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Dear Fellow American:

Here are a number of letters that I have submitted as "Letters to the Editor" to about 1000 major newspapers across the nation.

LETTER AAAAA:

Dear Editor:

Do you want more money in these hard economic times? I do and I am sure you do as well.

With all this talk about capping the pay of corporate executives and appointing a Pay Czar, how about extending the idea to entertainers and athletes?

They are paid way too much.

A-list Actor George Clooney, for example, makes $15 million per movie. Now, compare George’s expenditures to someone earning, say, $30,000. If Mr. Average Joe buys a car worth $20,000, that’s the equivalent for George of only . . . $40.

Actor Tom Hanks makes even more than George, a cool $25 million a movie. So your $2,000 laptop computer is the equivalent for Tom of spending a mere $2.40.

Actor Brad Pitt makes $25 million, too. Your $10 meal at a family restaurant costs Brad the equivalent of . . . 0.01 cents.

Actress Angelina Jolie . . . $10 mill, Actress Halle Berry . . . $14 mill, Actor Tom Cruise. . . $25 mill.

I could go on. And that’s not even mentioning what the stars make on movie merchandise.

Ridiculous, isn’t it?

Yes, they provide good entertainment, but is anyone really worth that kind of money?

It’s time for the Obama administration to step in and use the Pay Czar!

They seem to like getting their fingers in every pie, so how about a mandatory salary cap for movie stars?

Not to mention athletes.

Los Angeles Dodger baseball player Manny Ramirez gets paid $48 million for two years!

Los Angeles Lakers basketball Player Kobe Bryant’s current salary is $21,262,500. Next season it will go up to $23,034,375. Kobe earns $7,203 for every minute he plays in a regular season game. Yes, that’s right: seven thousand, two hundred and three dollars per minute.

It’s time for some wealth redistribution. It's time to spread the wealth.

How about the 15 million residents of Los Angeles County, which includes me, getting paid from the Dodgers and Lakers by "adjusting” player salaries?

When the players are paid, the owners could cut a check every two weeks for each resident as well. It would be just like receiving a paycheck, but in this case, we will call it a stimulus check.

Or we could have lower ticket prices for the average Joe. I'm sure Vice-President Joe Biden would approve. Moreover, how about giving the minor baseball leagues or the farm leagues an equal distribution of the money? Similarly, we could spread the wealth to the residents of cities where there are other professional sports teams.

Another way we could spread and share the wealth would be to lower the prices for movie tickets, sporting events and concerts. Here in Southern California the price for a movie outing with the family is $11.00 per adult. A DVD costs about $20.00. A lot of people can’t afford that. It’s time to lower the prices for us common people.

There are a lot of actors and actresses out there—over 100,000 rank and file members of the SAG and AFTRA unions, of which I am a member, who don’t make a fraction of what the big stars make. They have to wait tables just to make ends meet.

How about the big stars like Clooney, Hanks, Cruise, Penn, and others making a generous gesture and sharing their wealth with fellow members of their profession? And let's not forget former actor and California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. He's expressed interest in returning to the silver screen after he’s finished his job as Governor. I'm sure he wouldn't mind sharing his wealth.

Every time they get paid for a movie, just give these celebrities a fair salary like that of the average American, and divide the rest among the 100,000-plus members. Then send each member of the SAG and AFTRA unions a stimulus paycheck. It would be like each of us are stockholders of the "celebrities."

These actors know they are just lucky and any of the 100,000 plus members of SAG could play the same part in any movie. In fact, I don't think any of these high-paid celebrities would have a problem redistributing their wealth.

Why don’t we just ask them and find out?

As for the sports stars, we should just demand that the Obama administration takes over the running of the whole business. After all, Obama is taking over everything else, so why not baseball, basketball, football, and everything else that moves?

Let Obama of the U.S.A. be owner of the N.B.A. and coach/player for the Lakers. Obama plays basketball, and I'm sure he thinks he is as good as Kobe, if not better, so he could play for the Lakers. Of course, he will need to quit smoking — he’s just told us all what a “dangerous habit” it is — so he can hustle up and down the court and won’t need to extend half-time so he can catch his wind or take a smoke break.

Obama and the Pay Czar can make sure that all the players and coach Phil Jackson make no more than the average American. The rest can be divided up among all the residents of Los Angeles County.

Now there’s a great stimulus package. I’m surprised that the Obama administration seems not to have thought of it.

Well, here it is Mr. President, a wealth distribution plan that everyone can love.

This is real stimulus! Why don’t you try it? It's extremely fair and equitable.

I'll look forward to receiving those stimulus paychecks.

In fact, I'll vote for you, the Boss Obama, in 2012, as long as you just keep those stimulus paychecks coming from those overpaid actors and athletes.

Sincerely,


Steve Mozena

LETTER AAAA:

Dear Editor:

Do we need gray matter to solve California's fiscal crisis?

It seems that youth and inexperience, from Governor Schwarzenegger to our California State Legislature, can't make tough fiscal decisons.

By gray matter, I don’t mean just brains, although Sacramento needs all the brains it can get.

I mean the Gray-haired Grandmas and Grandpas of the "Greatest Generation".

These are the people who have the wisdom.

They survived the Depression, they know what hard work is, and they know what it is to make sacrifices for family and country.

They also know how to save a dollar and cut expenses, and live on less.

When I look at the state legislature, I see a lot of youngsters getting elected. They may be “smart,” but how much do they really know?

Instead of electing the young, inexperiened whipper-snappers, kids 69 and younger who still have so much to learn, maybe it’s time for us in California to only elect our grandparents over 70 years old.

California is in a fiscal mess.

We need Californians who know how to make tough decisions like cutting expenses and surviving on less.

Let’s call on the wisdom of the elders to help get us out of this crisis.

Let our seniors assume positions of power in the California State Legislature and make the tough decisions that have to be made.

Starting now, all Senior clubs and organizations should encourage their members over 70 years old to run for the California State Legislature, and maybe even for Governor.

President Ronald Reagan may have said of Walter Mondale in a 1984 presidential debate that he would not make an issue of his opponent’s “youth and inexperience,” but maybe he should have. 

Certainly we in California should now. 

Our grandparents have done it before, and it’s time for an encore, a repeat performance.

Move over spoiled Californian kids! They have taken advantage of their parents, the California taxpayers. 

Now it's grandparents to the rescue. It's grandparents who know best.

They can set us on path toward solvency and responsibility, so that one day we will be free of debt . . . and in their debt. 

Sincerely,


Steve Mozena

LETTER BBBB:

Dear Editor:

Do you have a family member or a friend who has died of cancer?

Do you or someone close to you have cancer?

This September will mark the 30th year since my Dad died of pancreatic cancer at the young age of 58.

In this past year, a close family friend died of brain cancer, also at age 58. He left behind a wife and 6-year-old daughter. Tragic.

But in the span of approximately 30 years since my father died has any better treatment than chemotherapy for cancer been found? No.

Between 1950 and 2005, there has been only a 5 percent decrease in the cancer death rate, adjusting for size and age of population.

This is in spite of over $200 billion that the United States has invested in cancer research since 1971.

Moreover, has the way we treat cancer with all that chemotherapy changed? No.

Both my Dad in 1979 and our family friend in 2008 were treated with chemotherapy.

Many of us have witnessed the awful effects, not necessarily of cancer, but of the chemotherapy.

Side effects include nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, constipation, anemia, malnutrition, hair loss, memory loss, depression of the immune system, leading to infections, weight loss or gain, and hemorrhage. It’s a long and depressing list. 

Radiation and surgery, also used in treating cancer, are just as devastating.

Is this really the only way we have to treat cancer after nearly 30 years?

Can we shift the paradigm? Can we think out of the box for new treatments and cures?

President Obama has promised to step up the fight against cancer by increasing federal cancer research funds by one-third over the next two years.

But we’ve already spent $200 billion and made little progress. Is it going to be different now?

What we need are innovative studies that shake up what we know about cancer and how to treat it. This kind of high-risk research tends not to get the money because funding institutions fear there might not be anything to show for it after the research is done.

But is there any alternative? It’s time to be bold.

We need new research that doesn’t just refine existing treatments, with no appreciable lowering of the death rate, but actually cures cancer. 

Our goal should not be to further enrich the medical industry and the corporations by producing more treatments that are in some cases almost as bad as the disease itself. 

Come on, there are infinite possibilities for treatments and cures. Sometimes things even happen by accident. After all, Viagra was originally intended to treat heart disease, and we all know what it is used for now.

We are Americans. We lead the world in medical research. Let’s have a national goal of producing over the next five years more than two new solutions to the curse of cancer. But why not more? In honor of my dad, let’s develop thirty solutions!

How?

Like detectives in a murder case, we must exhaust all possible leads.

We should solicit ideas not only from recognized cancer researchers but also from cancer victims and their family members and anyone else who wants to offer a constructive suggestion for a cure. Their ideas could be posted on the American Cancer Society website in an online suggestion box.

Then, cancer scientists can research the ideas and see if any of them might be of use in treating, preventing, or curing cancer. Researchers could report on the results of their studies on the website. Who knows, maybe other medical websites can adopt the same online suggestion box.

At this point, after 30 years of chemotherapy, it seems a barbaric kind of treatment.

