Your Letters for Oct. 31, 2025

Love and joy permeate Grace House

I continue to be amazed and impressed by what I call "the miracle on Lafayette street."

I'm referring to Grace House, the clothing mission operated at 2638 Lafayette street by Mrs. Ruth Costello and her dedicated volunteers.

Grace House charges for nothing. "All free for a smile!" is the anthem. Prior to the start of the current school year, Grace House served 1,307 children with new backpacks, school supplies, clothing outfits and new shoes for 790 children.

To date this fall, Grace House has provided coats for 602 adults, 241 children and 681 blankets.

Over the years Mrs. Costello.has been operating Grace House she has brought happiness to several thousand. I have no idea how she does it, other than getting help from generous donors of cash and lightly used clothes. I know of no better place to make donations of clothing or money. There is no tax revenue, no federal grant, just generous donors.

Take time to stop by, see the operation first hand, and experience the love and joy that permeate the atmosphere.

St. Joseph is blessed with many wonderful programs to benefit the needy. Grace House is among them.

Bob Slater
St. Joseph

Bottomless pit

All you Dems who are so compassionate about healthcare, adding another trillion plus dollars to subsidize it, and shutting down the government until you get it, let's take a walk back in time.

When Obama and the Dems were fighting to get Obamacare, the Republicans said Obamacare would drive the cost of health insurance sky high. Check! They also said it would drive doctors to early retirement. Check! Thanks to John McCain and his feud with Trump, Obamacare became a reality. Check!

Let's put this in perspective. Insurance companies are in business to make a profit. When they fail to achieve this, like all businesses, they either drop the product or close the door. The doctors under subsidized health insurance are dictated by our government how much time they can spend with a patient and how much they will be reimbursed for their service.

As you are currently experiencing, there is a shortage of doctors and physicians assistants are filling the gaps. While physician assistants do a decent job, they don't know what they don't know. Lawyers are salivating as they fill the courtroom with lawsuits of malpractice. After all, insurance companies are a bottomless pit of money.

Insurance is another element to this circle and that is the dependence of government to subsidize or socialize the health insurance for all. Please don't tell me illegals are part of this boondoggle. Where do these non-citizens go when they get sick, have a baby, etc. In care you don't get it, it's the emergency room and guess who pays for that? The tax payer!

As a retired military person and twenty five years in the insurance business, I can tell you Dems socialized healthcare like Obamacare and government run programs are bottomless pits for our tax dollars. The Dems say they need a trillion plus to fund health insurance because premiums are going to skyrocket. Starting to see the waste and pit? The government who runs health care has no risk in the business and can only solve problems with more of our money.

One final thought, healthcare is not a right. Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness in the Constitution does not include healthcare. The reason I know that is because early healthcare was mostly paid by barter in the beginning of our nation. For all you compassionates out there, it means you had to have skin in the game. Nothing was or is free!

Our next lesson will be New York when and if they elect a communist. I mean, a Socialist Democrat, as he calls himself. His solutions are government mandates and subsidized programs. It's time to wake up, socialism is here and the Dems love it as they keep our country shut down! You can't blame Trump and the Republicans for this shutdown because they keep voting to keep the government open while the Dems refuse to vote on the same bill they voted on when autopen was running the country.

Richard Sharp
St. Joseph