Letters on GOP bullies, ‘Obama’ banknote, women’s history, time change

GOP candidates are behaving like bullies

In weeks of watching the Republican presidential debates, I have become increasingly disturbed that no candidate presents real ideas or solutions to solve the serious problems this country is experiencing. There is not one I would vote for. And I have questioned myself about why I continue to watch these spectacles.

It has finally occurred to me that my deeper concern about what I am seeing is an issue that is one of this country’s biggest social problems – bullying.

Over the years, we have seen how that behavior has become an epidemic that has caused mass shootings, suicides and other tragedies. These have filled our TV screens, newspapers and social media. Blaming social media as a factor in this needs to be taken to another level, revealing that this is occurring during debates by men who want to make America great again.

All the positives of focusing on solving the social scourge of bullying seem to get erased when the screaming, insulting, belittling, finger-pointing and such are brought into our homes by men who want to be president.

‘Obama’ banknote

Some in government support eliminating large denomination banknotes ($50 and $100 bills). By forcing the populace to transact with smaller bills, tax evasion and corruption become more difficult and negative interest rates become more feasible. The European Central Bank is already focused on a similar strategy. The 500 euro note is commonly called the “Bin Laden,” because it’s hard to find in circulation and often linked with terrorism.

I believe we should head the opposite direction. Print a $1 billion note and call it the “Obama,” because it’s highly elitist and useless to anybody but the richest 10 people in America.

Learn women’s history

Now that Women’s History Month has arrived, it’s time that our white male historians start telling the whole story about how women got the right to vote. Our textbooks tell us the date of when women were legally allowed to vote, but there often is almost no information about what they had to endure to claim that right.

I don’t understand sexism firsthand, but I know that something’s wrong when women still earn less than men, and many of them do all the child-rearing by themselves when irresponsible men bail out on them. We need to learn women’s history so we can be enlightened about creating a just world.

Time change fix

Right now, most of us spend 7 1/2 months of the year in another time zone. And according to the surveys I’ve seen, about half the people in the United States prefer daylight saving time and about half don’t.

But those same surveys show that about 70 percent of the population find the semiannual time changes annoying and disruptive; they would prefer one or the other all the time.

Maybe I’ve been overthinking this, but perhaps there is a way to please more of the people and eliminate this “spring forward, fall back” thing. Starting on the second Sunday in March, what about advancing the clocks by 30 minutes and leaving them there forever?

This compromise between those who want more daylight at the end of the day and those who don’t might appeal to many. And the main advantage of this would be to eliminate those bothersome twice-a-year time changes. (And, yes, there is one example now of a 30-minute time zone offset from Greenwich Mean Time in North America, and that is Newfoundland.)

This story was originally published March 11, 2016 at 6:04 PM with the headline "Letters on GOP bullies, ‘Obama’ banknote, women’s history, time change."