TJW Mailbag

Dear TJW:

While reading a local paper (Southern Champaign County Today, 10/11/06), I see that Rep. Tim Johnson won an award from the National Association of Manufacturers. Wow!

I question the newsworthiness of these awards. If you go to nam.org's web site, and download the PDF of who won the award in the 109th house, you see that 224 Republicans out of the 230 Republicans in the house ALSO got this award.

Basically, this award is about as special as the gold star I got for showing up in kindergarten.

Bob Rubendunst,
Sidney, IL
October 12, 2006

And what does NAM want for its gold star? They support the Bush plan to gut social security, freezing the minimum wage, the disastrous 2003 Medicare "Reform" Act, and a menu of extreme environmental depravity (opposing, for example, reductions in the levels of fine particles in the air and mercury in the water, and favoring drilling not just in the ANWR but in the Outer Continental Shelf). This gold star may please Tim Johnson's Republican colleagues in Washington, but it's surely not what's in the best interests of his constituents.