Letters and Comments for March 28, 2009

Letter contained inaccuracies

To the Editor:

I was impressed a few months ago when The Observer staff put out an editorial that said that they would not print letters to the editor unless they were factually true. A letter in the March 24 paper contained several inaccuracies.

The letter, by Roy Hills of Island City, was a diatribe against President Obama. The facts quoted within the letter contained several very obvious errors.

I would think that anyone on your staff would be able to see immediately that the letter wasn’t fit to print under your own stated standards.

Mr. Hills claimed that the Dow was at 11,000 on President Bush’s last day in office. This is patently false. On Bush’s last day in office, the Dow was at or below 8,000.

Anyone who followed the election should be aware that the main reason Obama was elected was that the Dow had fallen several thousand points, that the very fabric of our economy was failing and that the bailouts had started months before the election.

Mr. Hills also claimed that the Veterans Administration was suffering because of President Obama’s stand on funding it. The truth is that Obama’s budget contains a funding increase of $30 billion for the VA.

Greg Lawrence

La Grande