Reagan Veto of Farm Bill

I would like to say bravo in regard to President Reagan’s veto of the farm bill! He is doing what we voters asked him to do when we elected him to his second term.

There are farmers and there are farmers, and some of them got caught in the middle of the recession, but so did many many other people who did not blame the government. I think the entire farm support program has long outlived its usefulness and it is high time the farmer started to take the responsibility for his own business and stopped farming for the government handouts. This goes for other people, too--not just farmers!

JAMES P. ASHBY

Palos Verdes Estates

No one should be surprised that the farmers relief bill has been vetoed. Reaganism is like a virus--no one cares about it until they are infected and then it’s too late.

The President, during his first term, initiated programs that have eliminated the poor, the sick, the old, and the minorities from the mainstream of American life. The targets for his second term are obviously the farmers and the middle class. Fortunately an antidote will soon be available--the 1986 congressional elections.

FRANK FERRONE

El Cajon

Why are the Republican farmers, students, and other interest groups crying foul now? Didn’t they overwhelmingly vote for no taxes, less government, and more defense only 100 days ago?

Both Ronald Reagan and Walter Mondale spoke their economic pieces with clarity and candor during the election debates. Is it possible that those, who complain now, didn’t understand plain English? Maybe the President should fashion a safety net for those with language handicaps.

I give the President an “A” for political courage and consistency in doing what he promised to do. The Republican interest groups that want to change the rules after the test, deserve a “D.” But they can take the test again in 1988.

ALOYSIUS MICHAEL

Los Angeles

How the President of this country can turn his back on a necessary way of life and industry that contributes greatly to mankind, and at the same, keeps a fair balance between private enterprise and corporation, I will never know. But maybe I knew. I didn’t vote for him.

DEBBIE LEWIS

Los Angeles

The priorities of the Reagan Administration are truly mind-boggling. Our strained resources are, apparently, such that we can spare not one penny to save thousands of struggling family farms from impending bankruptcy. Yet, there are ample funds available to pay the contras in Nicaragua to rape and murder innocent Nicaraguan civilians, and to burn and destroy their farms, schools, and hospitals.

SUSAN GUBERMAN

Hawthorne

After all of the bleating and hand-wringing about the federal deficit done by congressional Democrats, they immediately opposed the first effort toward reducing that same deficit by voting a huge subsidy for the farmers. Thankfully, we have someone in Washington who has the courage to veto such irresponsible legislation.

Isn’t it time the farmers stood on their own feet instead of depending on the government to finance their operations? The farmers (and their banks) speculated on higher inflation and on land values rising. They lost. Now they want the taxpayers to bail them out.

Maybe whoever buys up these farms at auction will do more farming and less speculating.

GEORGE H. McCUTCHEON

Los Angeles

Does it seem a bit odd that in two of your front-page stories (March 7) you report opposing fiscal strategies staunchly held by the Reagan Administration? One reported that President Reagan said that “spending must be brought under control.” Yet he also said Congress must release huge amounts of money to support the “Peacekeeper” MX missile.

Please make no mistake. I am not advocating all government assistance or bail-outs, but I am feeling a bit schizophrenic hearing our beloved media manipulator tell us in one breath that Congress is giving away the store, while in the next Congress is sabotaging the arms talks if they do not give him a blank check to build weapons that continue to up the odds on our children’s future.

Sounds like “Doublespeak” to me. I thought we had made it beyond 1984!

LAWRENCE M. JACOBSON

Long Beach

Like the farmer, I, too, perform valuable services, and provide a worthwhile and necessary product. I have a substantial investment in property, education and experience, tools, materials and equipment. In addition, I am required to be licensed by the state, and I operate my business under government regulations at least as strict as those that constrain the farmer.

I have been performing and producing for nearly 40 years. My efforts, and those of the people I employ, have put hundreds of thousands of dollars into the nation’s economy, and without “government” relief or taxpayer subsidy.

Mr. Farmer, weather has from time to time delayed or impeded my work and diminished my income, so that I am sometimes less productive than I would like to be.

Mr. Farmer, I, too, have a mortgage, and I owe money to the bank.

I am not a farmer; I am a house painter. I do not ask the taxpayers to underwrite my purchase of paint and brushes, of ladders and dropcloths, or to guarantee my mortgage payments or subsidize the price of my work, and I don’t think the farmer should either. I’m not “against” farmers; I grew up on a farm. What I do decry is inefficient or inept practices in any industry, which we taxpayers end up subsidizing. I object to government interference in your business or mine.

If you, Mr. Farmer, cannot operate profitably in a free market, you ought to get out of a business for which you are not qualified, same as the rest of us have to. I wish you well, Mr. Farmer. On your own two feet. (Isn’t that the way you’d really rather do it?)

DON RANSDELL

Los Angeles

At long last, Ronald Reagan’s Teflon coating is getting scratched. After four years of personal immunity, he has been directly accused by Midwest farmers for refusing assistance.

In addition, his equating of Nicaraguan contras with the Founding Fathers of the United States or the French Resistance in World War II has added scratches.

To some, this carping may sound like disrespect for the office of the President, but Reagan has defiled and profaned that office, and deserves no respect. Only Warren G. Harding stands close to him in this regard.

JOSEPH C. SASWELL

Los Angeles