From Cathy Weygandt, Findlay OH: Here to stay

So, the voters have spoken?

A recap: Ohioans have openly supported getting rid of gerrymandering over and over. And now, due to deceptive tactics by Frank LaRose and the state GOP, we will continue to not all be represented. Ohio is one of the most gerrymandered states in the union. We lost a senator who fought for every Ohioan to a businessman without a shred of experience to represent us? And, Americans chose a misogynistic rapist, failed businessman with many felony counts still unaddressed, as he would make America great again? Wrong is right, up is down, laws don’t matter and investigative reports should be hidden, right? God help us all if we survive another term.

We as a nation cannot allow the obvious fascist direction that our newly-elected leader and his cabinet choices are introducing. It is time to be on the right side of history and decry the incompetent, immoral and questionable choices that we are seeing as this new administration is forming. Reach out to your elected officials and let your voices be heard.

This voter will choose to stay “light years out of touch with the majority” if this includes my values system that enshrines justice, ensures tranquility, provides the common defense, promotes the general welfare and secures liberty and prosperity for all. I was taught to “love thy neighbor” which is not defined by color, race, creed nor gender. I don’t believe there was an asterisk next to that commandment in Matthew 22:39.

The Democratic Party will always be relevant and we will not be fading away!

From Roger Kranz, Findlay OH:

Congressman Latta,

I appreciate your recognition of and advocacy for veterans.

However, I feel compelled to remind you of the attitude toward veterans displayed in the past by President-Elect Trump.

In 2015, Trump said this of Senator John McCain who was a Vietnam POW for over 5 years and was brutally tortured: “He’s not a war hero. He was a war hero because he was captured. I like people who weren’t captured.”

As an aside I must note how ironic it is that Senator Lindsey Graham tweeted in response: “If there was ever any doubt that @realDonaldTrump should not be our commander in chief, this stupid statement should end all doubt. At the heart of @realDonaldTrump statement is a lack of respect for those who have served - a disqualifying characteristic to be president.”

In the book “The Divider: Trump in the White House, 2017-2021” by Susan Glasser and Peter Baker, Trump talked to his Chief of Staff General John Kelly in 2017 about a military parade being planned in his honor. “Look, I don’t want any wounded guys in the parade.” Kelly said, “Those are the heroes. There’s only one group of people who are more heroic than they are, and they are buried over in Arlington.” Trump replied, “I don’t want them. It doesn’t look good for me.”

In 2023, General Kelly described Trump as “A person that thinks those who defend their country in uniform, or are shot down or seriously wounded in combat, or spend years being tortured as POWs are all ‘suckers’ because ‘there is nothing in it for them.’ A person that did not want to be seen in the presence of military amputees because ‘it doesn’t look good for me.’ A person who demonstrated open contempt for a Gold Star family – for all Gold Star families – on TV during the 2016 campaign, and rants that our most precious heroes who gave their lives in America’s defense are ‘losers’ and wouldn’t visit their graves in France.”

Congressman, I hope you will remember Trump’s attitudes towards veterans and all the other terrible flaws of the President-Elect during the next four years. My family and I are fearful for our country. Despite the fact that you twice declined to impeach Trump the first time he was President, we trust that you will work for what is best for America and not what benefits MAGA, your party or the President.

From Roger Kranz, Findlay OH:

Senator Vance, I write to express outrage at your handling of the problems in Springfield.
On Sept. 9 & 10, you posted on X about pets abducted and eaten by Haitian migrants.
Did you attempt to verify these inflammatory rumors before throwing them on the internet?
You wrote: “It's possible, of course, that all of these rumors will turn out to be false.”
But you concluded: “Keep the cat memes flowing.”
Finally, during a CNN interview that night, you said: “this town has been ravaged by 20,000 migrants…it’s interesting that the media didn’t care about the carnage wrought by [Kamala Harris’s] policies until we turned it into a meme about cats…IF WE HAVE TO MEME ABOUT IT TO GET THE MEDIA TO CARE WE’RE GOING TO KEEP ON DOING IT.”
It’s justifiable to promote outrageous rumors to get the media to pay attention? Or was it to use Springfield as a “talking point for immigration reform” as Clark County Commission President Melanie Flax Wilt said in the Springfield News-Sun?
https://www.springfieldnewssun.com/news/springfield-leaders-reject-recent-wild-haitian-rumors-focus-on-few-key-problems/B7523FC6BVGYRNQDX7LXK3NVKM/
I wonder how as a Senator of Ohio you think this is serving Springfield?

Link to entire Putnam County Sentinel interview: https://www.putnamsentinel.com/online_features/congressman-bob-latta-visits-pc-sentinel-office-to-discuss-energy-broadband-and-the-border/article_0f2ad826-5c43-5a66-bbd7-8ffdf7f9932a.html

Comment by Roger Kranz, Findlay OH:

I appreciated your article about Congressman Latta’s visit to Putnam County, but I must fact-check two of Mr. Latta’s statements.

1.) “The congressman noted that it was a shame that the Keystone XL, the previously proposed extension of the Keystone pipeline system, had been canceled by President Biden.”

The history of the Keystone pipeline was a long and torturous one through the Obama and Trump administrations before finally being terminated by President Biden on his first day in office. The pipeline was opposed by Native Americans whose tribal lands were part of the pipeline route. There were numerous environmental concerns including the danger of contaminating the Ogallala Aquifer, one of the world’s largest freshwater reserves, which provides drinking water for two million Americans and supports $20 billion in U.S. agriculture. There were several leaks and spills from completed sections of the pipeline in 2016, 2017, 2019 and in 2022, 588,000 gallons of crude leaked into a Kansas creek—the largest spill in the U.S. in nearly a decade. It hardly seems a shame that President Biden revoked the Keystone permit.

2.) “Congressman Latta stated that we’ve had almost 11 million people that have crossed [the southern border] in the last four years, and not counted among that number are what is called “gotaways,” which are complete unknowns, possibly a criminal element, that had gotten away from border security.”

I emphasized “possibly a criminal element” because many Republicans under the leadership of their Presidential nominee with the help of their media mouthpiece, Fox News have been spreading the unsubstantiated myth of so-called “migrant crime.” I refer interested readers to the Washington Post article “The Truth About Illegal Immigration and Crime” of 2/29/24. Here are some salient excerpts: “There is strong evidence that all immigrants — in the United States legally or otherwise — are more law-abiding than native-born American citizens. Most immigrants are motivated to do well in their new country, especially if they bring skills that can enhance local economies, and so there is little incentive to break the law. [Two criminologists] surveyed more than two decades of research on immigration and crime for their 2023 book Immigration and Crime: Taking Stock. …Generally they found ‘that long-standing concerns about immigration as a major source of crime are unfounded.’ In fact, communities with more immigration tend to have less crime, especially violent crimes like homicide.”

It's sad that the Congressman would indict “unknown” persons as “possibly a criminal element” without evidence.