MAILBAG - Oct. 11, 2008

Don’t let Fed off the hook for recession

Regarding “The end of the beginning of money woes,” Pol Position, Oct. 4:

Rep. Adam Schiff and apparently everyone else are overlooking the actual cause of this crisis. It was the actions of the Federal Reserve lowering the interest rates to 1% that was the genesis of the problem.

If interest rates had remained at 3% to 4%, how many of the sub-prime borrowers could have afforded even the payments on a “teaser-rate” loan? My guess is there would have been many thousands fewer loans made that are now defaulting.

Would there have been a recession at the time? Undoubtedly. That is the price to be paid for credit booms. But to try to solve the correction with more credit only leads to the situation we face now — a global financial and economic meltdown.

So while Wall Street undoubtedly needs more regulation, you need to look at the real source of the problem — the Federal Reserve. It should not be the job of the Federal Reserve to try to manage the economy with interest rates. Its job is to create stability by not allowing increases in the money supply that exceed the growth of goods and services in the economy.

RANDALL WISE

Glendale

Marriage sanctified? Not so fast, people

Proposition 8 is one of the most bigoted acts to ever pollute our lives because it supports the oppression of a group of people considered different than the norm.

We have the religious right wing trying to tell us how to run our political system in order to oppress another group of people that they consider inferior. How is this any different than the Jim Crow laws that plagued our country between 1876 and 1965? And what happened to the separation of church and state?

Proposition 8 is not about protecting the sanctity of marriage. Where is the sanctity when more than 50% of all marriages now end in divorce, while one in five never-married women ages 15 to 44 is a single mother, and 20% of those are raising three or more children alone? And let’s not even get into all the deadbeat parents out there who are spreading their seeds without any thought to paying child support — forcing the taxpayers to raise their kids.

Does the religious right really think it will convince an educated public that a family with two loving same-sex parents is worse than being raised by some of these so-called straight parents out there?

This really is not a gay issue; it is an issue of denying a group of people their basic civil liberties guaranteed to all of us by our Constitution.

Let’s finally put all the bigoted attitudes to bed and allow everyone to live their lives as they see fit, without Big Brother and the religious right telling us how to live our “free” lives.

Vote no on Proposition 8 — anything else would be un-American.

JIRAYR BOYNERIAN

Glendale

Not quite springtime for San Fernando

I watched Tuesday’s redevelopment meeting and, although I was pleased to hear there might be landscaping by Christmas, the quality will be lacking due to $700,000 squandered on start-and-stop construction, fences installed and removed, etc. Would it not have been prudent to have all interested parties on board before any construction was started?

Due to the “wasted money,” we now are expected to accept saplings with 1- to 2-inch trunks that will not be trees for years, and bumps instead of bushes. San Fernando Road is not only important to area residents, but also used by thousands of drivers each day.

Maybe we should ask the landscaper of Burbank’s center islands for suggestions, or better yet, hire Laura Friedman’s husband. I would feel much better with a professional landscaper who has a vested interest in Glendale rather than staff picking out trees, as Public Works Director Steve Zurn suggested.

I hope the city has learned a valuable lesson. Too bad it’s at the expense of residents.

JUDY TAYLOR

Glendale