Writer thinks many elected to public office under-qualified



Dear Editor,

One thing that has always puzzled me in how grossly under qualified people have been elected to our public offices.

The answer has to be that the voters are unaware of the ignorance because nobody is vetting any of the candidates for office. Our paper, the Democrat, does a pathetic job of informing citizens about the qualifications, background and experience of the candidates for office. I had hoped the Weatherford Telegram might fill the void, but they have been a disappointment. The other magazines and papers are merely propaganda outlets.

The last city election was a joke. They would not even allow the challengers to face the incumbents in a public debate, let alone tell the voters just what the qualifications and history was. Our population demographics have changed drastically over recent years and the people simply do not know who the people running for offices are. The result has been a continuation of the uneducated, unlearned regime.

What might educate the populous is a televised debate with an outside moderator. The city hall already has the cable channel dedicated to them alone. Bring the incumbents and challengers face to face in an intelligent debate where the citizens can see for themselves just what they would be voting for. Televise the debate; don’t just broadcast it like the council is currently doing. Let the people actually see and hear those who would be representing them. Publicize the event broadly before the debate so the people can arrange to watch.

We have an election coming up in the very near future that the populous is totally unaware of. That would be a perfect proving ground for the televised debate forum. Weatherford College is electing their board of trustees on May 11. Provide the college incumbents and challengers the opportunity to show the populous who and what they actually are before the election.

The city hall is a perfect place to hold the debate at minimum cost and maximum coverage. Do not allow the use of the laptop computers or ear plugs currently in use by the city council to tell the candidates what to say and what not to say. Much like Obama without the Teleprompter let the people see for themselves the real people they are voting for. It is time to bring the elections into the modern age.

Bill Moylan, Weatherford



Writer responds to writer’s response

Dear Editor,

In an attempt to defend his partisan cheerleading of the risibly misnamed Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, Mr. Tilly presents incomplete, inaccurate and fabricated information, even going to the point of disavowing his own authorship.

Citing the adulatory evaluation of Obamacare by the AARP, some unknown “National Associations of Insurance providers [sic]”, and various unknown and unnamed “associations of doctors, nurses, hospitals, and consumer protection organizations,” Mr. Tilly fails to note the extensive financial interests the AARP – the nation’s largest seller of Medigap policies – and, presumably, the various unknowns have in the promulgation and enforcement of the law.

Asserting a significant portion of those opposed to Obamacare object that the law does not go far enough in intruding into the private affairs of the citizenry, Mr. Tilly provides no evidence in favor of this, nor for his claim that the citizenry desires ‘greater government involvement in health insurance’.

Objecting to the cost projections provided by the Congressional Budget Office which, among other things, shows the estimated cost of Obamacare nearly doubling, going from $940 billion over a decade to $1.76 trillion over a decade – Mr. Tilly refers to it as a “long-discredited” source.

Mr. Tilly makes the demonstrably false claim that Obamacare does not start until January 2014. The law, enacted March 23, 2010, “contains provisions that became effective immediately, 90 days after enactment, and six months after enactment, as well as provisions phased in through to 2020” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patient_Protection_and_Affordable_Care_Act). Further, his claim that the 9.5 percent increase in premiums “is actually about two thirds of previous annual increases” is utterly unsupported by the facts.

Ignoring the elementary fact that the federal government obtains what money it spends directly or indirectly from taxpayers, Mr. Tilly justifies his support for the $118 billion dollar expansion of Medicaid on the basis that the federal government will pay for 90 percent of the cost of the proposed expansion – at least until the next funding ‘crisis’ erupts.

This expansion may prove a temporary wind fall for certain states but is certainly a disaster for all who pay taxes

“Beggar thy neighbour” is poor public policy and at a time when the national debt stands at $16.5 trillion dollars supporting any increase of federal and state obligations is not just illogical but verging on the insane.

His attempted defense of the administration’s granting of waivers to the provisions of the law is both ludicrous and directly contradicts his assertion that there is not one ‘negative provision’ in the law. The waivers, in large part, have been granted to companies with insurance plans that do not comport with, let alone exceed, the provisions of the law.

Mr. Tilly attempts to arraign the sources used as ‘right wing’ – an odd designation for, among others, the Congressional Budget Office, The New York Times, and The Huffington Post – and supposedly discredited by “fact-checking organizations” without providing evidence that any of the points raised were inaccurate or false. That he invokes unnamed and unknown organizations and, when misstatements and fabrications fail in their effect, resorts to the ad hominem does more to discredit his arguments than any effort on my part could accomplish.

There is no need to wait until next year to see the effects of Obamacare – they are all around, destructive, and accelerating.

William Picou, Weatherford