Like many, including the President Trump, I have grown fearful of the menace of socialism lurking about in America and think we need to go from listening to talk radio and Faux News to advancing a concrete program of meaningful action.

First, we must ignore our own history: Between 1900 and 1940, over 100 socialist officials were elected or appointed across 348 cities and towns, and 146 cities selected socialist mayors.

Next, we won’t mention that Milwaukee, Wi., under the socialist mayor Daniel Hoan (1916-1940), was considered by TIME magazine as “perhaps the best governed city in the U.S.” and that it repeatedly won national health prizes.

On the other hand, a $5,000 “dividend” (read “bribe”) for voting the right way is pure capitalism in action!

Charles McCullough

I’ve been lectured by the post-nominal crowd as well as others who advocate for socialism. I’ve heard all their sophistic arguments about interstate highways, TVA and Medicare, even the post office and military but with each, the arguments fell short and didn’t turn me into a socialist. I’ve known I was a capitalist since my ninth grade civics class at Northside Jr High with my excellent teacher, Mrs. Mae K. Smith.

Mail service is no longer a monopoly of the federal government, because we have choices. We can choose email, FedEx, UPS and phones to send texts, all the result of capitalism’s free market. Also note: choice is the enemy of socialism.

The Interstate Highway System was not the result of a socialist ‘pipe’ dream. It was an integral part of the National Defense Act of 1956, consistent with the Preamble of the Constitution to “provide for the common defense.” It was enacted and funded by Congress and initiated through the role of the President as commander-in-chief( Articles I & II). Some leftists may spin the military as socialism but the Founders saw it as the means to provide for our common defense and not as a surrender of sovereignty which is also what socialism is.

Gen. Eisenhower marveled at the speed and efficiency the German military was able to move cross-country on the Autobahn during WWII. The U.S. had no such interstate highway system until it was designed and initiated by the administration of President Eisenhower, R-PA. It subsequently replaced the waterways as corridors of population growth and by that it has benefited us all.

TVA was somewhat of a result of leftist ideas but again, at the time, it provided for the common good and security of the nation via the expertise and abilities of the national government making use of waterways to provide cheaper and more plentiful hydroelectric power to many American citizens which they in turn paid for. It wasn’t ’free electric power’ provided by the “benevolent leader” of a collectivist nation.

The same could be said of Air Traffic controllers and the TSA providing air safety but just because the federal government takes a lead doesn’t mean these were social experiments dreamed up by Eugene Debs, Morris Hillquit and the old Socialist Party of America.

FDR initiated a number of socialist-style initiatives and agencies like the CCC, WPA and Social Security. Some served their purpose providing employment and bridges and schools at the time but some agencies are gone now while others that remained have changed.

That brings me to Social Security. Money was taken from my paychecks, without my consent, since I was a teen. A team of bureaucrats determined how much, when and if I would start getting some of it back as well as complex rules about the process. If I was self-employed I would have had no choice but to pay up or go to prison but as I wasn’t, money was withheld, put in a fund controlled by the government and used the way bureaucrats chose to use it.

Someone in this forum suggested those of us who oppose socialism should burn our SS and Medicare cards. How foolish. As money was taken from us for these programs, most of us could not suddenly just make other provisions now. We were hooked into both, by law. Now that…is…socialism.

So voters I implore you to think about how important these next elections are for the future of this nation and your own liberty. Don’t vote for candidates who want to impose a system that makes decisions about where and how you live, how much you earn, how much or how little you eat, how warm or cold you are, your transportation, your career and every aspect of your medical care, if there is any. That’s kind of like it is in prison.

Remember we were once told by a benevolent leader, “You can choose your own doctor?” That was but a sniff of socialism and it stinks.

Ralph Miller