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Hernando Today

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

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The Tampa Tribune

Published: January 30, 2008

Updated: 01/29/2008 08:33 pm

County Leader:

Reversal Is Needed

Re: County selects new leader, Jan. 24.

The next county administrator has been appointed by a board of commissioners split down near the middle. Everyone wishes him well. Sadly, Hernando has a record of short-stay administrators and long-stay commissioners. A reversal of stays is needed.

A long-stay administrator has time to plan a much overdue, leaner government system and implement it mainly by attrition. Such will cut costs and make lowering of taxes a reality.

Again, space thereby vacated becomes available to judiciary and so eliminates the spending of millions of dollars for new construction.

Short-stay, that is, one-term commissioners do not have time to become cozy, stale and tolerant of staff's lax discipline as well as its low morale and work productivity. Also, fresh minds and innovative ideas are brought to issues increasingly complex. All effort is directed to community needs and not own.

Without such reversal, Hernando, so rich in tradition, may slide into a financial crisis. Recovery is unlikely.

Takeover by a neighboring county could be the outcome. Alternatively, functions of commissioners, administration and department heads could be outsourced to Chindia, that is, China or India.

James A. Willan

Brooksville

Maglio Column

Says It All

Thank you for Dr. Maglio's article, "A Drugged Nation is Not Healthy." Nobody could have said it better.

The recent death of actor Heath Ledger from an apparent drug overdose is just another in a string of celebrity deaths and close calls involving dangerous prescription drugs. Too many of our children and elderly are being needlessly prescribed antidepressants and antipsychotics.

Virtually every teen involved in a school/mall/church shooting spree and suicide was reportedly on these kinds of psychiatric medications. Maybe actor Tom Cruise was right in his rant against putting kids and new mothers on these drugs. He paid a heavy price in the media for having the courage to speak out against this but not has heavy a price as our children and elderly parents are paying.

Ernest Ryan

Temperance, Ariz.

Herbert An Example

Of Lazy Journalism

I read recently John Herbert's column as I usually do and nearly choked on my breakfast. Herbert said, giving his support to John McCain, "You just can't repatriate 12 million illegals overnight."

With all do respect Mr. Herbert, who in the world thought that was the best way to handle illegal immigration? The answer to that is: No one, at least no clear thinking person has called for that.

The proper solution is to do what other states like Arizona and Oklahoma have done recently by cutting off certain services to illegals which has lead to a slow, but steady, exodus of illegals from these states.

It's unfortunate that Mr. Herbert has become another example of lazy journalism or, as I like to like to call it, autopilot journalism, especially when it comes to John McCain.

It doesn't take a journalism degree to research the candidates and if Mr. Herbert and editors of newspapers did their job properly, they would see that McCain is the worst candidate the Republicans have to offer. He's a bigger flip-flopper on the issues than any of other candidate.

It's plainly obvious to me Mr. Herbert that from where you sit is high above the clouds in your ivory white tower. It's time for you to come down to earth.

Peter Stathis

Spring Hill

Romey: A Superman?

Maybe no one I know is more to the left as a Democrat than I. However, in my many years in politics, running for the Ohio legislature, working in New Hampshire for the National Democrat Campaign for John Glenn and serving on the ballot both in Ohio and in Florida some 40 years as a precinct or township representative on Democrat executive committees, I am moving toward being a prognosticator rather than a pundit on the outcome for the presidential race between conservative and liberal candidates.

One would predict that Hillary Clinton will be the candidate for the Democrats, mostly because some 800 (797) super delegates will be the voters to place her in nomination because elections are close in races between Barack Obama and Ms. Clinton. These are the delegates allowed by law who include members of Congress, governors, past presidents and many elected officials and prominent party officials. They make up some 40 percent of the delegates.

The national will among Democrats, at least, would propel Barack Obama into the White House with John Edwards as his vice president. As a team, their message of vision, unity and hope could bring the economy back to life. Edwards is helping Senator Obama win votes as Edwards continues to siphon votes from Senator Clinton state after state. They could speak to the pressures of the moment based on a freefall of the economy suffering in its gross national or domestic product mostly by cautious, skeptical consumer spending and the current credit crunch.

Nonetheless, I predict a surprising victory by conservatives for the presidency. I predict an easy victory by Democrats for Congress and the Senate, but the conservatives have Mitt Romney to win the office of president. Romney will choose a vice president from the ranks of the private sector, not among the political candidates left on the podium. He will be determined to deal with the economy now in a tailspin.

Barack Obama is a visionary much the same as former president John Kennedy. However, idealism over the pragmatic may not be substantive in times when recession may be a prospect for the next three to five years in an economic slump Americans are not accustomed to sustaining. Americans are losing homes, jobs and their savings in the stock market into the thousands of dollars.

Suddenly, pocketbook demands are more significant than the war and concerns for health coverage, education, initiatives for the poor and the domestic market to include Wal-Mart and Autoway. The credit crunch holds the common worker at bay. Purchases now become a major decision by even the ordinary person in every quarter of the nation. Big ticket items present real concerns. The economy is now paramount in the minds and attitudes of every American going to the polls. Party principles are elusive in comparison. Can Mitt Romney fit into the Superman cape and tights?

Maybe.

Deron Mikal

Brooksville

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