Dear editor:

Just want to send a huge thank you to Dan Vandenheede for his open letter, “Are you listening, Fred?,” in the March 31 Niles Daily Star.
He so eloquently stated the case for 99 percent of the population who must live with the circumstances dictated by the other 1 percent. It seems like we vote in every election, work steadily until retirement and contribute to the respective pension plans as well as Social Security, and still have to struggle to keep the lights on and food in the refrigerator in our senior years.
Not everyone is taking cruises and traveling around the world in their retirement. Many of us have been trying to help our children and their families stay out of the welfare system in this lousy economy, while those at the top — many who were responsible for the near-collapse — have been again receiving big bonuses for doing a poor job. And they are advocates of “merit pay” for everyone else. Go figure.
At the moment, we are blessed with reasonable good health and have good health insurance with a prescription plan for which we are very grateful, but still have to pay nearly $300 per month for medications. Now, those in the majority in the Senate and House want to start whacking away at that, too. Dan mentioned that we do need to have some reform in Social Security as this huge crop of baby boomers begin to collect, etc. That may be true, but we must also remember that if Social Security had been kept for what it was intended in the beginning and not dipped into for this and that through the years, just perhaps the fund would be in better shape today.
I, too, would like to have talked to Fred in person, but there definitely wouldn’t have been the time for me to share the things concerning me either. Thanks again, Dan, for putting it all together. It has surely made me sick to watch the middle class just disappear before my eyes, while the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.

Sincerely,

Eleanor D. Fisher
Niles