In scientific and medical history, there have been many inventors and scientists who made major discoveries and breakthroughs, even though their contemporaries balked at them.

In the 1980s, for example, Barry Marshall and Robin Warren, two medical researchers from Perth, Australia, discovered that ulcers were caused by germs. This was a significant discovery, since it meant that ulcers could be killed by antibiotics.

At first the medical world did not believe them. They did not go to elite medical schools; they were not attached to some large research center. Warren was a staff pathologist at a Perth hospital. Marshall was a young internist still training to be doctor. They could not even get their research published in a medical journal.

But they were proved right, and were awarded the Nobel Prize in 2005.

Just because someone has not been trained at cancer research, it doesn't mean they cannot come up with treatments and cures.

Cancer victims and their families are in the trenches on the frontlines of the cancer war. Maybe they can see possibilities that cancer researchers in their labs may not.

But we have to think differently and take risks in the kind of research we choose to fund.

We should be more proactive in funding medical research, as at the National Institutes of Health, www.nih.gov/ rather than reactive, funding lowering of prescription drug costs for example.

I would like to see the American Cancer Society offer full information on its website about who funds cancer research and what types of research receive the biggest funds.

Perhaps the American Cancer Society could also publicize on its website new approaches to cancer treatment.

Wouldn’t you sooner have a bold new approach rather than pouring endless billions of dollars into research that ends up extending life by only, in some cases, a few weeks?

Sincerely,

Steve Mozena

LETTER CCCC:

Dear Editor:

Don't drink bottled water!

Why?

It's bad for you, specifically, your teeth!

Huh?

Drink tap water instead! You know, from the kitchen faucet, and, yes even from your garden hose.

You've got to be kidding!

Nope.

For years, our government at all levels pushed us to have fluoridated water... and they succeeded at every level. In California, the fluoridation of municipal tap water is mandated. 

Fluoride has been shown to prevent or reduce tooth decay, especially in children.

But many of us now drink bottled water, and even buy it for our children. 

The problem is that most of the bottled water we drink, from Aquafini to Dasani, isn't fluoridated.

In light of how government has invaded our lives at every level, are we now going to regulate bottled water manufacturers and tell them they have to put fluoride in their bottled water?

The answer is much simpler. 

In these hard economic times, we can just tell everyone that the water in our pipes—from the bathroom faucet to our backyard hose—is not only cheaper, it's more healthy for us, so we can stop buying bottled water.

To encourage us, maybe the government can tax bottled water, like alcohol and cigarettes.

Great, another sin tax. Now, it's a sin to drink bottled water not fluoridated.

What's next?

MSG. We were told it was bad for us. Chinese restaurants post signs saying they don't use MSG. But why then do food manufacturers from Campbell’s Soups to Frito Lay’s Chips still use it?

What’s the truth about MSG? Is it good for us or not? Should it be removed from the food supply, or should we tax it too?

I can see the President Obama and the Democratic Congress rubbing their hands with glee—so little time ... so much to regulate ... and so much to tax. 

Sincerely,

Steve Mozena

LETTER DDDD:

Dear Editor:

We, as Americans, should all be wearing adult diapers.

Why?

Because President Obama is quickly taking away our independence as if we, as Americans, are just a bunch of big babies.

Independence Day, July 4th, is almost here, but we might as well have President Obama and his wife Michelle tape on the Depends Diapers because we are becoming more and more dependent on the government. 

We should be celebrating our independence.

But apparently, in the President’s opinion, we, as Americans, can't do anything for ourselves. 

In Daddy Obama's eyes, we are all kids.

In fact, why should we learn to crawl, walk or even run when Daddy Obama will take care of everything?

We need to take a deep breath and remind ourselves that we are not dependent, we are not victims, we are Americans.

What separates us from the rest of the world is our independence, our drive, our ambition, our creativity and desire to win, to be the best.

The system of government Daddy Obama is creating is for losers and victims, and will lead to mediocrity at every level.

We must reject all of that.

On July 4th we celebrate those days when we won our independence from England—no more kings! But now we have an erudite President who think he is not only the current father of our nation but the king, master and ruler over us who knows what is best for all of us.

We are not here on this earth, especially in the United States, to be dependent on any government.

We are independent people. We are free to choose our paths based on our drive and our personal goals.

We are still a young country, a young nation, and we need to grow ourselves, not our government.

We are not children, we are adults, and we should demand of our government that they treat us as such. No government-run programs that take away our right to think, plan, and act for ourselves. 

Obama's not here to change our soiled diapers or the Constitution, he's here to preserve our independent rights as citizens and keep the United States strong, so we, as U.S. citizens, can seek our own destinies, not those that the government lays down for us. 

Can someone let our president know?

Sincerely,

Steve Mozena

LETTER EEEE:

Dear Editor:

Did America just hire a salesman named Barack Obama?

But President Obama is a lousy salesman. He wants to sell his wares to all these big clients, but he doesn't follow through on what is necessary to close the deal.

Only very rarely does anything done in haste have good results.

He should remember the words of St. Augustine: "Patience is the companion of wisdom." 

Salesman Obama has all of these grandiose ideas, but they lack meaningful substance, planning or any strategy.

He has no follow-through. Sales talk, like political talk is cheap.

The hard work is the day-to-day follow through to complete the sale to the end user—the American public. Like the economic stimulus, this costs lots of money and attention. 

But Obama has a short attention span. He’s on to the next project on his agenda even before the ink is dry on the last one. 

That’s no way to run a country. A president, like a salesman, has to deliver. 

Unfortunately, as Americans, we have just been hosed by a lousy used car salesman, and in this case, it's our President.

Sincerely,

Steve Mozena

LETTER AAA

Dear Editor:

Is President Obama’s naivety putting all Americans at risk? 

Will Obama’s foolish view of the world allow our enemies to attack us, with possibly devastating consequences? 

Obama seems to think that he lives in a world in which there are no real enemies, only reasonable people who can be persuaded to act in a reasonable way. 

Obama taught Constitutional Law. He should know as U.S. President that his first priority must be to keep America safe.

I call on him to demonstrate that he is a leader, not a follower of naïve liberals who think the world would be a better place if we could all just talk to each other more. 

There are bullies in the world, just as there are bullies in every schoolyard. 

No matter what you give them, they always want more. When British prime minister Neville Chamberlain gave in to Hitler in 1938, Hitler only wanted more. 

It is the same with today’s bullies in North Korea, Iran and elsewhere. Making concessions to them only makes them stronger and more dangerous. It does not make them more reasonable. 

Don't kid yourself, Mr. President. Don’t live in a fantasy world. You can’t charm everyone into agreeing with you. There are real threats to America. Will it take a destroyed American city, like Chicago, Illinois or Portland, Oregon, the victim of a nuclear strike from Iran, North Korea or a terrorist group, to make you understand the nature of the threat you are dealing with?

Several years ago, we lost a great American city to Hurricane Katrina. Please don’t make us lose another one. 

Don't allow this nation to let its guard down and put at risk the lives of millions of Americans.

Mr. President, keep us all safe. That’s what we elected you to do. We depend on you to make wise decisions. Please open your eyes and see the evil in the world, and do what you have to do to fight back against it. 

This is no time for words and compromises that only arouse the contempt of our enemies. 

Sincerely,

Steve Mozena

LETTER BBB

Dear Editor:

A new word has been added to the dictionary: Mozenaphobia. 

Mozenaphobia is a dislike and/or fear of Steve Mozena by members of the print and broadcast news media and politicians. Like xenophobia, Mozenaphobia is an irrational fear of someone who is different.

When caught, Mozenaphobia has dangerous symptoms: those infected immediately cover their ears and thrust their heads in the sand. They talk more loudly to block out all competing sounds. They lose touch with reality. In extreme cases they take to wearing eye-patches and even blinders, like horses, so they will not see anything that might distract them from their job of cheering on the corrupt political establishment. 

Mozenaphobia, like swine flu, can easily be caught. It can be passed from editor to TV news commentators to politicians in just a few days. 

There is an epidemic of Mozenaphobia right now in the United States, concentrated in a few easily identifiable places: the corridors of power in Washington, D.C., the media centers in New York, and in state capitals around the nation. In fact, wherever the rich and powerful gather, eager to preserve their entrenched interests, there waits the Mozena, a microscopic gadfly that has been identified as the virus that causes Mozenaphobia. 

However, there is no need to panic. There is no need to call in the World Health Organization. 

The cure for Mozenaphobia is easy. Under careful supervision by medical personnel, the earplugs and eye-patches should be removed from those infected. It has been found that the easiest way to do this is suddenly, like ripping off a bandage. The pain only lasts for a moment, and then . . . the light dawns, the truth is revealed. 

What truth is that? 

The answer to what ails us as a nation, the solution to so many of our problems. 

All laid out for everyone to see. See www.postthefinances.com and Anchoring America in Stormy Times: My Voyage to Discover the American Dream, available from Amazon.com. 

Those who have recovered from Mozenaphobia report that they are happier than they have ever been before. They realize that they feared Mozena only because they feared the truth. Now they know that the truth has set them free.

No longer Mozenaphobics, they have become Mozenaphiles. They love Steve Mozena! 

And who can blame them? They have discovered a "Real Reformer for Real Change", and finally they are listening. 

