Letter: Baird’s efforts applauded

I appreciate the Nov. 15 story in The Columbian — “Baird gives inside scoop on trading” — about non-public information advantages our national leaders have in legislation effecting the stock market.

We had Brian Baird as our watch dog in Washington, D.C., on that issue, and almost none of his colleagues joined him to clean up this bad practice.

Do you think that U.S. Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler, R-Camas, will pick on the need as she said she would in a later story? Ah, democracy is messy and capitalism without social justice shows a heart of stone.

I am grateful to the CBS-TV show “60 Minutes” for airing this story and prayerfully, Washington, D.C. will run less on corrupted power and more on justice for all.

Is it too early to ask whether the American empire will crumble now that we have terrible disparity between the poorest 99 percent and the richest 1 percent?

The Soviet empire broke apart once people found out that top quality beef was going from Poland to the Politburo in Moscow, all the while people stood in long lines to buy the needed staples to feed their families.

Alvin Fischer

Vancouver