A Guy Without A Clue

Here’s a letter to the editor of the Sun that deserves a retort: 

Town, state employees should try seeing how others live

I triple dog dare all politicians, school teachers and just plain faculty, emergency personnel and all town employees here in the entire state of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, to take a pay cut of 50 percent of their pay for one month.  No complaints either on this dare. Just be grateful you have a job. Do this dare for one month. After one month, I want to see each town report as to how much they just saved and how much it helped the budget. This is especially directed to the governor and everyone working for him.  I personally challenge him and for him to man up to his own requests. But just remember, I live on $200 a week and with that weekly amount comes my half of rent, food, bills and cigarettes.  Again, I triple dog dare every last one of you. And the first person to com plain about my dare is “yeller.” Hope Gomes Westerly

To some degree, I concur.  The Governor should give up his private driver and all those perks that make him feel important, yet do little to improve the governance of the State.  Governor Carcieri is used to being wealthy and I do not expect him to live like the rest of us anytime soon.  He’s a spoiled pig of a man and will continue to be one.  Has Rhode Island ever had a Governor that was not a rich spoiled pig? And I will not be surprised when the State and teacher’s unions give up pay increases for the next 3-5 years and start paying bigger chunks of their benefits.  They are, in fact, happy to have jobs and will ultimately do what it takes to keep them.  But there are a number of problems with this idiot letter.

1.  A Chariho teacher went to 5-6 years of college.  They are professionals.  And they would not be doing what they are doing for $10,000 a year, or even $20,000,  as Hope Gomes suggests they should.  I’m sorry if Hope Gomes thinks all our teachers should be flipping burgers.  Clearly his education let him down and his paycheck reflects it.  I’m not sure why he thinks teachers and DOT employees are all wealthy.  They are not, they are middle class Americans.  And many of them have likely seen some degree of poverty.  For a man that does not even pay property taxes, it doesn’t make a lot of sense for Hope Gomes to be crying about the state deficit.  It’s not coming out of his pocket.  As a matter of fact, they are the ones supporting him via the American welfare system, supplying him with an unemployment check.

2.  Adults don’t “triple-dog-dare” each other to do anything.  It’s just not how we behave. I’ll point to his probable  lack of quality education here again.

3.  Mr. Gomes pays for “rent, food, bills and cigarettes”.  I suggest he give up smoking.  He’s probably spending $25-$50 a week on cigarettes.  And if he has that much money for a luxury like cigarettes, he clearly has plenty of discretionary income.  I am assuming that he lost his job recently, as he commands state and municipal employees to be happy they have a job.  Is he spending $50 a week of unemployment checks on cigarettes?

Its much easier to blame others for our failures than to take personal responsibility for them.