My Reply to the Viral Email

I find this letter upsetting, especially coming from a loved relative. Why would someone spend such effort to encourage fear, confusion and lies at such a difficult time for our country as this is? I really wonder if the right wing is just hoping that Obama is shot and killed.


AN OPEN LETTER TO PRESIDENT OBAMA
written by Lou Pritchett
former Proctor and Gamble Executive

Dear President Obama:

You are the thirteenth President under whom I have lived
and unlike any of the others, you truly scare me.

You scare me because after months of exposure, I know
nothing about you.
 How could you know nothing about Obama? Unless you choose to ignore the continual press and exposure day after day and believe only the anti-Obama websites? There are many responsible Republicans who try to fight this flood of smear — even McCain had to chastise a woman who called Obama a Muslim and not to be trusted. Even George Will says he knows too much about Obama and wishes he would stay out of the news!!!

You scare me because I do not know how you paid for
your expensive Ivy League education and your upscale
lifestyle and housing with no visible signs of support.

 The Obamas had student loans, grants and scholarships to pay for their education. The smears that suggest Israeli agents or Muslim big shots paid are unbelievable and have not a shred of proof. Almost until Obama ran for President he was paying off his student loans. The hundreds of thousands of dollars he earned on his two best selling novels helped a lot.


You scare me because you did not spend the formative years
of youth growing up in America and culturally you are not
an American.
 Obama grew up with his WHITE MOTHER in Hawaii, with a few younger years in Indonesia. Formative years begin when? In one of Obama’s speeches he talked about how his mother got him up early to go over homework. When he complained she said, “Well, it isn’t any picnic for me either buster!”. This sounds pretty American to me.

You scare me because you have never run a company or met
a payroll.
 This is an old right wing conservative whine. I’m not sure how many of our presidents ran companies or met payrolls. Unless you count Bush who managed to bankrupt companies.

You scare me because you have never had military
experience, thus don't understand it at its core.
 Another bunch of baloney. Did Reagan ever carry a gun into battle? Obama kept Secretary of Defense Robert Gates when the Bush Administration left. It sounds as if he knows where to go to FIND military experience.

You scare me because you lack humility and
'class', always blaming others.

 Where is the proof of this? He has bent over backwards to listen to the people in the Congress who disagree with him. He has apologized on more than one occasion. This is ridiculous filler to me.

You scare me because for over half your life you have
aligned yourself with radical extremists who hate America and
you refuse to publicly denounce these radicals who wish to
see America fail.
 Obama’s first jobs were with poor black neighborhoods in Chicago. He was Editor of the Harvard Law Review in College. Harvard is hardly a hotbed of radicals who wish to see America fail!

You scare me because you are a cheerleader for the
'blame America ' crowd and deliver this message abroad.
 Obama went overseas and helped restore America’s image after a battering from the Bush Administration. When did he ever “Blame America”? He is a cheerleader for America, for Americans, for our values, inventiveness, hardwork and respect for other peoples of the world. I’m particularly proud of him for this.

You scare me because you want to change America to a
European style country where the government sector dominates
instead of the private sector.
Where again is the proof of this? After a colossal failure of our economy and after years of greed and mismanagement a crisis came while the BUSH ADMINISTRATION WAS STILL IN OFFICE!!!! Obama and his administration continued the Bush policies and poured money into the banks and the private economy to keep us from sliding into full scale Depression. How does this make us like a European Country? How is the government dominating? Obama has critics on his own side who wanted him to give government a bigger role.

You scare me because you want to replace our health care
system with a government controlled one.
This is one of the biggest lies of all. Obama doesn’t want to replace our health care system. He wants to make it fair. He wants to make the insurance companies be fair and not deny coverage for pre-existing conditions and drop people (who thought they had insurance) from having coverage just when it comes time to need it. Obama and many experienced health care experts including most doctors and hospitals know it is time, past time, to do something.
The idea of having a small piece of the pie be a “public” portion (like Medicare) doesn’t seem to be anything like a takeover of the whole system. Who is spewing these smears? Who stands to lose if things are cleaned up? Insurance Companies do you think? What is truly truly amazing is that the people who are buying this misinformation are just the people who would benefit from a better health care system!!!!!!!

