Clutching our pearls

Letter writer Dennis Pierce in last week’s Telegraph is confused or lacks understanding of the difference between the public and private sector. The writer wonders why liberals don’t get as upset at job losses at a Starbucks or JoAnn’s as they do at the current massacre of federal employees.

As a so-called pearl-clutching liberal, I never want to see people lose their jobs. But in the private sector, people are hired or laid off due to changing market conditions or just poor decisions by business owners. The public sector is different. Federal agencies are created by Congress with specific mandates for the public good. That we, the taxpayers, have invested in these agencies for decades only to have them vandalized and decimated with the stroke of a megalomaniac’s Sharpie should generate outrage in all Americans.

It is irresponsible and immoral for President Musk (who btw, knows nothing about how government works but does know how to mine money from it) to destroy USAID to force the starvation of millions of children. Or to try to destroy Social Security, so Grandma has to stand in line for hours to get an important source of income.

So much for compassionate conservatism, which was a sham anyway. That is why pearl-clutching liberals are upset. Our government may be imperfect, but it works and would work better if billionaires like Bezos and Musk paid taxes.

– Tom Sabel, Lakewood