Congressional debate

U.S. Rep. Chet Edwards, D-Waco, and GOP congressional candidate Bill Flores will debate today.

I hope they do not spend their time attacking each other’s character and defending their own. I hope they debate their views on some of the many issues facing us. For example, if there had not been bailouts or stimulus provisions, what do they think today’s unemployment rate would be and why? What would they do to promote job growth and why?

Maybe the Tribune-Herald could influence the debate agenda.

Robert Acrey, Waco

EDITOR’S NOTE: The Waco Tribune-Herald is co-sponsoring tonight’s debate, which begins at 6 on KXXV-TV, Channel 25.

District attorney race

I’m the Republican district attorney for Wood County and I endorse John Segrest for McLennan County district attorney.

As a colleague of Segrest, we secured convictions and life sentences for dangerous felons like Harvey Sossamon and Barney Oldfield, who stabbed five young men on the suspension bridge several years ago.

I’m one of many elected public officials who have been honored to work with Segrest in McLennan County. He’s a dedicated public servant, committed to honest, open government.

Jim Wheeler, Mineola

How tough are we?

My good friend Clifton Robinson had an upsetting column on Oct. 3, “Just How Tough Are We All?” I thought about this a couple of weeks before deciding to respond to it.

How tough are we all? The answer is without question not how tough we are or want to be. Rather, it depends on our very economic situation.

In my 93 years, I’ve learned that our economic situation determines how tough we are. In the Depression when we lost our house, we weren’t very tough. As years progressed I started to build a big business. I got tougher and braver. My radical father, however, never ceased explaining after losing our house in 1929 (I was just 12) that he was scared. He was not tough! He was scared that he could not take care of his family.

Today I have a lot of friends who are scared and with good reason. The top 1 percent of Americans earn as much as the bottom 120 million, according to an abstract from former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich’s book “After Shock.”

Certainly, a good sure method of measuring “toughness” is determined by your pocketbook!

Bernard Rapoport, Waco

Insider trading

Thanks for Clifton Robinson’s Oct. 17 column, “Audacity on Capitol Hill,” which informed me about Congress being above insider trading laws. I didn’t know it, but a congressional representative who trades stocks based on information received from a family member who is a corporate insider could be charged with insider trading. However, a congressional representative who learns in a private committee hearing that Company X will likely be awarded a lucrative government contract and who then buys stock in Company X before that contract is publicly awarded may do so with impunity.

Mike Young, Axtell