The Free Press, Mankato, MN

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May 16, 2009

Your View — Wealth should be used to help others

John Bipes, Mankato

The recent Free Press Our View‚ “Lawmakers: Don’t make economy worse,” concluded that the “key will be minimizing the “downside (job loss) risks” to both the “DFL and Republican strategies for balancing the budget.”

It seems that both the Legislature’s and the governor’s actions have not disregarded “economic models and common sense,” each nuanced by partisanship. There’s more at issue than jobs and the economy: The well-being of all Minnesotans — those with/without jobs, the unborn, those growing up, those profitably working and those wishing to be so. Those retired. Those who can’t afford it and perhaps whose days are drawing to a painful end. Everyone.

Christians (are supposed to) know “Love your neighbor as yourself.” The Jewish Torah orders: “That which is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow.” Muslims hold that “none of you truly believes until he wishes for his brother what he wishes for himself.” Even those holding no religious creed state it well, as did motorcyclist Glen Heggstad in “Two Wheels Through Terror”: “... within a capitalist society I see little wrong with struggling harder to get ahead, but there should be limits.”

When everyone is engaged in the race, it’s no sin to strive for victory, but racing against those who are crawling is disgraceful. If there is dignity in wealth, it lies in disguising it and utilizing it to help others. How there can be billionaires while others starve is an issue that needs to be considered, now more than ever.

The Golden Rule in many creedal forms, Heggstad’s wisdom and The Free Press’ compromise proposal for “tax increases as well as spending cuts” all suggest Pawlenty’s stance is weak.

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