Are the media elite ready to take the cure? Or will it be business as usual, with Mozenaphobia gradually eating away at their brains?

You decide. 

Sincerely,

Steve Mozena, who did you expect?


LETTER AA

Dear Editor:

Are you green with envy?

I'm not.

U.S. "Green" President and "GM CEO" Barack Obama has increased the CAFE standards on the auto companies. By 2016, auto companies must produce cars and light trucks that average 35.5 miles per gallon. Passenger cars must reach 39 miles per gallon. The result will be a big reduction in greenhouse gas emissions.

But why are we so concerned with long-range goals regarding car emissions when so many people die on the roads in auto accidents daily?

If President Obama is going to drive the car industry, let him solve the major problem first.

Aside from Obama's willingness to toss aside Americans’ freedom to choose the color, size, and make of car with these new regulations, Obama should be thinking first of the safety of U.S. citizens.

How about dealing with the here and now instead of the future?

About 100 people die in auto accidents every single day in the United States.

Motor vehicle traffic crashes are the ninth leading cause of death in the United States.

But for kids age 15-24, auto accidents are the leading cause of death.

Moreover, Obama needs to remember safety first. If we start building small cars like the SMART cars, and they get into accidents with Big Rigs or SUV's, Obama should visit the victims’ families and explain to them that their loved ones were crushed to death due to his agenda of creating new emission standards.

The U.S. used to take the lead in auto safety.

But now we lag behind other nations in our rates of improvement.

In terms of deaths per 100 million vehicle miles traveled, in 2002 the U.S. dropped from first to tenth place in the world.

How about creating safer cars for the highways and byways of the United States? How about creating a car that doesn't need to head to the repair shop after an accident?

Do you like amusement parks? Do you like bumper cars?

How about creating a car with a firm strip of rubber, if you will, a bumper bar, around the entire body of the car?

Wow, just think—you could be green and recycle all those old car tires. No more flaming tire dump sites. Not to mention an end to getting dings in your car doors from people parking too close to your car.

I'm sure that current Tonight Show host and car enthusiast Jay Leno, like many car fans across the country, has ideas to solve the mileage, emission and gas challenge as well.

On a recent show, Leno spoke about getting a ticket on a Los Angeles freeway in his Stanley Steamer Car. Apparently, the police had called the fire department because they thought his classic car was on fire, mistaking the steam for smoke. Leno loves cars and has a huge warehouse of them. Ask him for solutions to the car crisis. I’m sure he would have many good ideas. 

Here’s another idea. With alternative car fuels, there could be regional differences, just as there are with food in the United States. The Stanley Steamer would be great for states such as Oregon and Washington because it runs on water. Corn-driven fuel would be good for the Midwest because of the farm belt in Iowa, Nebraska and other states. Southern California and Arizona would favor solar-powered cars because of the year-round sun.

And what about wind power? At 60 miles an hour, wind is racing through the engine. Why not use wind power with a fan and a storage tank in the engine and/or trunk?

Has anyone asked Leno for solutions about how to get better mileage from cars, or how to improve safety? 

Or do we have an erudite, know-it-all Green President who thinks he and the elitist college eggheads can solve all America's challenges? I’m beginning to think he is an educated fool. 

Henry Ford had about a sixth grade education. Thomas A. Edison had virtually no formal education his entire life. Bill Gates never finished college. Yet, all of them were solution-oriented idea men.

Oh sure, Mr. "Feelgood" President may hear and even listen to the American public at town hall meetings and online, but has he implemented any of the great ideas of the common American man and woman he claims to represent, especially those who work in the automotive industry? They may not have college degrees but they know cars. 

As for now, we do have a green president, but not in the way that he would like to be. I mean green as in inexperienced.

Maybe it's time President Obama slows down, takes a deep breath and tables some of his agenda, so he doesn't show his naiveté.

Obama needs to learn the job of the Presidency. The number one priority is keeping U.S. citizens safe. 

In the case of the car industry, if he wants to continue to run GM as the "CEO", he should learn the car industry from the bottom to the top as well.

If Obama's commitment to green is that important, maybe he should mandate the auto industry to paint all the hybrids and related green cars various shades of green only: Lime Green, Rainforest Green, Chartreuse Green, Olive Green, Sage Green, Fern Green, Jungle Green, Shamrock Green, Money Green, Hunter Green...

My message to President Obama is this: Try looking at the whole picture when you make your decisions, not just your personal agenda.

You won the presidency, but remember, that was not a mandate for whatever changes you want to make. Not everyone voted for you.

Your lack of managerial experience is showing up in these half-cocked and rash decisions. 

It appears that although Obama blamed Bush for his strategies and lack of exit plans, Obama himself doesn't appear to be a planner. He appears to make rash decisions, like the decision to close down Gitmo. Now he’s beginning to realize that it’s not as easy as he thought. Well, he should have thought it through before making an announcement. 

Proper Planning Prevents Problems. 

Didn't he learn from the mistakes of his predecessor, President Bush?

Obama has a Blackberry, maybe he should use the planner.

When an experienced manager takes over a company, he doesn't have a fire sale and fire everyone on day one, and he doesn't make major changes. He learns the in and outs of the company. He takes his time, like the tortoise who eventually overtakes the hare. Many of Obama’s ideas are hair brained.

Even now, it is wise to table the healthcare issue. Obama is force-feeding us his green vegetables for change.

Obama needs to take time to solve the problems at hand. Gas prices are going up again right now. Obama needs to do something to help people get to work at a reasonable cost, as well as helping them with the costs of gas for summer vacation.

But with Opportunist Obama, it seems like his attitude is Damn the Citizens. 

All he wants is go full speed ahead with his own agenda. Our President is Obama the Opportunist, taking advantage of this economic crisis, rather than being a president who helps Americans create their own opportunities.

The United States is still the world leader in many ways, yet Obama seems to want to go FEDEX Kinko's and copy the ideas of other nations. 

He seems to think there are no bullies in the world and everything can be talked out. Tell that to the many children across the country who are victims of schoolyard bullies.

Unfortunately, the real bully seems to be Obama himself, who wants to make sure his own agenda is completed, no matter what anyone else thinks. 

Sincerely,

Steve Mozena

LETTER BB:

Dear Editor:

President Obama, you're fired!

Congress, you're fired!

U.S. governmental workers, you're fired!

Of course, it’s not going to happen. 

In this climate of radical change, you'll see the CEO of GM get fired, but you won't see one politician or governmental worker suffer the same fate.

Business owners all across the United States are making the tough decisions to fire and lay off people in these economic times.

But for government employees, it’s a different matter. 

Most governmental workers are Democrats. In the U.S., you're not supposed to pay for votes, but the truth is that votes are paid for by the Democratic politicians to the unions: “You vote for us, we will ensure you keep your jobs.”

Workers in the public sector always do very nicely when it comes to cushy benefits. Fat pensions, long paid vacations, paid sick days, healthcare plans that many others cannot afford, and inflated salaries that are not related to job performance. 

But at some point, these jobs will collapse because there won't be enough private sector businesses or private sector workers to pay in to them.

The problem is that the Democrats are led by the radical left. The Republicans are no better since they are still led by the conservative right. 

What we really need in the United States is a centrist capitalist party. 

We need a system in which nonperforming or superfluous government workers can be fired and laid off just as workers in the private sector are. 

At the moment, here in California we have three politicians who refuse to take tough decisions: Obama at the federal level, Schwarzenegger at the state level and Villaraigosa at the city level. 

It seems that everyone is pointing a finger at the corporations for their failures but no one is holding the government accountable. 

Our politicians need to learn to make the tough decisions.

Jack Welch, former chairman of General Electric, and Donald Trump certainly know how to fire people.

Our elected leaders should take a leaf from their book and do what is necessary for the good of the nation. 

Sincerely,

Steve Mozena

LETTER A

Dear Editor:

Are you stressed about the economy? I am.

President Obama is giving a stress test to 19 banks, and rumor has it that most will fail. I guess this is his version of stress management.

I’m not surprised the banks are failing. And they are passing on all their stress to us, the American consumers and business owners.

For myself, I feel like the banks are inflicting a stress test on me, my family and my family business. Sometimes I think I'm about to have a heart attack from all of these fiscal problems.

Don't send the ambulance or paramedics yet but this has to change.

Banks such as Wells Fargo, Citigroup, US Bank as well as credit card merchant service companies have caused me undue stress over the last year.

The damage to the fiscal health and credit of my family and my family business has been enormous.

You won't believe this story when you read it. But I know it echoes similar stories that many people have about dealing with the banks today because I have spoken to many people.

For me and my family, this has all occurred over the last year.

When I started Mozena Medical I had a great vision of being able to help reduce the costs of medical equipment and supplies for thousands of regular people and healthcare professionals.

Just recently, I saved a doctor about $20,000 plus on what he would otherwise have paid for five new exam tables.

Additionally, I have saved regular folks money with my medical retail store since inception as well.

But I have run into difficulties because of the dishonest way the banks have dealt with me.

Something doesn't smell right. It seems as if the whole financial sector is trying to kill my business.

In short, the banks that have received billions of dollars in taxpayer bailout money have destroyed my up-and-coming national medical supply and equipment business.

What is going on with our banking system? To be honest, I don't know what bank to use to pay my bills or for that matter what bank account to use.

