O’Malley budget cuts spare state employee benefits
Let’s translate more accurately what is really going on regarding Maryland’s latest round of budget cuts. The Democrat-controlled state government plans an avalanche of new taxes, but not before the next election.
To make it until that election is over, the Board of Public Works singles out the most vulnerable citizens for cuts, leaving the real source of the state’s budget problems out of the equation entirely: namely, the overpay of state employees by 42 percent due to retirement benefits that do not exist in the private sector.
These costly retirement benefits mirror those in Montgomery County, where the average county employee’s salary is $110,000 — two and a half times the average personal income in the state. Many of these employees who retire after only 20 years of service receive cost-of-living increases and family medical care (after only five years of service) for life. An employee retiring today at age 42 will receive more than six times as much as his first year’s pension when he reaches his life expectancy of 82.
Tax-free disability awards are far out of proportion to those given in the private sector for similar disabilities. Some are for conditions that would not even be considered disabilities at all by Social Security or the private sector insurance market.
The state’s handling of the current budget mess is enough proof anyone might ever need that liberalism allowed to run amok is toxic. Giving a single party total control is a mistake and makes good government impossible.
Richard C. Kreutzberg
Chevy Chase
Abortion damages women’s health
Re: “Worst ideas of the week, No. 5,” Nov. 15
Rep. Lynn Woolsey, D-Calif., wants to eliminate the tax exemption for the Catholic Church because of its advocacy for the sanctity of human life. Lobbying for life is infinitely better than crusading for death as Rep. Woolsey is doing.
Rep. Woolsey should read the medical literature and at least require that women be informed of the health risks of abortion. She thinks abortion is a great medical benefit for women, but for most, it seriously damages their physical and psychological health.
Diane Hess
Damascus
Justice for Lockerbie victims has been denied
When the only individual convicted for the murder of 273 people in the tragic destruction of Pan Am 103 was released Aug. 20 with a predicted lifetime of less than three months, there was a question as to whether this was a political favor from Great Britain to Libyan ruler Moammar Gadhafi. With three months elapsed and the criminal Ali Mahmoud al Megrahi still alive, the question may have been answered.
Certainly his longevity is not due to the superior medical care he is receiving in Libya, or the enthusiastic reception this mass murderer got from the Libyan people.
Justice has been denied to the 273 people murdered in the Pan Am 103 tragedy. Without any proper explanations, Libya is still protecting those responsible.
Nelson Marans
Silver Spring
