for old politicians. Not for the status quo. But, for us. For you. For me. For the USA.

George Anderson

Spokane

Art of governing is compromise

The question which will be settled this week is, “Will the Republicans throw the Democrats into the briar patch over the budget.” At this point, it seems like a foregone conclusion as the far right of the House Republican Caucus is demanding cuts to the budget for their cooperation in avoiding a government shutdown.

We have seen this picture before and the results are not pretty. Rather than save the government money, it has proved costly, and further divides an already divided Congress where one party allows a handful of extremists to determine their governing decisions. But if Republicans truly wanted to get control of spending, they would have not supported Trump when his tax cuts, most of which went to the wealthy, increased the deficit by some $8.7 trillion.

The ball is in the GOP court at the moment. If they should decide to shut down the government, voters will remember who did this in next year’s congressional races. With only a four-seat majority in the House, they would do well to reconsider their options. Marjorie Taylor Greene and her fellow extremists are not legislators, but fire breathers. The art of governing is compromise, something not in their vocabulary.

Allen Roberts

St. John, Washington