Your Opinion: Inflation claim contested

Thomas Minihan

Jefferson City

Dear Editor:

It's getting ridiculous, U.S. Rep. Blaine Luetkemeyer is regularly using the News Tribune to concoct things and present them in an essay that gets published as if it was fact. His latest attempt at this is to claim the actions taken by the current "administration" in the last six months have caused inflation to rise, "at the fastest rate in 13 years." In 2008, you might remember we had a different type of catastrophe; it was called the subprime mortgage crisis. Today the country is facing a crisis of equal or greater circumstance. To lay the blame on a jump in the inflation rate on the current "administration" by an individual who pretends to be bipartisan seems to be very partisan. Especially if you consider the alternative could have very easily been a recession, if the current "administration" had not taken swift and intelligent action to jump-start a stalled economy.

Then he claims, "I have worked tirelessly with my colleagues to provide much-needed relief for small businesses." I guess he thinks he can say anything he wants because the News Tribune simply publishes anything he sends them. The American Rescue Plan, which he said last week in his partisan proclamation from our nation's capital, "I voted against the bill," included that much-needed relief he mentioned. However, he had to follow the orders of Kevin McCarthy, his pack leader, and vote no. The U.S. Small Business Administration says the American Rescue Plan had $7.25 billion more for the Paycheck Protection Program. Additionally, there was help in the form of grants, not loans. The Restaurant Revitalization Fund provided a total of $28.6 billion in grants to restaurants and bars with 1-20 locations, and on and on. But no, he voted not to help the American small businessperson, just so he could get an "attaboy" from the guy getting his marching orders from the guy who's still throwing a tantrum over losing the election.

I believe this should be a sign for the News Tribune to review its "Core Values" and stop publishing partisan opinion pieces from elected officials. Just because you publish these "alternative facts" on the opinion page does not mean people don't take it for the truth. As your statement of core values indicates, "there needs to be a sharp and clear distinction between news and opinion."