Victims of COVID
are all around us
Since March, I’ve listened to my family, friends, neighbors, co-workers and strangers react to COVID-19.
I’ve seen a pattern with the people I love who have been viscerally affected by this pandemic. Two co-workers who were furloughed and not rehired. Another friend who lost his job as a chef and hasn’t been able to see his son, who lives in France. Another friend who hasn’t recovered his sense of smell or taste three months after he got COVID. These are the ones who are most sanguine.
They aren’t weighing in on what the government, the CDC, or people they don’t know should or shouldn’t be doing regarding masks, vaccines or social distancing. They’re looking for work, or they’re working, masked, 8-12 hours a day. I respect them, admire them, and love them.
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Mary Grace Rodarte
Midtown
Foolish attachment to the filibuster
Sen. Kyrsten Sinema says she opposes eliminating the filibuster because it “promotes bipartisanship.” In fact it does the opposite.
In an ideal world, her concept might have merit. But in today’s cutthroat political arena it is a pipe dream and could end up stonewalling any of Joe Biden’s policies that might actually help the country recover from COVID, the economic downturn, and Donald Trump.
Republicans have learned that by using the filibuster they can make a Democratic administration look like it is not delivering on campaign promises, thereby giving Republicans ammunition to win elections. The 2010 election, in which Republicans netted a 63-seat gain, is a perfect example. And it therefore behooves them to use and abuse it at every opportunity to strangle all Democratic legislation and use the resulting inaction to defeat their majority.
So I implore you Sen. Sinema: Get real and support your party’s incredibly important agenda by ceasing your opposition to eliminating the filibuster.
Cathy Hemler
Northeast side
Sinema must empathize with workers’ plight
I am disappointed in our senator, Kyrsten Sinema, who is bullhorning her opposition to an increase in the minimum wage in the current COVID relief bill. Sinema appears to be turning a blind and indifferent eye to the plight of low-wage essential workers.
Puzzling, since the rest of America has had its consciousness raised about how these previously unnoticed workers, now risking their own health and wellbeing, have kept our country from grinding to a halt. The COVID pandemic, for empathic Americans, has focused our attention on these previously invisible, poverty-level essential workers so critical to our communities.
Over a decade has passed since the minimum wage was raised to $7.25 per hour (July 24, 2009). For decades to come, there may not be another nationwide teaching moment revealing how justified and deserved need for a national living wage is.
In this moment, the country knows our dependence on our financially struggling fellow citizens. Seize this moment, Sen. Sinema: Millions of essential workers are depending on you.
Glenn Johnson
Midtown
