Stay out of Venezuela
The continued attacks by U.S. administrations against the Venezuelan people in the name of democracy would be laughable in an Orwellian sense. I am no fan of Maduro, but he was the elected leader of his sovereign country. Juan Guaido is an unknown person who did not even run against Maduro, and was approached by this administration to be a wedge against Maduro, but is being touted by 45 as the legitimate leader of Venezuela.
If 45 wants to cry ‘foul!’, he should welcome examinations into his own tainted thievery of democracy with his campaign’s collusion with Russians and other operatives to throw the U.S. election in 2016. Not that he really had to—voters’ disgust with Clinton and the Democratic Party’s decision to knock Bernie Sanders out of the primaries virtually sealed his win anyway.
The U.S. has continually tried to overthrow the left-leaning government of Venezuela, not so much because of the Venezuelan desire to return power and land to poor and indigenous people, but because they are simply oil-rich. And they have refused to kow-tow to imperialist autocratic rulers like 45.
The U.S. Government should focus on its own problems of usurping democracy when it allows states to purge legible voters from the ballots, gerrymander districts and allow billionaires to write laws and decimate our environment and our rights to have representatives in government that reflect the views of its constituents.
Kevin McDaniel 
Hurleyville, NY

Trump’s Super Bowl interview
Here’s what President Trump stated during his Super Bowl interview: “This [Mexican illegal crossings] is really an invasion of our country by human traffickers.” An invasion? If it’s an invasion, why did Trump wait until his third year in office to do something about it? That’s not just incompetence, it’s dereliction of duty and malfeasance. It’s neither an invasion nor an emergency: illegal border crossings are down from an average of 1.3 million in 2000 to 360,000 in 2018. And there are much better solutions than a multi-billion dollar wall. Read on.
“You need a wall. And anybody who says they don’t, they’re just playing games.” Security experts and the intelligence community repeatedly claim fiber-optic technology—which has already been tested successfully at the U.S.-Mexican border—is the answer. It can be installed almost immediately and would cost approximately 1/10th the amount of a physical barrier. 
“When I took over Syria, it was infested with ISIS. Now you have very little ISIS.” His own cadre of security experts disagree vehemently. On January 29, Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats, stated, “ISIS is intent on resurging and still commands thousands of fighters in Iraq and Syria.” 
“We have very fast airplanes.” This is the president of the United States explaining how we would react if/when there is a resurgence of ISIS in Syria. That’s his strategy for Syria.
“So when my intelligence people tell me how wonderful Iran is… I’m going to go by my own counsel.” His intelligence people didn’t say that, or even imply it. His “own counsel” is clearly not to be trusted, based on the fact that six of his closest hand-picked advisers have been indicted. 
Trump: dangerous for America, dangerous for the world.
Will Voelkel
Milford, PA

Faso writes in
Fritz Mayer’s report [February 6, 2019] on the Sullivan County meeting held by Rep. Delgado contains the assertion that “…constituents could ask whatever questions they wanted, in stark contrast to former Congressman John Faso, who held limited meetings with constituents, and required that questions be cleared in advance.”
In fact, during the two years I was in office, I held more than 1,000 meetings with constituents and constituent groups, in Washington and around our district. I had many such meetings in Sullivan County concerning local, state and national issues, as well as individual constituent casework matters and matters brought to my attention by local government officials, nonprofits and business leaders. Further, I have never “required that questions be cleared in advance.”
Mr. Mayer’s report should be placed in the “fake news” file.
John J. Faso [former NY Representative]
Kinderhook, NY
Editor’s response: After a vote on abandoning Obamacare, an article in Roll Call (tinyurl.com/yxpappmm) said Faso attempted to avoid criticism by arranging a meeting with seniors “capped at 100 attendees who had to sign up and submit questions ahead of time.” For more about Faso trying to avoid contact with some of his constituents read this article in The Daily Freeman (www.tinyurl.com/y4dzzrc5) or this one in The River Reporter (www.tinyurl.com/y4slc4l7).

Bring Congress back to communities
Not so long ago, members of Congress were real people, with real jobs, in real communities throughout the country. They played an integral part in the civic, economic and social affairs of their constituencies. They went to Washington temporarily, and then they came back home.
For all practical purposes, today’s members of Congress consider Washington their home. When they do decide to go back to their communities—back to their constituents—they act like tourists in their own district. We must restore Congress back to a citizen legislature, and not just a bunch of bureaucrats.
Tim Seretis
Hawley, PA