Let me give just a couple of examples that have happened within the last 30 days or so.

My wife made a deposit recently that appeared, then disappeared for three days, and then reappeared, then disappeared for two more days. When we brought our deposit slip to the banking office, the branch manager explained it wasn't a teller or a branch error, but didn't explain how such an error might have occurred. We saw the deposit posted on her computer that day, Wednesday afternoon, but the next day it wasn't there, and finally it was there on the Friday. The unexplained disappearance of this deposit caused my electronic mortgage payment and two car loan payments to bounce, not to mention other checks as well. The bank canceled all the fees and said they were sorry. Oops, then they put in double the amount. Of course, it took them a couple of days to fix that problem as well. This is Wells Fargo, the bank that supposedly didn't need taxpayers money in a bailout. But it got $25 billion nonetheless.

For our commercial property, a duplex, we needed a new roof. We looked at our options, and Home Depot gave us a no-interest loan for one year. Our line of credit was more than the amount needed to meet the charge for the roof. Initially, Home Depot charged half of the price of the job. Apparently, unlike hotels or car rental companies, they didn't secure the other half. After the job was completed, but before Home Depot had charged our credit card for the final payment, Citigroup lowered our credit line, unbeknown to my wife and me. When Home Depot attempted to charge the final amount it was unable to be cause of the lowered credit line. Many of my peers have seen their credit limits lowered as well.

Wasn't the government supposed to free up credit? 

And what happened to that $45 billion in bailout money that Citigroup received from the government last year? Apparently, the banks want the U.S. government to increase their capital, but they don't want to increase or keep it the same for our capital or credit line. I have noticed reductions in several of my credit cards—not increases.

Additionally, I purchased nearly 2 million dollars in stock for a healthcare supply company. The company killed my common stock, and now I have no interest in the company. This doesn't seem legal.

What the hell is going on?

To me, there is something emanating from Washington D.C and the financial sector, and it doesn't smell right. It's not Hamlet's Denmark. It's the American citizens' United States.

Our system is putting the Constitution and our rights through the shredder.

Let me give you some background about me and my business.

After an absence of a number of years I returned to the medical supply field last year and founded Mozena Medical Supplies and Equipment, selling from a store in Long Beach, California, and online through Mozena Medical website. See www.mozenamedical.com

However, soon after I founded Mozena Medical, catastrophe hit my fledgling business.

First, I set up an account with U.S. Bank, and through Costco I set up a merchant service account with Nova, now Elavon.

Then I was hit with credit card fraud in a transaction, for which I blame Costco and Elavon.

When I applied to Elavon to manage the payments side of the business I made it clear that I wished to be approved both for my brick and mortar store and my online e-commerce account. I have e-mail correspondence from the representative reflecting that understanding.

Elavon approved my terminal instore but denied it for my website. Through my e-mails I made it clear that the approval of both my store and online website was necessary for me to do business with them. I reapplied on two occasions but was denied both times. Who knows, maybe this was because of the merger or acquisition by Elavon of Nova.

Then, U.S. Bank allowed Elavon to take money from my different bank accounts. This horrified me and caused numerous bounced checks and overdraft charges.

I had opened the Medical bank account, and got checks, deposit slips and deposit stamps all charged to my account.

I now have some mark on my credit history from Elavon for non-payment, while they ravaged my other U.S. bank accounts to satisfy the debt. I even sent a letter to the CEO of both Costco and Elavon, complaining about this treatment of me.

Also, during this time a transaction I took from Singapore through my website turned out to be fraudulent. This cost me thousands of dollars and led to bounced checks and overdraft fees. Unable to reach any satisfactory resolution, I eventually just closed my account with Elavon.

Then I set up another account with Wells Fargo and First Data Merchant Services for both the store and website.

I then sold nearly $7,000 through my medical supplies store, but I had to wait months for the money to be deposited in my account by Wells Fargo.

First Data pulled the account from me because they said I could not have two accounts for the same business. In fact, later I learned they were actually the same company as I had been using before. First Data had acquired my merchant service company Cardservices, International, my trusted merchant service company for nearly 15 years.

However, I did not in fact have two merchant services accounts for the same business. My Publishing and Medical companies were different businesses. I had incorporated Mozena Medical on the advice of both my accountant and insurance agent for liability purposes, and I opened four accounts. Two were for Supply and Equipment, one for the store and one online, and two were for Rental, one for the store and one online. My merchant services rental accounts were designed to hold additional funds should a renter not return the medical equipment or return it damaged. This is similar to how a hotel holds funds for its hotel rooms.

Again, Wells Fargo made off like a bandit, taking a variety of fees from me, including new checks, deposit slips, deposit stamps, not to mention the monthly leasing charges for the new terminals from First Data.

Similar to First Data, Innovative Merchant Solutions also held more than $8,000 of my company's money, compromising my business.

In addition, my main publishing bank account with U.S. Bank for nearly15 years was compromised by two different check by phone fraudulent charges within a 30-day period, which had allowed Nova, now Elavon, to take money out of my other business bank accounts. Now someone had used my account without my authorization to pay themselves or their company through payment checks by phone.

I was forced to re-open a new checking account and transfer my merchant services account, formerly Cardservices, International, now First Data, to the new checking account. All I was doing was changing checking accounts. I contacted both American Express and Discover merchant account services and they changed it almost immediately. All I needed to do was fax a copy of a voided check and it was completed.

Unfortunately, First Data was now the gatekeeper of my VISA and Mastercard transactions and they said I needed to reapply.

First Data made me reapply because they had purchased my longstanding and trusted merchant credit card servicing company, Cardservices, International. Giving me no real reason, First Data made me sign a personal guarantee under duress. I signed it because I needed my account open; I was in one of the peak periods of the year for my business. But Mozena Publishing is a corporation. I am supposed to have limited liability with a corporation, not personal liability. But I had to agree to their terms if I wanted my cards processed immediately.

I pleaded with US Bank not to close my account the first time. The closure of it embarrassed me with my vendors and especially my clients.

The second time the fraud department at U.S. Bank was more reasonable. They left my account open so I could filter through the honest transactions.

I had a call before work hours from a regional manager with U.S. Bank. I asked him to e-mail me his request for more information in writing. He never sent me the e-mail.

For now, I have postponed indefinitely connecting my website to an e-commerce account as I try to sort out the mess these financial institutions have created for me.

But, all in all, I have had trouble paying my medical supply and equipment vendors, and my credit worthiness has gone, not to mention being unable to set up my local and national business in a timely fashion. I was forced to let employees go and table the hiring of new ones.

I have already helped some, but I can help thousands of seniors, children, handicapped people, and others save money on their healthcare costs just through my medical supply and equipment company. I can also help those in the healthcare profession save money, from doctors to nursing homes, medical clinics, and hospitals.

I sometimes wish there was an attorney who would be willing to represent me to sue these banks and financial institutions.

Will the U.S. government help me get back on track?

Small businesses are the lifeblood of our economy. It’s time we got some real help.

I'm not in business to learn stress management or take a stress test.

I need to help keep the blood flowing to my heart and the money flowing to my company to add to the lifeblood of our economy and help support my staff and my family.

My 6-year-old daughter needs her daddy to be healthy. There's still much time I need to spend with her and so many things to teach her about.

In fact, it would be a great present for my wife to have this fiscal mess cleaned up for Mother's Day, which coincides with her birthday as well.

Personally, I'm doing my best to turn this ship around.

I refuse to let it sink and go bankrupt because of the banks. I am constantly prioritizing my list of To Do's.

They say that laughter is the best medicine for stress, and, I love a good laugh, but this fiscal crisis is no laughing matter.

Sincerely,


Steve Mozena,

LETTER B

Dear Editor:

It's a numerical nightmare.

Millions, billions and even trillions.

$175 million in bonuses to AIG? It’s a scandal of course, but I'm more concerned with where the $170 billion that the taxpayers have given to AIG is going.

The bonuses are only small fractions of this huge amount of money. 

AIG has over 110,000 employees in more than 130 countries, many of which are beyond the reach of U.S. laws. In addition to the punitive taxes Congress is trying to levy, will Congress try to extradite these foreign employees as the 10 most wanted criminals and bring them back to the U.S? 

Can we have a reality check here first? Let’s exercise some common sense. 

The Democratic-controlled Congress may like the idea of a one-world government, but certainly, President Obama and Congress aren't there yet, nor are they Emperors of the Earth or Umpires of the Universe. 

They should stop wasting taxpayers’ money on this issue. It is time to move on.

The more important issue is, how is AIG spending the remaining nearly $170 billion?

No, I don't mean in general terms. I want specifics. Since all the accounting is in electronic format, it would be easy to upload it every day to the Web.

Then we could all see what is happening to our money. It would be just like examining an online checking account.

Post the finances every day! It’s long overdue.

If the I.R.S. were to audit A.I.G., we would know where the money went and how it was spent.
But at the moment, no one human being wants to be accountable. I’m sure there is not one AIG employee who does. And certainly our politicians, from the President to Congress, don’t want to be held accountable either.

President Obama and most of Congress are lawyers. They talk a lot about bailouts and accountability, but they know how to parse words to obscure or glide over the truth. 

Maybe it's time Americans stop electing lawyers as politicians.