You scare me because you prefer 'wind mills'
to responsibly capitalizing on our own vast oil, coal and shale
reserves.
 The Obama Administration is working WITH the oil and natural resources people to beef up our protections and from ruining the environment (and our serious dependence on foreign oil). The Oil and Gas people are not yelling from the rooftops because they know better than anyone hat needs to be done. There’s a lot more going on than “windmills” — this is trivializing the problem.

You scare me because you want to kill the American
capitalist goose that lays the golden egg which provides the
highest standard of living in the world.
 Obama knows full well the workings of the capitalist system and is trying to strengthen them. Unfettered capitalism just recently ran on the rocks and needed a boost and got it from the Obama Administration. Many of our biggest capitalists want free markets when it suits them and the “socialization of risk” when things go bad — when the banks run out of money due to crazy loan practices. When millions of people are foreclosed and states go bankrupt, someone has to step up. Who else but government? Also see the Savings and Loan Scandals. Forty million people with no health coverage and families going broke to finance catastrophic health disasters might question the “highest standard of living in the world” statement. Maybe for those people in gated communities.

You scare me because you have begun to use
'extortion' tactics against certain banks and corporations.
 During the meltdown pressure was put on Bank of America to buy Merrill Lynch. Is this what this means? I don’t think people realize now how close our whole system was to coming down, going over the edge with no money in any banks and no way to restart the economy. As for companies like GM and the auto industry meltdown, something had to be done and quickly. No one is accusing the Obama Administration of helping the unions too much!

You scare me because your own political party shrinks
from challenging you on your wild and irresponsible
spending proposals.
 Three words, “Blue Dog Democrats.” Not that I like it. Even Diane Feinstein has said spending that mandates programs for California (which is seriously hurting economically) without providing the funds will not meet with her approval. But this is a long way from agreeing that Obama’s spending proposals are “wild and irresponsible.” I hate to think what this guy would say if Obama did nothing to stem the disaster. Wimp?

You scare me because you will not openly listen to or
even consider opposing points of view from intelligent
people.
 This is ridiculous. Obama has had a steady STREAM of opposing viewpoint visit the White House and talk at length to him and his Administration. Some of his own party thinks he listens to opposing viewpoint TOO much.

 You scare me because you falsely believe that you are
both omnipotent and omniscient.
 I fail to see the truth of this statement. In an emergency he consulted with members of the previous AND new administration before taking action.


You scare me because the media gives you a free pass
on everything you do.
 I don’t see this. If anything, I think the media bends over backwards to present “both sides of an issue” to the point where sometimes they balance an intelligent point of view with sheer idiocy just to prove they are being “fair and balanced” — except for Fox News, of course.

 You scare me because you demonize and want to silence
the Limbaughs, Hannitys, O'Relllys and Becks who
offer opposing, conservative points of view.
This isn’t true either. How has he ever “demonized” these people? How has he ever tried to silence them? He may not like them, but he has always answered their criticisms fairly — such as the attempt to keep him from speaking to schoolchildren as Reagan and Carter did.

 You scare me because you prefer controlling over
governing.
I fail to understand this comment. We still have three branches of government.

 Finally,
you scare me because if you serve a second term I
will probably not feel safe in writing a similar letter in 8
years.
Let’s hope we have a chance to find out (if you haven’t encouraged some nut case to shoot him before that day comes). I think our chances are better to express our views openly with Obama in office than with Dick Cheney for instance.

Lou Pritchett

This is a retired Proctor and Gamble Executive (Lou Pritchett) as the Snopes “True Check” shows. Big deal, the man himself is real, nothing he says has been proven by Snopes or anyone else. The email goes on to say: “All that is necessary for evil to succeed is that good men do nothing.” He suggests this is why his letter should be forwarded on and on. It was enough to motivate me to do something.

TRUE CHECK:
http://www.snopes.com/politics/soapbox/youscareme.asp


This letter was sent to the NY Times but they
never acknowledged it. Big surprise! Since it hit
the internet, however, it has had over 500,000
hits.
Keep it going. All that is necessary for evil to
succeed is that good men do nothing. It's happening
right now.