ORIENT

Thank you!

I want to thank two wonderful women who came to aid my wife, who fell face first in an aisle of the Target Store in Riverhead, at 10 a.m. on Friday, April 12. Both came and helped lift her onto a chair, called 911 and waited until an ambulance came and took her to Peconic Bay Medical Center. Ann suffered a cut lip, bruised palm and a fractured femur bone. We are so grateful for them coming to help my wife and how nice they were. Now we are thankful for the care she is getting at the hospital.

Bob and Ann Hulsmann

CUTCHOGUE

I worked hard for what I have

May I add another two cents’ worth of opinion on the subject of student loan forgiveness? Some of us left high school and followed the path of higher education, the promise of a bright future, a good job with benefits and generous vacation time. Those who did sometimes chose to borrow the money to make this happen. So yeah, they went, after having completed high school, to another four, six or possibly more years of extended childhood, going to school and pursuing their dreams.

There was another group who perhaps aimed a bit lower for whatever reason — lack of academic ability, motivation, or just a lack of interest — and chose the trades.

The ability to work physically hard, endure long hours and various climates being the prerequisites. If you worked six days a week, 10 or 12 hours a day, and sometimes seven days a week, you would be able to afford something of a middle-class lifestyle. If you were lucky you got more than one week a year of vacation, but most of us didn’t. We beat up our bodies, sacrificing cartilage in our knees and discs in our backs.

In my case, it was a life I’m quite proud of, and one that has treated me well. But I have spent 40 years working Saturdays at the homes of people who have chosen the easier path, schoolteachers, government employees, people in financial and banking systems. All of which require a college education. I’ve been at their houses while they’re prancing about in their backyards with their children and living what seems to me to be the good life. I’ve never asked for anything from the government except perhaps a little fairer deal on the taxes I pay, but that is a conversation for another day. 

I resent the hell out of people being forgiven their student loan debt. I wouldn’t own a home or a business if I hadn’t worked six and seven days a week for many years in my 20s, 30s and 40s. This is a giveaway to people who chose an easy path and now don’t want to pay for it. It’s Saturday afternoon at 5 o’clock and I just finished working at the age of 63. I didn’t have to but it is the habit of a lifetime.

Jack Gismondi

CUTCHOGUE

Is this 2024 or 1864?

Finally, after more than 50 years of ceaseless efforts, a minority of one-third of the country achieved what they’ve been working so hard for all these years. The Arizona Supreme Court, in a vote of four to two, with one justice recusing himself, revived an 1864 statute imposing a prison sentence of not less than two nor more than five years on anyone procuring or assisting in an abortion except only to save the life of the pregnant woman — a standard undefined. The law was enacted before Arizona was even a state, and at the later stages of the Civil War. To put it in a nutshell, Arizona has now imposed 160-year-old thinking on today’s modern woman.

The abortion debate is a gift to Democrats that keeps on giving. When last anyone bothered to look, women account for more than half of the citizens of this country and no less than 66% of them would allow for abortion in most cases. For many of them, the right to choose is a single issue for them in the upcoming election. And they are not all Democrats by any means. At least 39% of Republican women think their party’s position on abortion rights is too extreme. Many of them will vote for Democrats over this issue.

A test case on how voters will react to the Dobbs decision that overturned Rove v. Wade, followed by the Civil War thinking of the Arizona Supreme Court, will play out right here on Long Island. Our congressman, Nick LaLota, who previously pushed the New York State Legislature to repeal a law that expanded abortion access, has modified his position as the political wind has changed. But his website nevertheless still declares, “I am the father of three wonderful daughters and if called to vote on the issue, would vote on limitations on abortion.” We will have to see if Mr. Lalota continues to “evolve” on the issue once faced with a Democratic opponent who highlights Mr. LaLota’s assault on a woman’s right to control her own body.

The election in November should tell us whether we’re living in 2024 or we’ve gone back to 1864. 

Michael Levy

CUTCHOGUE

Vote wisely in November

Maybe come November, you’ll fill in all the circles for Republican candidates like you’ve always done. Maybe this is because you don’t like Joe Biden because of the kind of person he is or you believe that Kamala Harris is an “evil woman” or that all “liberals” are bad people. Maybe, like 85% of evangelicals, you think Trump has been anointed by God to do great things. Maybe you haven’t really thought about what your vote means in the next election. Maybe you think it doesn’t matter whether or not you vote at all. Oh, but it does.

Here’s what we saw with the Trump regime in 2016-2020 and very likely — no, assuredly — what we will see if he gets elected this time around: Lies. Narcissism. Nepotism. Greed. Accelerated climate change. Incompetence. Disrespect. Xenophobia. Lack of transparency. Further attacks on women’s rights. Further attacks on democracy. More lies. Fearmongering. 

Your vote for Trump means that his world is the one you want your kids to be living in. That it’s OK to hate someone because they’re different from you. That the truth is whatever you want it to be, or that truth doesn’t matter at all. That science is just fiction. That no one’s opinion besides that of Trump himself can be trusted.

Trump does not care about you. All he wants, regardless of the harm it brings to you, your family and friends and to the entire Earth, is to be the center of attention. It is all about him.

Still, maybe you let all this slide because in your mind the biggest worries right now are immigration and the economy. Well, Joe Biden was just ready to sign into law a bipartisan-approved plan to deal with immigration much more effectively. What happened to this plan? Trump called his lackeys the night before the vote in Congress and told them to squash it. By many measures, like job creation and wage levels, the U.S. economy is doing better under Joe Biden than under Trump.

So why is Joe Biden so hated by so many Republicans? Is it because of what we have seen from him during his presidency? Truth. Modesty. Inclusion. Compassion and altruism. Aggressive action to halt climate change. Competence, at a high level. Respect. Transparency. Unequivocal support of women’s rights. Fervent protection of democracy. Truth. Hope for the future. Are these the things you would want for your children and grandchildren? This is the choice you are making when you vote this November.

Stephen Tettelbach