With all of these words being bandied about, I feel like I'm trying to solve a crossword puzzle or a doing a word jumble game in the newspaper.

There's all this finger pointing by politicians. I'd like to give all of our politicians the middle finger. They are failing us once again.

President Obama, who was a law professor, is like a schoolteacher—all talk and no action. Obama is fine in front of a classroom-like town hall setting. Maybe he should go back to teaching.

Moreover, he likes the adoring fans in these settings, as his appearance on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno demonstrated. He seems to prefer this to doing the work of the people. 

President Obama is showing himself to be inadequate for the job and should resign. 
Because he likes being a celebrity, and since he has no acting experience—just as he had no managerial experience to bring to the presidency—maybe he should try being a game show or reality show contestant. "Wheel of Fortune" or "Hole in the Wall" might suit him well. Maybe he can find his fortune and crawl into a hole somewhere, leaving a space for a real leader and manager to emerge and run the country. 

People who can, do, but those who can’t either teach, become politicians or even actors.

Meanwhile, it is all adding up for the American taxpayer, both now and for future generations. 

We are accumulating trillions of dollars in debt and we do not have the means to pay it back.

We will be leaving these debts to our children and grandchildren. 

Whatever will they think of us?

Sincerely,

Steve Mozena


NUMBER ONE:

Dear Editor:

In desperate times, people look to desperate measures. 

California is hemorrhaging money and now it wants to squeeze the last dollar out of our physicians in taxes.

Take away their money! Kill the doctors financially—as if they don't pay enough for malpractice insurance!

Is this a stealth way for California to help the Obama administration kill off the strong AMA lobby and get their healthcare reforms passed? 

But what government should first do, before demanding our money, is get its own house in order by showing us that it is using our money honestly. 

The solution is simple: Post the finances to the Web, every day. Then all American citizens will be able to see what government does with our money.

Transparency, transparency, transparency. 

Why pick on doctors? Who shall we go after next?

I know—let's go after the mom and pop grocery shops where they work 12 to 14 hours a day or longer! Usually, these stores are run by Asian-Americans, Koreans. Let's scrutinize their tax books, too. I'm sure we can bleed money from them.

The attitude of the government is like that of New York muggers or a crime syndicate that demands protection fees. We will shake you down, break your legs or kill you, the American taxpayer, if you don’t pay. 

If the government is determined to make up revenue at the expense of the American citizen, what about all the people at flea markets and farmers’ markets who take cash? Do they pay taxes?

What about all the "massage" therapists online? Do they pay taxes on the fees their customers pay? Check out www.craigslists.com, www.la-exotics.com and www.thatmall.com, to name just three of thousands of such websites.

Clearly, the Obama administration is proclaiming that they will go after tax cheats, but a number of the president’s high-ranking selections, including his Treasury secretary, admitted that they had in the past failed to pay their taxes. Do as say, not as I do, appears to be their motto. 

Here is what government should do right now, to help all American citizens. Suspend all taxes for a year, through January 1, 2010: property taxes, excise taxes, state taxes, sales taxes, corporate taxes and personal taxes. Hey, weren’t personal taxes supposed to be only for a limited time?

Then, beginning in 2010, set personal taxes, sales taxes and corporate taxes at a rate of 10 percent. No loopholes. No other taxes.

Simplifying the tax code and making it apply equally to all citizens will go a long way toward restoring this country’s fortunes. 

In turn, the government must act responsibly with our money. No more double standards. No more hypocrisy. 


Sincerely,

Steve Mozena


NUMBER TWO:


Dear Friend:

You are one of the lucky ones who will get to see our President.

I tried unsuccessfully to get tickets for the Costa Mesa town hall meeting; there were about 1,000 people turned away, including me.

I would give my right arm to ask the President some direct questions. 

Read these ideas below and questions below.

If you like any or all of them, please, if you get the chance to ask the President a question, and you don't have one yourself, feel free to use one of mine. I know many Americans share one or all my ideas.

I would like him to know about the ideas I have been generating that will help all of us Americans solve our problems together.

But because I couldn't get tickets, I'm asking you to help me and our country.

These are the some of the ideas and the questions I would like have asked.

1. Create total fiscal transparency by posting all federal, state, and local government finances to the relevant government websites every day.

Q: Mr. President, will you expand the Web site www.USAspending.gov so that it shows every single penny received and spent by the federal government on a daily basis, like online banking?

2. Lower property taxes immediately to reflect the slide in housing prices.

Q: Mr. President, to help homeowners and property owners who are struggling to survive in the recession will you personally encourage local governments to immediately slash property taxes so they reflect current, lower, housing values, thus lowering homeowner monthly mortgages?

3. Help banks offer low interest loans to small businesses.

Q: Mr. President, small businesses are the lifeblood of our economy. As the owner of several small businesses in the Long Beach area, I would like to ask you, will you make it possible for banks to make low-interest loans to businesses like mine?

4. Require politicians to set an example for others.

Q: Mr. President, will you ask local, state and federal politicians to work for free and use no government expense and gas credit cards?

5. Reduce the spiraling costs of college tuition by investing in online education to obtain an undergraduate or post degree.

Q: Mr. President, as a father, I’m worried about the rising costs of a college education. Will you aggressively promote the growth of online education at the state level as a way of reducing duplication in education, cutting tuition fees and improving the quality of our children’s education?

6. Lower credit card interest rates, overdraft charges, and other fees charged by banks and credit card companies to consumers.

Q: Mr. President, bearing in mind that taxpayer money has been given to many banks, will you issue an executive order mandating that no credit cards are issued with interest rates higher than 10 percent per annum, that there are no annual charges for credit cards, and that only nominal fees will be charged for bounced checks, ATM usage and other basic services?

7. Tackle the overcharging and mischarging for medical supplies and equipment that occurs in every facet of federal, state and local government. I am ready to offer my expertise to serve my country. I have the knowledge and experience necessary to tackle this epidemic of mismanaged healthcare supplies and equipment on behalf of our government and the American people.

Q: Mr. President, are you willing to hire me, Steve Mozena, and so help millions of seniors, as well as other American citizens who need medical supplies and equipment, save on their healthcare costs?

8. Solve the problem of the nursing shortage in America. As the baby boomers age and need more and more medical care, the problem is only going to get worse unless we create a solution. According to a recent report, the U.S. could be short of 500,000 nurses by 2025. If we open the doors to nursing programs not only for U.S. citizens but for legal immigrants as well, we will be acting to save lives and protect the dignity of our older people.

Q: Mr. President, if you care about reforming healthcare, will you make sure you have a plan to enroll more nursing students at our nursing schools and also allow hospitals to recruit the best-qualified nurses from here and abroad?

9. Lower gas prices. Here in California, gas prices have risen by nearly $1.00 over the last month or so. Yet oil companies continue to make record profits. In 2008, Exxon Mobil made a profit of $45.22 billion, the largest annual profit in U.S. history. Gas prices should go back to $1.40 a gallon or less. This will give relief to millions who are just trying to keep their heads above water in this current crisis.

Q: Mr. President, you speak of your adoration of FDR. What about Teddy Roosevelt, a trust buster who broke up monopolies? Will you and the Democratic Congress take some action and lower gas prices?

Swiftly implementing these nine suggestions would go a long way to getting this country back on its feet.

I thank you in advance for asking these questions on behalf of me and my fellow Americans.

Please recycle this letter by passing it on to another person or throwing it into the trash.


Sincerely,

Steve Mozena


NUMBER THREE:

Dear Editor:


We, the people, declare "War on Our Government!"

No, we are not terrorists and we do not advocate violence, so there is no need to call out the military. 

We are speaking rhetorically. We just want to rile up those in power. We want them to know that we know what they are doing. 

Though many of us have shed red blood for this nation, we now get wrapped in red tape whenever we deal with the government. Even worse, because of the recent actions of our government, we are shackled with an endless river of red ink for ourselves, our children and for generations to come.

Our message to the government is that you are breaking the capitalist business backbone of our country.

No longer will we be free to rise from abject poverty to riches with hard work and determination.

We are losing the soul of our nation. 

Doesn't it strike you as odd that the politicians wag their fingers at the CEOs for losing billions of dollars and asking for billions in bailouts, when our politicians are spendthrifts with trillions of dollars?

President Obama and even Senator McCain have said they are for financial transparency.

Transparency. Transparency. Transparency.

It’s time to stop the political lip service. Let's have a government that is truly accountable.

President Obama, how about posting to the White House website the daily finances of operating the White House, so they appear like an online checking account?

Senator McCain, post your finances to the web.

Even House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who has recently been in hot water over her alleged excessive use of a military jet (a charge since disproved), should post all her finances to the web.

We have had too much of these hypocrites.

Politicians just don't get it. It's not their money they are throwing around indiscriminately. It belongs to us, the American people.

To me, they are worse than the corporate CEOs. They are taking our money now, taking it from us, from our children and from generations to come. For our descendants, the American Dream will be something they only read about in history books. 

Post the damn finances to the web, before it is too late!

Sincerely,

Steve Mozena


NUMBER FOUR:

Dear Editor:

Speaking yesterday on CNBC Warren Buffett said we are in an “economic war” and that we must all get behind the president. He also said that inflation will increase as we tackle the problem. 

This set me thinking. 

