Online group targets campaign cash
There are several facts that are very hard to accept; these facts show beyond a doubt that money is currently running our country.
Fact: 94 percent of elected federal officials are the ones who raise the most money.
Fact: More than 20 percent of the time of our elected federal officials is spent raising money.
Fact: More than $2 billion will be contributed to those running in the elections of 2012. Much of this money will be unidentified due to the existence of Super PACs.
Fact: Recent polls have shown that more than half of today’s citizens believe that their congressmen and women are corrupt. Money is always at the middle of all corruption.
If you are offended by these facts, as I am, there is something you can do. Go to the website getmoneyout.com. There you will get information concerning a proposed constitutional amendment to get money out of the federal election process.
Sure, it is a monumental task. However, if you want to keep our federal elections from merely being an auction; if you want our representatives to spend their time on important items; if you want less money affecting election results and less corruption in government, this is a place to begin. Join the more than 300,000 who have signed on to this effort and put pressure on Fort Wayne to join a host of cities passing resolutions to support the Get The Money Out project.
CHUCK DOENECKE Fort Wayne
Money eroding political process
Ever since the Supreme Court ruled that corporations are individuals, enormous amounts of money have been used in advertisements. Unions can contribute also. Ever since then, states that have Republicans running them have tried to pass right-to-work laws. This will stop money for the regular guy to be represented in the upcoming presidential election. Unions only represent around 12 percent of the workforce – but they must be some kind of threat. This election is turning out to be a David and Goliath situation.
CONNIE DIRIG Orland
State’s revenue model must evolve
I find your Sunday editorial comments lacking (“Good steps on sales tax,” Jan. 15). There is a full-page ad by “Stand with Main Street” in the paper the same day The Journal Gazette supports taxing Amazon, among other online sellers. Alliance for Main Street members include large retail corporations such as AutoZone, Best Buy, Home Depot, Sears, Target, and Wal-Mart. Somehow those don’t seem like my mom-and-pop Main Street store.
Those large corporations have the tax department to collect sales taxes from everyone, but what about someone who wants to sell their wares but isn’t large enough to understand the myriad tax laws of 50 states and who knows how many individual laws. Give them a pass for the first however-many dollars. Notice it will be small enough not to compete with AutoZone, Best Buy, Home Depot, Sears, Target and Wal-Mart.
The Internet is changing the way to shop, and large corporations are fighting back. Almost all of them are downsizing brick-and-mortar stores and going to online sales. This issue is not about collecting sales taxes but using the government to stop small business competition via sales tax collection. The state needs to rethink its revenue model.
The Journal Gazette should more carefully consider whom it is supporting.
JIM WINGER Fort Wayne
Tax giveback law a sham
Republicans speak with a great deal of puffery when they claim they want to return much of the people’s money (taxes) to us. A law passed barely a year ago guarantees just that. It essentially says if the state surplus reaches a certain dollar amount, then the state would issue a refund to all the state’s taxpayers. Problem is, as it turns out, Republicans never had any intention of ever letting it happen.
Then $300 million is discovered they didn’t even know we had. That puts us right on the doorstep of the automatic refund. Now Republicans are suddenly in a panic and are coming up with a long list of reasons why they need to spend our money rather than give it back to us. Every one of these reasons existed when they passed the law to begin with, mind you, which clearly demonstrates they never intended to ever allow a refund to happen.
The pattern seems to be that Republicans love refunds, as long as their wealthy friends get the vast majority of them. So I say to all the state and national elected Republican leaders: Who is really promoting class warfare?
DAVID WILLIAMS Garrett
