Dominguez is the right choice
Voters on the Eastside should reelect Jason Dominguez to the City Council. Mr. Dominguez is highly involved with the community and is a true servant of the people. When the recent proposal was made to locate new housing on the Eastside that had not gone through appropriate city processes, it was Mr. Dominguez who stood up for local residents who wanted more participation in this important decision. This is the sort of city councilman the community, especially the Eastside, has long needed.
Mr. Dominguez is in very close contact with his constituents, including Eastside schools and businesses. He is chair of the City Finance Committee and serves as the council liaison to the Airport Commission, Architectural Board of Review and Creeks Advisory Commission (alternate). No member of the City Council works harder on behalf of the residents of his district and the entire city than Jason Dominguez.
Neither of the other candidates in this race can compare to Mr. Dominguez’s record of personal and political accomplishment. Mr. Dominguez is the city councilman the Eastside needs to continue the progress that has been started since his election to the City Council in 2015.
Liz Bustamante
Santa Barbara
Benefits of single-payer
If you could buy a necessary item at a lower price, that was guaranteed for life, had more advanced features, and gave you choice of color and style, why would you buy a less modern item at full price? Single-payer Medicare for All would provide more health care, for everyone, and cost less. You, not your private insurer or your boss, would get to choose the doctors, dentists and hospitals you’d want to use.
You’d pay a tax that you could afford, with 98% of it paying for care. You’d pay nothing additional when you needed care. There’d be no need for armies of claims processers, advertising, lobbying and shareholder costs.
With Medicare for All’s 98% efficiency, we’d have 100% affordability, and complete medical benefits, with no one left out. Administrative savings would lower the overhead costs of care providers and hospitals, thus lowering the amount they needed to charge.
Your current health care “tax,” which is set with no regard to what you can afford, is your foregone wages that your boss pays to a private insurer, plus your share of premiums, deductibles and out-of-pocket costs for services that are not covered. Your coverage usually has gaps, and payment for services are often denied. This system results in only 70% of your “tax” actually paying for medical care, with no guarantee of permanence or stability.
Beware of look-alikes. “Medicare for some” options cannot achieve 98% efficiency nor control cost inflation.
Peter Conn
Santa Barbara
Election key is immigration
I read Tony Krejdovsky’s Sunday letter to the editor (Voices, Oct. 27), and he is, for the most part, right on the money. The big political and social question in the 2020 election will be illegal immigration.
More than half a million people are homeless each night in the United States, a new White House report has found. And nearly half of them, 250,000, are concentrated in one state: California. Thirty-three percent of the residents in California are on some form of taxpayer-supported welfare assistance. Affordable housing for California’s workers is in crisis mode. Several other states have the same problems.
Do we as a country, with over 500,000 people living on our streets and millions of others living in poverty, especially in our inner cities, want millions more of poverty-stricken, uneducated, unskilled and, in many cases, ill people, to come into our country at will? Do the American people have the will to provide health care, food and housing to many of these people, when so many of those already living here, Americans and illegal immigrants, are in dire economic straights?
President Trump is a formidable campaigner and hits base instincts in people. If he runs again, this will be one of the most racially charged elections since the 19th century. Illegal immigration is the crazy aunt in the basement, deep in the minds of millions of American voters — a subject that many do not talk about openly for fear of being called racists.
Mr. Trump will play this like a violin, while the Democrats do not have one candidate at this time who has a better than even chance to beat him. Not one.
Do I have any takers to argue against my points?
Ernest Salomon
Santa Barbara
Presidential job description
From Jon Meacham, Pulitzer Prize-winning author and historian, in his book “The Soul of America,” a notable and timely quote by President Franklin D. Roosevelt:
“The Presidency is not merely an administrative office. That’s the least of it. It is more than an engineering job, efficient or inefficient. It is pre-eminently a place of moral leadership.”
Dan Mendoza
Santa Barbara
Trump fights for Americans
I was mildly amused by the Bernie Schaeffer letter of Oct. 27 titled “Support of the Evangelicals.” In it he questioned the patriotism and later the intelligence of the Christian right and their overwhelming support of Donald Trump in the 2016 election. Are the evangelicals hypocrites?
Admittedly, many Christian voters wrestled with their vote because of Mr. Trump’s immoral reputation, his outrageous behavior, and because we were not sure he was a true conservative. But we knew Hillary Clinton, who was in the public square for nearly 40 years. We knew who and what she was. Given the choice between voting for a known, noxious entity and voting for someone who gave us a ray of hope, it was easy to choose the latter. Fortunately, Mr. Trump has done more than we could ever have expected or even hoped for.
Apparently, Bernie is not happy with the 4 million jobs and record unemployment numbers that have been created since President Trump assumed office. Bernie should be pleased with his lower income taxes, but he is not. How about the economy, the record-breaking stock market, and the 4 million people no longer relying on food stamps? Most important is the appointment of numerous circuit and Supreme Court judges that will interpret the law as written and not create new law. Mr. Trump has done what no other president has done: He fights for the American people, even for guys like Bernie.
John Hammerel
Santa Barbara
An honest soul at Costco
On Oct. 8, while shopping at Costco, somehow we dropped a credit check for merchandise for $88. Once we got to the checkout counter, we discovered it was missing. We were frantic. My husband went up to the desk and relayed our mishap. Yes, it was found, and yes, it had been turned in.
Please, if it was you and you are reading this, thank you, thank you. You have certainly proved that there are still some people that are good Samaritans.
Nick and Claire Sanford
Goleta
Say goodbye to our tourists
One recent warm Sunday morning, I started out on a nice walk in downtown Santa Barbara. Heading up Santa Barbara Street, I happened upon an older couple from Colorado who had just parked and were getting ready to walk as well. I mentioned to them that their four-door pickup and the travel trailer it was towing were both considered illegal within the city, and both vehicles might get a ticket if enforcement happened by. They were totally amazed about that and thought that a law like that would not be tourist-friendly, which I agreed to.
I said that the city attorney had formulated the new ordinance in order to make the streets “safer,” and that the monies brought into the city from the tickets could help pay his $400,000 salary. That really made their jaws drop.
I continued up Santa Barbara Street, and I think they were considering leaving town. Can you blame them?
Dave Blunk
Santa Barbara