During World War I and World War II, the U.S. government asked citizens to plant “Victory Gardens” in order to support the war effort. Millions of people responded. Americans planted over 20 million gardens and were able to provide their own fruits and vegetables. These gardens produced up to 40 percent of all the vegetables consumed nationally.

Now we are in an economic war, I propose that we all start planting “economy gardens,” so that we can economize on fruits and vegetables, beat inflation, and become more self-sufficient. 

Now, with spring almost here, is the time to start planting vegetables, fruit and herb gardens. 

If you don’t have a backyard, you can plant on the rooftops of apartments, or on a porch, patio, or balcony. 

“Economy gardens” can provide you with fresher, more nutritious food for less money. You won’t be paying the higher food prices that will result from inflation. Because much of the food we eat travels long distances to reach our supermarkets, as gasoline prices start to rise, so food prices will rise too. 

In today's economic climate, we should do everything we can to save a penny for us and our government.

If in the fall you find you have too much broccoli or zucchini, share them with your neighbors. Give them away! 

So many people today are feeling helpless about the recession and worrying about the future. But planting an “economy garden” is something that almost all of us can do, and we can have fun with it as well. The whole family can take part. 

It’s a positive step. Let’s start our “economy gardens” today. 

Sincerely,

Steve Mozena


NUMBER FIVE:

Dear Editor:

Americans are sick! We are sick and tired of corruption in our healthcare system.

If we want to solve our health care crisis, we must solve the problem of waste and fraud.

According to a leading former Republican Congressman, “The current level of fraud is astonishing - perhaps more than $200 billion a year. This robs honest businesses, steals from government, and compromises the care of every American.”

I hope that Kathleen Sebelius, who has been nominated to head the Department of Health and Human Services, has a plan for how to deal with healthcare fraud, but she must know the industry and how it works.

There is overcharging and mischarging for medical supplies and equipment in every facet of federal, state and local government.

I know what I am talking about. I have been involved in the medical equipment and supplies business for many years. It runs in the family. My father purchased a physician and hospital supply company in October 1954, which had been established in 1922. At the time of his purchase, the company had 80 employees with annual sales of $3 million, covering approximately 10 states. I entered the field as a youngster of around 9 years old at my father's company and over the years got experience in virtually every facet of the business, which was based in Portland, Oregon, and Seattle, Washington. On my father's early passing in 1979, I managed the Seattle branch of the company and was a member of the board of directors. Over the years, I learned how to work with manufacturers on everything from price protection contracts to private labeling products from our national buying group, ABCO. My father's company was the number one prime vendor to nursing homes in the states of Oregon and Washington.

After selling the company I worked for the leading hospital supply company, American Hospital Supply, a billion-dollar corporation, at its corporate headquarters in Chicago. Again I learned vital tasks such as how to private label products and to create prime-vendor contracts with hospitals and hospital chains. After this I worked for a $115 million regional company, Daly Drug and Supply in Boston. I was getting the experience needed to develop a national medical company in each region of the country. I now had experience in the Northwest, Midwest and now East.

After finishing college, I moved to Los Angeles, where I worked for FoxMeyer Hospital Supply and later transferred to Phoenix, Arizona. We had been awarded a national prime vendor contract with the hospital chain, worth approximately $250,000 per 400-bed hospital in gross sales. Later, I would work for Bay Area Surgical and Stuart's Drug and Supply in San Francisco, capping off my supply experience in the field. So, I had garnered more experience in the Southwest United States as well as the West Coast. At that point, my regional experience just lacked the Southeast, which I would make up with my acquisition.

About a year ago I returned to the medical supply field and founded Mozena Medical Supplies and Equipment, selling from a store in Long Beach, California, and online through Mozena Medical website. See www.mozenamedical.com

At about the same time I purchased more than 2 million shares in a medical manufacturer in an attempt to take it over. I now own over 5 percent and have reported it to the SEC. The company has sales between $10-15 million per year.

My goal is to create a nationally vertically integrated medical supply and equipment corporation from durable medical stores (DME) catering to the general public as well as selling supplies and equipment directly to physicians, nursing homes and hospitals.

I am also ready to offer my expertise to serve my country. I have the knowledge and experience necessary to tackle this epidemic of mismanaged healthcare supplies and equipment on behalf of our government and the American people.

If President Obama were to ask me to serve, in whatever capacity, I would be able to help millions of seniors, as well as other citizens who need medical supplies and equipment, save on their healthcare costs.

The situation, as President Obama explained to Congress, is urgent. It cannot wait a moment longer.

I’m ready. I’m available. The American people deserve better than they have been getting, and I can deliver the goods. 

Uncle Sam is sick, and so are Americans, and I, Steve Mozena, am the prescription that will cure their ills. 

Sincerely,

Steve Mozena


NUMBER SIX:

Dear Editor:

Are we ready for the collegiate-level educational system of the 21st century?

President Obama touts his administration as being for the 21st century, and he said in his address to Congress he would invest in education.

Here’s how he can do it. Create national and state level online-only universities. Such universities will give students a better education for less money.

This plan would save taxpayers billions of dollars and give students a chance to be taught by the best professors in the nation.

With many states in dire financial straits, reducing the costs of state university and college systems would be a relief to taxpayers.

Considering the duplication in numerous universities and colleges in every state, reducing administrators, professors and staff would save a lot of money.

According to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, this academic year at least 28 states have made cuts to public colleges and universities or raised tuition, or both. California is raising in-state tuition for 2009-10 by 7.4 percent to 10 percent. As tuition rates rise, students are paying more but getting less.

In South Carolina, the governor has even recommended that the state should phase out three two-year college campuses.

Creating an online college is the perfect solution to this problem.

Besides being much cheaper, online education offers many advantages over the traditional campus-centered system. It promotes the development of independence and intellectual maturity rather than prolonging childhood by shackling students to a brick and mortar college.

So much of what goes on in our campus-based colleges at the moment is highly impersonal. When classes consist of more than 30 students, and rise to as many as 500 at many state schools, most students don't even speak directly to their professors, either inside or outside of class. Most likely, they are being tutored and graded by teaching assistants.

Online education can change all this, promoting more direct interaction between students and their instructors. Electronic social networking is becoming more and more sophisticated like www.skype.com, and the tools used in online education are becoming more varied and easy to use.

Professors are now posting their articles on Blackboard, www.blackboard.com, an increasingly popular facilitator of e-learning and creator of virtual learning environments, or on their own class and course websites for free.

Amazon's Kindle, a wireless e-book reader launched in late 2007 and now in its second version, is also being used for such purposes and will soon become as the ipod is to audio cassettes and CDs.

With online education, students can have interactive conversations with the best professors, via a split computer screen, with the professor on one side and on the other the student asking the question from anywhere in the U.S.

Imagine what a thrill this will be for the students to be able to interact directly with the most eminent professors in the nation, who will no longer be just famous names on the title page of a book in their school library, but real professors who are available to instruct them and answer their questions.

Why should the best professors be confined only to the elite schools, where only a relative handful of students can benefit from their knowledge and expertise? In return, these professors should be paid on the same scale as top professional athletes.

Of course, there will still be areas of study such as the biological sciences or chemistry that will need laboratories and brick and mortar classroom learning. But there is still plenty of learning to be done outside of labs, so much in these disciplines can be taught online as well. Moreover, private colleges and universities can develop specialties in those disciplines. But as far as the social sciences and the liberal arts are concerned, they can all be taught online. All testing could be done instantly online. This will enable the U.S. to considerably reduce the number and size of its public colleges and universities.

Some states might opt out of funding collegiate education and completely close down their college and university campuses, while others might decide to increase the offerings of their online-only colleges so that students could obtain a wide range of undergraduate or graduate degrees.

Another advantage of online education is that it fosters competition. Students do not have to enroll in courses offered by their hometown college. They can enroll anywhere in the United States.

And if we are truly thinking globally for education, we can have the best professors from anywhere in the world teaching our undergraduate and graduate students online.

Think about the possibilities. Our students could take classes from world-renowned professors at Oxford University or the University of Tokyo, or anywhere, without even leaving their homes. It would be wonderful to have all these great minds available to our students.

American students could be foreign exchange students without even leaving the country, and vice versa.

This is the way of the future. Many of our universities are bloated behemoths due to new buildings and housing being placed on campuses and the duplication of administrators, professors and staff. These institutions need to be trimmed. Moreover, there are too many campus monopolies on books, food, housing and other services. These functions can easily be handled by online bookstores or on-campus mom-and-pop stores at much reduced costs.

This would end the scandal of overcharging on college textbooks by the large publishers, who charge up to $150 for a textbook. The profits made by these companies are as outrageous as those made by the oil companies. Students should pay for information, not paper and binding. Textbooks and course materials should all be available electronically, becoming e-texts and e-materials for students’ online college classes.

If students still crave a hardcover book, they can print it on their home printer and bind it too. Back in the mid-90's, I sent letters to the CEOs of corporations such as Hewlett Packer that manufacture laser and ink-jet printers suggesting they combine a thermal or tape binder with their printers to create instant books. Then students would be able to print out the book and drop it the printer for an instant tape bind.

With Google digitizing whole libraries, university and college libraries could be closed, and cities and counties could also start to consider closing their brick-and-mortar libraries.

