The Massachusetts Message

Conservative Scott Brown could not have won the Senate seat in highly liberal Massachusetts without votes from liberals. Brown’s election does not represent a conservative victory or a liberal defeat. It is simply a common sense victory, and I applaud the voters in Massachusetts for providing an inspirational model demonstrating what can be done by citizens in our great country.

Scott “He doesn’t have a chance” Brown campaigned on a promise to vote against the health care bill now before Congress. In my opinion this bill is a financial monstrosity. It is a product of bribery, last-minute deals, favoritism; and the 2000 pages haven’t even been read by the vast majority of our senators and representatives who support it. I hope there will now be a groundswell of support for the common-sense “drop it and start over” suggestion. We need health care reform but we should progress one step at a time, with early emphasis on tort reform and allowing health insurance companies to compete nationwide. Nei ther of these cost-cutting topics appears in the present bill.

I hope Scott Brown will be the first of many soon-to-be-elected officials who go to Washington and truly represent the common-sense people who put him there. Massachusetts has shown that liberals and conservatives can unite with an “enough is enough” theme. I suggest that common-sense Californians remind Senators Boxer and Feinstein and Representative Capps that we have the power to put them into early retirement. We have allowed them to provide themselves with great retirement benefits at our expense. That’s hardly great news, but we can determine when they start using these benefits. If they demonstrate that they don’t understand the Massachusetts message, let’s make sure they begin using these benefits very soon.—Sanderson Smith, Carpinteria

* * *

For the first time in my adult life I’m proud of Massachusetts—and I’m 76.—Don Ricky, Santa Barbara