Founding Fathers made it difficult to pass controversial laws
Mark Tapscott wrote that the Founding Fathers would be appalled at the notion that major bills in the Senate require 60 votes to pass. Not so. The founders made it clear in their debates that the aristocratic Senate should primarily protect property and temper the “leveling spirit” of the lower house. They would be amazed at the notion that health care is a birthright and that taxes should be used to pay for it. Nothing in the Constitution they prepared would sanction such an idea. The Founders also loved the idea of making federal laws difficult to enact such as judicial review, which has been used many times to overturn acts of Congress. They also required 75 votes in the Senate and a three-fourths vote in the House to override a presidential veto. They clearly did not want to make it easy to pass controversial laws. If these points were not enough, it is important to recall how stridently they opposed both public debt and the printing of paper money by empowering the government to produce coins, not paper money. Thus they would be appalled at Obama’s bill, which creates a new entitlement with an assortment of accounting tricks to hide its deficits that would make Bernie Madoff blush with envy.
Richard C. Kreutzberg
Chevy Chase
EPA is right to regulate hydrogen sulfide
The Environmental Protection Agency is considering lifting the administrative stay of the Toxic Release Inventory in regard to reporting requirements for hydrogen sulfide. Conventional rayon filament producers use carbon disulfide during the manufacturing process and produces hydrogen sulfide. I worked in India for 30 years in two rayon units and know the extent of damage hydrogen sulfide causes to human health. No doubt, EPA is justified to lift its administrative stay since this chemical is highly toxic by inhalation and a strong irritant to eyes and mucous membranes. Daniel Chellaraj
Arlington
Another reader misses Scrappleface
Please bring back Scott Ott’s Scrappleface column! It is one of my favorite columns and was one of the first columns I read when I first picked up The Examiner. I now am a loyal reader, but the paper is not the same without Scrappleface. Mary Kimber
Gaithersburg