It is only a matter of time before electronic books entirely replace traditional books. The traditional library, with thousands of shelves of books taking up large amounts of space and needing large funds to maintain, will be a thing of the past.

Yet another advantage of online education is that it makes students safer. Our colleges and universities are not the safe havens many people assume they are. Campus violence is a nationwide problem. A White Paper on campus violence issued by the American College Health Association in 2005 found a high rate of rapes, assaults, physical harassment, taunting, stalking, and suicide amongst students. The White Paper reported that between 1995 and 2002, college students ages 18-24, full-time and part-time at public and private institutions, were victims of approximately 479,000 violent crimes annually.

In short, in this era of electronic technology, there no longer needs to be a physical location for any college or university. Online education presents an alternative form of education for those who are self-motivated, for stay-at-home parents, for those who need more flexible schedules, and also those who seek greater safety. Students enrolled in online education would be able to earn degrees at all levels, from associate degrees all the way to Ph.Ds, without having to set foot on any campus.

Sure, there are already online universities but nothing is as far-reaching and has the depth and scope of the online universities that I envision, where you would not even put your foot on a college campus. With these online universities, you would pay for your tuition and books all online, and once you completed your courses for your undergraduate or graduate degree, you could in effect print out your diploma on your home computer on nice parchment paper, frame it, and post it on your wall in your home study or office. 

One final thought. Think about the savings on gas. Think about ending the headache of finding a parking space at a university and avoiding getting a parking ticket. It would also relieve the freeways and city streets of much congestion.

Times of crisis are also opportunities to think big about we are going and how we can better meet the future.

I hope that the Obama administration will have the vision to see the future of 21st-century education and move swiftly forward in promoting online education for all.

In light of the current economic crisis, not only would the change save billions of dollars, but our kids, our children, would receive a better education that would also be less expensive for them and for us, their parents and American taxpayers.

Truly, this is a 21st-century college education.

Sincerely,

Steve Mozena


NUMBER SEVEN:

Dear Editor:

The stimulus package is supposed to bring lots of construction jobs.

But for whom?

Illegal aliens?

Are bonafide, certified, credentialed American construction workers going to get those jobs?

Prior to the meltdown of the housing market, who were the construction workers?

Similarly, how about all that outsourcing of jobs, especially in the financial industry?

Mexicans and Indians are wonderful people.

But do we really want Mexicans here who don't want to learn our language or assimilate to our culture or follow the immigration laws?

Do we really want Indians who have a difficult time speaking English deal with our private credit history?

Enough is enough. We need to stand up and say no more: no more lenience with illegal immigrants, and an end to the outsourcing of jobs that Americans are available to do. 

On the other hand, we do have a shortage of nurses, and that shortage is going to get worse as the baby boomers age and need more medical care. 

Nursing colleges and universities are struggling to meet their enrollment goals. According to a recent report, the U.S. could be short of 500,000 nurses by 2025. The need for nurses is growing at the rate of 2-3 percent every year. 

Bearing in mind that there is nothing wrong with legal immigration, can we open the door wide and invite the best qualified nurses from countries like Ireland and the Phillippines?

I say yes. It will fill a real need. 

Sincerely,

Steve Mozena


NUMBER EIGHT:

Dear Editor:

Ring! Ring! I pick up my cell phone.

"Hello, this is the President of the United States."

No.

"Hello, this is your mother."

Oh well, but in this case my mother is more transparent than Obama.

I wasn't asked to be on the Accountability and Transparency board by President Obama even though I have spent more than 10 years advocating financial transparency in government, including countless hours informing U.S. Presidents, Congress, 50 U.S. governors, 200 mayors of the largest American cities, business leaders, broadcast news personalities, talk radio personalities, celebrities and ordinary Americans through letters published in newspapers, of my idea of posting the finances to the Internet every day. 

The Obama administration has put up a great-looking website, www.recovery.gov, which is designed to explain to the American people where all the money in the economic stimulus, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, is going. 

But so far it says really nothing. It is all generalities.

Transparency and Accountability means stating specifics.

Obama's recovery.gov website looks more like a school kid’s attempt to embellish a weak paper with a bright shiny cover rather than submitting a simple typewritten essay with a staple in the top corner. 

How about a spreadsheet of all the items in the stimulus package with column headings: Project, Price, Purpose, Progress and Completion Date.

For example: 

Project: Bullet Train from Los Angeles to Las Vegas
Price: $1 billion
Purpose: To employ 1,500 people for 2 years to build it; 500 to keep it operational on daily basis
Progress: Hasn't started yet.
Completion Date: 2011 

Individual entries along these lines, also to include the total cost of each project, would ensure real accountability. We would all be able to see whether the project has been successfully completed.

As a side note, if it turns out that the stimulus bill is a complete failure, President Obama has given himself an out by saying it will save and create jobs. He should stop this political rhetoric about saving jobs. The stimulus bill is supposed to create jobs. If not, we, as Americans, will know it.

Come on, we were not all born yesterday. Who can really assess whether the stimulus saves jobs? We can only reliably assess how many jobs it creates.

I have been calling for more transparency accountability in government for ten years. This includes posting all government finances, not only those relating to the stimulus package, to the Web, on a daily basis. See postthefinances.com

Over the years, I have written to all our political leaders, urging them to enact post the finances. So far, only limited progress has been made. From what I have seen so far, www.recovery.gov does not represent the radical measures I would like to see taken. The only way to ensure that government at all levels does not waste or deal fraudulently with taxpayer money is by posting all the finances to the Web.

I'm ready now, as I have been for years, to serve as an advisor as to how posting the finances might best be accomplished.

I carry my cell phone with me all the time. If I don't answer, Mr. President, please leave a message.

I'm ready to serve.

At the moment, government financial transparency is like a skeleton. The outline is there but there's no flesh on it. I'm the man who can put some meat on those transparency bones.

As the famous Wendy's hamburger spokeswoman said, "Where's the beef?" I say, where's the meat? To me, it's all sizzle and no steak.

Sincerely,

Steve Mozena


NUMBER NINE:


Dear Editor:

Where are the true Republicans?

To me, six of them—three in the U.S. Senate and three in the California Legislature—were bought off by the Democrats.

They should no longer be considered card-carrying party members. They should be chastised and kicked to the curb.

We need to get real fiscal conservative Republicans who will tow the line on spending.

In California, as Gov. Schwarzenegger said, we already have a one-party state like the former U.S.S.R.

Is there anyone left who is reliably on the team?

Clearly, these six are not team players and have sabotaged the team.

We had plenty of Republicans who jumped ship during the Bush Administration by voting for spending increases.

Now, we had them all in line in the U.S. House, only to have three defect in the Senate.

We had them all in line in Sacramento until three defected.

Certainly, in politics, you sometimes need to compromise, but at other times you need to stand your ground.

What can we do to make our feelings known? 

We can't sew a scarlet letter on the defectors, but we can send them a jersey with the slogan, Team Democrats or Team Obama.

These defectors are publicity hounds who like the attention and bought it. 

These politicians are certainly not Republicans. In the U.S. Senate they are Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins of Maine and Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania. In California the first two defectors were Sen. Dave Cogdill of Modesto and Roy Ashburn of Bakersfield, followed by Abel Maldonado of Santa Maria.

Someone needs to rein in the spendoholic Democrats, but it gets harder when those who should do so fail in their duty and side with the opposition. 

I hope that when November 2010 comes round, voters will remember the names of these six Republican enablers. 

Sincerely,

Steve Mozena



NUMBER TEN:


Dear Editor:

Mr. President, you lied. You are Mr. Hypocrite.

You may be pulling out troops from Iraq slowly, but you'll leave a military base there.

And now you have put 20,000 more of our young men and women in harm's way in Afghanistan.

You're supposed to be the anti-war president, the peace president. 

When it all starts to go wrong, are you going to blame Secretary of State Hillary Clinton or Defense Secretary Robert Gates for your decision to send more troops to Afghanistan?

Mr. President, Afghanistan is now your war. You have escalated it. 

Now that a crack group of UCLA researchers has pinpointed Osama Bin Laden’s hideout in Pakistan are you going to get him, like you said you would during the campaign?

Is there any politician out there who doesn't lie?


From the anti-war demonstrations in Washington D.C. to the sandy beaches of Santa Monica, where white crosses represent the fallen soldiers of the Iraq war, Mr. President, these are now symbols against you and your broken promises.


President Obama is not the president of change. This is M.O.T.S., more of the same. This is not what the American people voted for. 

Sincerely,

Steve Mozena



NUMBER ELEVEN:


Dear Editor:

Now that the value of homes and commercial properties has gone down, why aren't property taxes being reduced too?

Lowering property taxes would relieve millions of Americans of an economic burden.

Could this be a solution to the homeowner mortgage crisis and even the commercial property crisis?

Many homeowners and commercial owners have property taxes impounded.

That means the mortgage company is taking extra funds to cover the property tax, which they, the mortgage lender, then pay for the homeowner or commercial landowner. The mortgage company even takes a percentage more, in case they underestimate the taxes. More than likely, they are using our money to make interest, profit, for them and not us.

But are they taking too much? Shouldn't the mortgage companies be taking less money for our impounds since property prices are down, and property taxes should also be going down?

Or are they playing with our money and our interest?

