Imagine my surprise at hearing the gospel so well preached in your paper!

Imagine my delight that Mr. Morgan knew what he was writing about!

Imagine my promise to you to inform others of your willingness to let a conservative christian say what he believes. This doesn’t happen in most papers.

 

Last week Mr. Dennis Carlson reflected on tax cut concerns “until such time as the divide between the “haves” and the “have-nots” diminishes …”   Without addressing Mr. Carlson’s concerns, this letter is to highlight troubles ahead from today’s policies that expands the” haves” and “have-nots” by supporting the “haves”.  

It’s one thing to consider how we transitioned from a government that did not initially provide taxpayer subsidies to the poor, it is yet another to understand how we’ve come to justify subsidizing the richest corporations in the world at the expense of the comparatively poor.  The book of Proverbs warns: “He that oppresses the poor to increase his riches, and he that gives to the rich, shall surely come to want.”  

Can our local community afford to subsidize Google, one of the richest corporations in the world?  Is this sustainable for our main street businesses, or even our nation? This is not meant to be critical of local government officials for trying to doing their job, it is meant to highlight how we the people must support them by saying no.  It is these discriminatory subsidies to make the rich richer that fuels the socialist flames of today’s politics.

 

Tom Emmer doesn’t care what you think. Emmer showed this on Tuesday at a Becker town hall. First, he selects who is allowed to speak, then he limits the amount of time he will stick around to listen. Oh, and he limits the number of people who can attend by holding his town hall in a venue much too small to hold all the people that come. And he does this at every town hall!

Many people walked away without the opportunity to be heard. And many were standing out in the hall; unable to even get into the room to be seen, let alone to be heard.

The town hall had a great start with Mr. Emmer proclaiming to the crowd, “I work for you.” That’s an easy thing to say, but if he really wanted to live that out, there is a very simple solution: Hold the event at a larger venue and stay longer than one hour…stay as long as needed to listen to everyone that takes the time to show up. You can bet he does this for his Big Donors.

Emmer doesn’t care what you think, but he does a great job at attempting to make it look like he does.

 

As a person who has worked with children in various settings, including being a school social worker, I have seen firsthand the tremendous need for access to mental health services for our youth.  With statistics such as one in five people experience a mental illness, and over half of all chronic mental illness beginning by aged 14 there is a high probability you know someone who is struggling with mental illness (NAMI, 2019).  The result is deadly and preventable with 783 people committing suicide in Minnesota in 2017.   

Currently in the Minnesota House (H.F. 26) and Minnesota Senate (S.F. 269) there is an effort to increase the school linked mental health grant funding by 5 million dollars each year for the next two years.  According to the MN DHS this would allow an estimated 7,000 more Minnesota students access to the mental health treatment they need. 

I believe it is important for to us as a community to come together to address the mental health needs present.  I urge everyone to contact their legislators to educate them on the importance of access to mental health services and encouraging them to support the upcoming proposal for increasing school-linked mental health services grant funding