Charles Krauthammer, in his article "Stereotyping a fact of life in the political arena" (July 28), says that liberals are stupid. To a degree, he is right. They are stupid enough to stand by and let liberal-haters define who they are. He is right about another thing: stereotyping is indeed a fact of life. His article is a good example of this.
Don't confuse liberal-haters with conservatives. They are neither liberals, nor conservatives, nor honest. I will give them this, they are better communicators than liberals. They have a knack for talking about issues without saying anything factual, often without really saying anything at all.
I agree with Krauthammer that everyone should cultivate self-reliance and all those other good things conservatives value. But there are some situations beyond the control of even the most self-reliant person.
Here are some figures from a study titled "Investing in Poverty," published by Jobs With Justice, a liberal think tank. If any readers want a copy of this study, write to Utah Jobs With Justice, P.O. Box 3151, Salt Lake City, UT 84110.
The Gateway has received $18,500,000 in tax breaks from the city's Redevelopment Agency (RDA) to locate in Salt Lake City. They pay their restaurant cooks $8.49 and their security guards $9. RDA has given Hotel Monaco a $1 million loan at 3 percent interest, payable in 20 years. The hotel pays its desk clerks $7.90, its restaurant hosts $6.80. I could go on and on. But it's plain that corporations get welfare, and poor people pay for it.
There is a cure for this problem: living-wage ordinances. These ordinances mandate that businesses must pay a living wage to get a contract with the city. Some cities have tried this with beneficial results for the economy; see www.acorn.org. The Utah legislature passed a law making living-wage ordinances illegal. So we have a recession in which businesses are not making a profit out of the money the workers don't have, and the state is not collecting the taxes the workers can't afford to pay, and the taxpayer is making up the difference through public assistance. Who's stupid, Krauthammer?
Utah Jobs With Justice is asking the city to pass another kind of ordinance, which will take 1 percent off the bid of any contractor that will pay its employees a living wage. Hopefully, intelligence will prevail.
Leon Johnson
Salt Lake City