Todays Op-Ed: Wealthy are out to destroy middle class

From the Op-Ed page of the Elmira New York Star Gazette:

President George W. Bush and the Republican Party destroyed the American financial system, resulting in an enormous deficit that has radiated to state governments.

Now aided by the Tea Party, many of these same Republicans plan to balance the budgets on the backs of the middle class. The billionaire Koch brothers, their millionaire friends and the Tea Party want to destroy all public unions, including those of police and firemen. As Rep. Michele Bachmann says, "We are going to take our country back." That's true — back to the Depression of the 1930s.

In the House, the Tea Party is working hard to restrict a woman's right to choose, remove gays from the military, defund National Public Radio, demonize Planned Parenthood, reduce unemployment benefits, repeal the minimum wage and sell Medicare and Social Security to its rich corporate friends. It has absolutely no interest in the unemployed or the cost of health care.

This is class warfare! The Republicans and Tea Partiers are out to destroy what's left of the American middle class.

Jim Goodwin

Montour Fall, New York

That wacky Michelle Bachmann. If everything she is fighting for comes true she and all other women will be relegated to the kitchen, barefoot and pregnant, wallowing in the blissful happiness that only the totally ignorant can appreciate.