Fact check on Biden blame letter

To the editor,

A contributor to the letters to the editor recently (Feb. 14, 2021) blamed President Biden for: The Talban resurgence, misuse of drones, the border crisis, shutting down the XL Pipeline, runaway inflation and the death toll from Covid. Below is a fact check.

According to Wikipedia, the Afghan withdrawal was negotiated by Trump Feb. 29, 2020 with the Taliban but without the Afghan government. It guaranteed the release of 5,000 Taliban combatants, a US force reduction from 13,000 to 2,500 and withdrawal by May 1, 2021. Biden negotiated a delay until Aug. 31, 2021 but was locked in (Trump's words) to the agreement. The dissolution of the Afghan government during the withdrawal made it chaotic.

More than 1,100 civilians died in errant drone strikes since 2001. Trump reversed the oversight order in 2017. During Trump's administration, Somalia and Yemin were hit 14 times with scores of civilian deaths. Trump made reporting of collateral civilian deaths less transparent by executive order in 2018. Presidents do not directly authorize every drone strike.

The Keystone pipeline currently operates from Alberta, Canada to Houston, Texas with a spur to Peoria, Ill. It transports Canadian tar sands oil, the dirtiest type, mainly to Houston for export. Biden stopped a proposed short cut line that was opposed by most environmental protectionist groups. A US State Department analysis states it would have created 2,000 temporary jobs for approximately two years. The Biden economy produced 6+ million jobs in 2021, meaning there was no net job loss. Its construction would have had no impact on current oil prices.

To maintain that Biden created the immigration crisis is to be wearing historical blinders. Immigration policy has been a problem since 1988. Though not very coherent, Biden's policy is at least more humane because it ended Trump's family separation policy. As far as the immigration crisis being a Covid super spreader event, it is a stretch to lay the blame on immigrants who have little integration with the main population.

However, super spreader events have occurred. They include Trump's unmasked political rallies, antivax hysteria and lack of faith in public health cooperation fomented by right wing conspiracy theorists, 'Qmorons' and the Trump crowd's belligerence toward public health mandates. Actually, Biden rolled out vaccination availability so well that everyone could have been vaccinated by September 2021. The supply was available and free, a united will to cooperate was absent. It's hard to blame Biden for the 10X higher death rate among the unvaccinated.

There are things the writer could have 'blamed' Biden for. They include, decreasing unemployment from 6.7%, to 3.8%. Average wages increased 4.7%. Inflation is 7%, but the ARPA offset ($4 billion for Wisconsin), and average wage increase meant a 1% loss in purchasing power. The IIJA will bring $5 billion to Wisconsin. (No Wisconsin Republicans voted for either bill). The trade war was ended, and Wisconsin farmers received the highest commodity prices since 2014. Twenty million Covid shots were given per month. Finally, America returned to a path of supporting NATO and democracy over fascist autocracy.

(Other sources: Reuters, Bureau of Labor Statistics, Wall Street Journal)

Ron Ginsbach

Elmwood

Slide of destruction

To the editor,

In 2013, historian and commentator Victor Davis Hanson wrote a Real Clear Politics article on presidential candidate Barack Obama’s intent to fundamentally transform America. Hanson thought then that our three-branch system of government would make significant transformation difficult, but large Democratic majorities in the House and Senate had changed his opinion.

In five years, the U.S. grew a $6 trillion debt. Federal taxes headed skyward as recipients of government entitlements and unemployment insurance increased. Balancing the federal budget disappeared as a fiscal goal, annual deficits climbed and in the private sector, interest rates on savings and investments tanked. Healthcare headed down a road to mediocrity with increased regulation and inadequate government reimbursements for providers.

Executive action replaced legislation, while hypocrisy and scandals became justified means to political ends. Benefits for the powerful but not for others and punishment of political enemies- turned-terrorists became the philosophy of winners. Racism, illegal immigration, and political correctness were favored political tools creating a them-and-us mentality and widening the divisions between citizens.

For the first time, concern for the environment, created by controversial data, erased the goals of nuclear and coal production for national security, energy independence, greater American business competitiveness, reasonable consumer prices, and jobs—all irrelevant to believers in hysterical green ideology.

Obama’s foreign policy will be studied for decades, but what remains memorable are a weak stance in the face of enemies, a perceivable dislike for historic allies, a compulsion to acknowledge U.S. flaws, and a need to condemn whatever the country had done outside our borders as imperialist and immoral.

Is it any wonder that Democrats demonized their political opponents well before the 2020 elections, enlisting partisan media to manipulate truth? With their desired majorities won in the House and Senate, they have returned the U.S. to a downward economic trajectory, foreign policy confusion, presidential and agency autocracy, disagreeable citizens-labeled-enemies, and political dishonesty.

Apparently, incompetent leaders are what the American voting majority asked for. Wisconsin needs to jump off the slide to destruction in November and return us to leadership that makes common sense and national sovereignty a top priority.

Stephanie Brown

River Falls

Vote for Dean Bergseng

To the editor,

County board supervisors play a quiet role in keeping our lives on an even keel.

Until the recent redistricting done in Pierce County, I was ably served by Jon Aubart. But now I’m in District 8, with most of the Town of River Falls and about half (Ward 2) of Martell. I’m pleased to know that District 8 is represented by Dean Bergseng, and that he is running again for his seat on the board.

Dean is a long-time dairy farmer who has served his community for ten years as Town of River Falls supervisor, six years as town chairman, eight years as Pierce County Farm Bureau president, and so far eight years on the Pierce County board.

As part of his work on the board he serves on the Ag and Extension, Land Conservation, Fair, Highway, and Veterans committees, chairing three of them.

He’s respected by all who know him. He works hard for the people of his district. I want him to be my representative on the Pierce County board and I hope you will vote for him, too, on April 5.

Maureen Ash

Town of River Falls

Clean energy is urgent

To the editor,

Authoritarians like Putin use fossil fuels as a weapon.

It's time to take that weapon away, and protect our families and our economy, by transitioning to clean energy.

America must urgently move to a clean energy economy that will lower costs, protect our national security, and secure our energy independence.

But America’s power to do that is potentially on the chopping block. The Supreme Court recently heard West Virginia v. EPA, a case that directly threatens our ability to regulate fossil fuels by preventing the federal Environmental Protection Agency from carrying out its fundamental responsibility to protect our health and our environment.

Now more than ever, the American people do not want to reverse decades of environmental progress and legal precedent; we do not want to destroy the tools we need to regulate fossil fuels.

Dependence on fossil fuels weakens the global response, empowers Putin, makes our economy more volatile and our world more dangerous. It's more important than ever that the U.S. lead the world in a global transition away from fossil fuels.

Jo Haberman

River Falls