Airport
Re “Commercial air service at Newport News airport ‘financially unsustainable,’ report says” (July 3): Has our local government and the “special airport commission” totally lost their responsibility to the local community? Citizens understand that taxpayers’ money is not unlimited and that profitable services are definitely beneficial, however, there is a responsibility to provide residents with basic services. Has our local government investigated the current management of the airfield for unprofitable practices?
As frequent business and personal travelers, many of us remember the days, not so long ago, that the Newport News-Williamsburg Airport, often called PHF, provided first-class air service for local residents. Often the parking lots were crowded with vehicles waiting for their traveling owners to return, and there was a line waiting in the cellphone lot.
Studies are great. However, as a professional analyst, I know that studies are easily influenced to show exactly what the funder of the study desires to express. Closing PHF to commercial air service puts Newport News residents in an air transportation desert. Norfolk and Richmond airports become the only options, and on good traffic days are a minimum of an additional one-hour drive or $100-plus cab fare each way. It is no secret that many local people regularly commute to Northern Virginia and travel out of the Washington-area airports.
Our local government officials are missing out on their No. 1 priority to take care of the citizens. Local officials need to complete another study on how to serve the voters who pay their salaries. Has PHF management focused on the easy way out to make a quick buck?
John Elder, Yorktown
Ban access
Regarding former President Donald Trump’s near assassin, 20-year-old Thomas Crooks was about 11 years old when the anti-Trump, hateful rhetoric and vitriolic speech started filtering through the various media sources. When a young impressionable (obviously weak) mind is repeatedly told that a person (Trump) is “evil,” referred to as “Hitler,” labeled terrible for American democracy and any other number of satanic descriptions, how could you not expect someone to feel it’s necessary to eliminate him?
I’m sure there are some who would give the shooter a free pass. I blame the media for fanning the flames of hate by agreeably allowing it to be fostered in our news cycles.
James D. Darden, Suffolk
Taxes
The IRS announced recently that it has been able to collect $1 billion in back taxes from wealthy tax cheats under the President Joe Biden tax initiatives of 2022. This illustrates the essential difference between America’s two political parties. For generations, the GOP has enabled tax evasion and protected the wealthiest from paying their fair share of taxes. They’ve done so through regressive tax policy and by relentlessly vilifying the IRS.
The claim is that these millionaires (And there are millions of them.) are “job creators.” This may have been true 100 years ago, but much of today’s filthy rich don’t create anything beyond more and more wealth for themselves.
Biden’s tax package was an essential step toward increasing tax revenue from these cheaters and addressing this country’s debt crisis, which grows daily with military aid and climate change disaster relief. A return to GOP control of government will no doubt reverse the progress made so far.
The rich need to be paying their fair share.
James W. Lewis, Chesapeake
Supreme Court
The Supreme Court once again stuck to its guns and made the right ruling on presidential immunity. First of all, the court did not invent this; presidential immunity is in the Constitution via separated powers. Their ruling covers all future presidents, not just former President Donald Trump. They did not give Trump immunity; he already had it.
What the court did is ask the lower court to define what were official acts and what were not. Presidents have been ordering air strikes on terrorists and other bad guys for decades. Is that murder? Is it an official act? Is it justified? Is it moral? All these question could get a president tied up in never-ending legal battles. Our Founding Fathers in their brilliance understood that presidents would be making hard decisions. They decided to protect the president. When the president executes an official act, he or she is not above the law but is shielded from it. Accountability for his or her actions will fall to the voters. Our Founding Fathers wanted the people to be the ultimate judge.
If you think Trump broke the law, don’t vote for him. Many polls suggest right now the majority of voters will vote for him. Go figure.
David Murphy, Virginia Beach
Transparency
When former Attorney General William Barr, under then-President Donald Trump, released the Russian investigation report, it was heavily redacted.
So now Republicans wanted the audio of special counsel’s interview with President Joe Biden. Seems both sides can play the same game.
Gloria L. Ross, Virginia Beach
Trump’s correct
Former President Donald Trump is right that the election is rigged, but the election is rigged in his favor, not against him, courtesy of the Supreme Court and the overall federal court system.
Jack Schmidt, Williamsburg
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