There are companies on the Internet who will, for a fee, help both homeowners and commercial owners reduce their property taxes. This company and others like it can be used to file a protest about property taxes on your home here in California and other states. See 
http://www.cutmytaxes.com/property_tax_overview_california.asp

You can also request your property be reassessed by the local authority. Many local governments assess properties only every three years or more, so it is not surprising that many assessments are too high, given the recent fall in value.

There should be no delay in adjusting these taxes. Properties have gone down in value. There is no dispute about that.

President Obama should sign an executive order for property tax assessors nationwide to revalue and devalue all properties. This will lower the tax burden on homeowners and commercial landowners.

It should be effective immediately.

The mortgage companies should also be compelled to lower their additional take on mortgage holders immediately, thus lowering the tax bills of homeowners and commercial owners.

If property taxes are based on the value of the property, isn't adjusting the tax rate the honest thing to do?

This definitely would make homeowner and commercial landowners mortgage monthly payments drop immediately. 

People should be paying less in property taxes, which would give them more money to spend on disposable items, which is exactly what they need and what the U.S. economy needs.

Now, that's stimulus.

Sincerely,

Steve Mozena



NUMBER TWELVE:

Dear Editor:

Modern-day bank robbers?

No, it's not people robbing banks but banks robbing people.

Am I the only person and small-business owner who notices that the banks, merchant processing companies and credit card companies are making out like bandits at the expense of people like me?

Not only are the banks and financial companies getting billions of bailout money from U.S. citizens, without any real accountability for the money, they make it harder and harder to do business with them. NSF (non-sufficient fund) charges and overdraft charges are going up all the time. Many banks appear to be relying on them for income, which means they are making billions of dollars off working Americans. According to a recent study, bank and credit union income from non-sufficient funds and overdraft program fees exceeds $37 billion. The average household with a checking account pays $368 per year in these fees. 

When I was younger, there were no such fees, and I see no reason why the banks should be allowed to charge them now.

Not only that, the banks don't protect us from electronic thieves. Just one incident of that nature can be devastating to small-business owners, as I found out to my cost last year.

Banks can do far more to prevent credit card, electronic checks and manual check fraud.

But this does not seem to stop President Obama and Congress from handing out billions of tax-payer money to the banks as part of the bailout.

How about something along with this that will rein in the predatory instincts of the banks and benefit the average American?

Part of the stimulus package and bailout should mandate that 

• no credit cards with interest rates higher than 10 percent per annum

• no annual charges for credit cards

• no fees or only nominal fees for bounced checks

The banks are quick to take instant advantage of credit card users by raising interest rates after only one or two late payments. Not to mention the fuzzy accounting by which they manage to post payments past the due date just so they can add a late charge. 

The credit card companies will jack up a rate from 9.99 to 29.99 in a flash. This may be usury, but unfortunately, it seems that the credit card companies have made themselves exempt from state and local usury laws. Like Shakespeare’s Shylock, they want their pound of flesh from their customers and apparently there are no laws to stop them. 

They also want billions in bailout money, which means they have got us twice—once as credit card customers and then again as unwilling taxpayers forced to bail them out. 

Let's stop these modern-day bank bandits from making off with any more of our money.

Why should these financial institutions benefits from the bailouts and the common folks not?

Stop helping Wall Street, help Main Street.

Put money back in the hands of the people. That’s the way to stimulate the economy. 

Sincerely,

Steve Mozena


NUMBER THIRTEEN:

Dear Editor:

Everything is a crisis! We must do something now!

But are we crying wolf? 

Are the President and Congress Chicken Littles screaming that the economy is about to collapse when in fact we have time in hand to assess the situation carefully before we act? 

Recent history shows that quick decisions are often bad decisions.

We hurried into the Iraq war, shouting Weapons of Mass Destruction!

Bad decision. There were no WMDs.

We pilloried President Bush for rushing to war with no exit plan other than wishful thinking. There was no long-term strategy for that war. No one took the time to think about it. 

Last year, Congress hurried into passing the $700 billion bailout bill, the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008.

Again, bad decision. There was no accountability for the first $350 billion, and we heard some horror stories about how that money was misspent. Back then, I asked that all recipients of bailout money should be required to post all their finances daily to the Internet. But this was not done.

Now, we are told that we need to hurry because we must pass this stimulus package.

Will this turn out to be yet another bad decision?

Our economy may be contracting rapidly, but it is not going to collapse overnight.

Let's be more methodical and logical about coming up with a great stimulus package. Use reason, not emotion.

Look at the mess the other quick decisions put us in.

President Obama and Congress need to take a chill pill, slow down and take a deep breath so that they can make a good decision that will benefit the majority of us, if not all of us. Have you noticed the angry tone that our President has been adopting? He needs to act more presidential, to be level-headed and in control.

Think about the times in your own life when people like used car or insurance salesmen pushed you into making quick decisions. Are our President and Congress using the same pressuring, hard-sell tactics on the American public?

There are plenty of good ideas out there to solve this economic crisis.

Look at the case of Donald Trump, who was on the verge of bankruptcy in the early 1990s. With careful financial management, he emerged from that crisis within a few years.

We can do the same. But Americans mustn't be stampeded into a quick, ill-considered stimulus package.

Let's think with our brains not our egos.

Finally, the President and Congress need to explain clearly to the American public, in a line by line, item by item analysis, exactly what this huge stimulus package consists of. We need to know what each item in the bill is going to do the for economy—how, why, and when. 

Public pressure as well as Congress made the automakers come up with a plan after they initially showed up on Capitol Hill just asking for money. We should expect the same of Congress itself now they are the ones requesting the money. 

This stimulus plan needs to have the support of the public. Otherwise it will fail. 

The President and Congress must take the time they need to craft an effective bill, and then they must explain to us all the reasons behind their decisions and their choices. 

No other approach makes any sense. 

Sincerely,

Steve Mozena


NUMBER FOURTEEN:

Dear Editor:

A recall of Governor Schwarzenegger? Some groups are threatening to start a drive to recall the governor because of the current budget crisis. 

I can see their point. 

In 2003, we, as Californians, elected Arnold Schwarzenegger to office because we thought Governor Gray Davis was responsible for the state’s fiscal crisis that followed the dot-com bubble burst and the electricity crisis. 

Schwarzenegger took office at the same time as gas prices soared and state coffers increased because of the sales tax revenue on gas.

But look at us now. We are in a financial mess. 

Unfortunately, the state of California is in such dire straits that it can't afford a recall election.

I believe the only way we can get out of this mess is by total fiscal transparency. We need to open up the financial books and post all information online. Other states are beginning to do this but California lags behind. We have zero transparency. 

We can’t afford to continue like this, particularly since California has the highest percentage budget gap of all U.S. states, at 22 percent. 

Posting the finances would create not only accountability but would thwart waste, fraud, duplicity and corruption in the state government.

Can we for once just do what's right, so we can see the money and make the hard decisions?

In the meantime, the state of California must rein in the careless spending of money. We have seen a 50 percent increase in state spending in the five years since Schwarzenegger took office. This must stop!

Sincerely,

Steve Mozena


NUMBER FIFTEEN:

Governor Schwarzenegger:

It looks like your artificial deadline to pass the budget on January 31, 2009 has passed. So California still remains in budget crisis. 

I have corresponded with you many times over the years, by e-mail or snail mail, concerning issues that face California, from the budget deficit to education and gas prices. I even sent you a copy of my book: Anchoring America in Stormy Times. You wrote back to me, saying you would read it. 

In most of my communications with you, I have asked you to post all the State of California's finances to the Web on a daily basis. This would include state agencies, from the governor's office and state legislators to the California lottery and universities. Posting the finances would create not only accountability but would thwart waste, fraud, duplicity and corruption in the government.

In addition to writing to you, since 1999 I have contacted hundreds of leaders in politics and the media advocating posting the finances. Those I have written to include President Obama, every U.S. Congressman, all 50 state governors, the mayors of the 200 biggest American cities, California state legislators, Bill O'Reilly, Larry King, and other figures in the media, as well as influential celebrities and CEOs. 

Is the time right for it now? Surely it is. The Obama Administration is talking about creating more fiscal transparency so that the government is more accountable to the people.

Seventeen U.S. states are already posting at least some of their spending online. Four more have legislation passed but not yet enacted, and a further five states have legislation for fiscal transparency pending. 

What I propose goes even further than any measure yet enacted by any state. I would like to see all government departments and agencies post their entire checkbook registers online in an easily accessible, searchable format.

Come on, Governor Schwarzenegger, please issue an executive order to post all California government finances daily to the Websites of each department or agency. The initial outlay for this important measure would be modest, since all the accounting is already in electronic format.

I’m sure you remember the famous line, "Show me the money!" from the movie "Jerry Maguire. "

Please show us all, as Californians, the money.

We can't make decisions, or judge whether correct decisions have been made, if we can't see the money.

Moreover, I wish that some day, maybe you and even President Obama would sit down with me for lunch. I would like to discuss the issue with you directly. 

It's unlikely I will ever get the fame, the fortune and the power you and President Obama have, but I'd sure like to see America survive this current crisis, not only for myself, my fellow Californians, and my fellow Americans but also for my 6-year-old daughter, Arista.

Again, please issue an executive order this week to post all the state's finances to their respective websites on a daily basis.

All Californians will thank you. 

Sincerely,