I read a very detailed article explaining why gas prices have come down, and I learned some things. However, I also felt one aspect of the “price reduction” was missing: the tapping of our emergency oil reserves.
As of March 25, the U.S. oil reserves were at 568 million barrels.
According to Bloomberg (March 31), the Biden administration is releasing (I call it depleting) 1 million barrels per day out of the strategic oil reserves for six months (total 180 million barrels).
This will leave 388 million barrels in emergency stock. I felt more comfortable when the USA was the No. 1 leader of oil production, answering to no one.
The six months would end Nov. 1. The general election is Nov. 8. What a coincidence!
Marcia Raley
Brownsville
Term limits
earn support
King Charles III vows lifelong service to his country. That is the problem with monarchy and with most politicians today. They are so addicted to wealth and power that they want to keep it for a lifetime.
That is why American democracy has term limits for our president and governors. We need to have it for Congress members too.
Kimball Shinkoskey
Woods Cross, Utah
Flores
backed
Who is Mayra?
Mayra Flores is a woman who will provide what we in South Texas need.
A real voice for South Texans. She is new blood.
Mr. Jaudzemis claims that we need someone in Congress who will support a higher minimum wage, tackle climate change, fight gun violence and support workers and the shrinking middle class (Letters, Sept. 8). Oh yeah? Well, obviously the current folks in Congress have not worked well on that agenda. Oh, and by the way, abortion is a crime.
So yes. Mayra Flores can get the job done and she has a lot of folks backing her for that reason.
M.C. Garcia
Brownsville
Republicans
receive fire
Now that the economy is looking brighter than a few months ago, President Joe Biden is telling the American people truthfully that the price of gas is going down, many jobs have been created in the short time of his presidency and the red wave claimed by the GOP is not as glowing.
But if the Republicans were to win their only purpose would be to shield Donald Trump from accountability and clear the way for his bid in 2024 and the authoritarian lawlessness. If the goal for Trumpists is to live under a dictatorship, we Democrats who still want a democracy will come out in droves to vote because that’ll be the only way to keep the crazies away from the White House.
That’s my opinion. But with all the crimes being alleged against the Donald, why his political admirers still believe his lies is beyond belief.
President Biden won the last election fairly and legally. Trump lost and he is a poor loser. He still claims he should be in the Oval Office, still implying Joe Biden is an illegitimate president. Wow. I say numbers don’t lie. And the Congress certified the votes on Jan. 6, 2021, period.
Long live President Biden and long live the USA and democracy.
Oscar Garza
Palmview
Benefit system
deemed unfair
I’ve been working on my husband’s unemployment claim for a long time. My husband has worked hard and not been one to get assistance but the pandemic hit us kind of hard, so I put in an unemployment claim for his gig work; they said he could get $207 a week, but lack of contact and communication from the Texas Workforce Commission, Department of Public Safety, ID.me and the lengthy other application processes I was involved in trying to keep from being evicted or having utilities cut off has drug this claim on and on to where I just know they’re going to say it’s too late now.
I had to fight eviction twice. Once while waiting for approved assistance, the other because the landlord jacked up the rent $200 a month. I had to have the constables force the landlord to turn my water back on (he illegally shut it off to force me to pay or get out), had to deal with Reliant Energy turning off my power during the freeze even though they got paid through assistance (they turned it off anyway), a new electric company then “accidently” shut off my power.
Oh, and I got hit by a car riding my scooter in September of 2020, leaving me badly injured and in a lot of pain, fighting depression and weight gain while I was out of work.
My point is, while we are poor and eking by they withhold approved benefits and all along large chain restaurants, the NBA and people like Don Trump Jr., Jared Kushner and Marjorie Taylor Green, as well as lying couples and California prison inmates, all raked in millions of dollars in PPP and unemployment money for this pandemic seemingly easily.
What about this one poor honest guy whose $207 a week was only good for a 6-month claim because rich boy Gov. Greg Abbott (who hasn’t missed a meal over this) decided we didn’t need continued support?
When we thought my husband was going get his unemployment insurance money we pawned his tools and other personal property figuring we’d soon be able to get them out. But with every day I’m paying more and more to keep from losing his stuff to the pawnshop.
What help or relief is there for us little people who are honest? Why are we being forced to jump through hoop after hoop for help but people with means are raking in the relief dollars? Is there a story here I can share in detail to shame them and maybe somehow get some financial help to get his tools and things out of hock? It’s only a few thousand dollars.
Not like I’m asking for millions like all these fraud cases got away with.
Shannon Bryson
Palmview
The future
of yesterday
What will become of the future of yesterday? Of America’s brush with tyranny and with a coup against centuries of stability and sensibility? Will history record the names of those who dared to seek to take the throne of power from the people? Will the chronicle of insurrection and sedition be penned alongside the Declaration of Independence or Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address? Or will chroniclers of history distort and whitewash the malevolence of the raid on our democracy by rabid supremacists of every ilk, who rose from the swamp of debauchery and arrogance like a fog in the night?
History will depend on whether the scales of justice remain calibrated and level, or whether the attempted coup and raid were merely a dress rehearsal in preparation for a full-scale assault against a slumbering giant, naively secure in a false illusion of normality, civility and fidelity.
The future of yesterday, and how history views it and records it, will determine the destiny of not only America, but the world. For if the keystone of democracy titters and falls, the leaning, tilting and tipping democracies across the globe will quickly follow suit.
The voices and faces of would-be oppressors, tyrants and autocrats are loud and intimidating. Louder and stronger, however, are the seedlings of our legacy and the roots of our heritage. The only thing we have to fear is a runaway lie, and those mesmerized by the allure of the trickery and treachery of street-corner hustlers and their three-card monte.
Let’s put our cards on the table. Our future depends on the future of yesterday, and how it was, and is, perceived by history.
Al Garcia
San Juan
