Letters to the editor Feb. 3

Transportation funds

a worthy investment

With the widespread disrepair of America's infrastructure and continuing economic challenges, I strongly urge Congress to provide badly needed investments in the U.S. transportation system, improving Americans' way of life and creating jobs in the process.

Data clearly demonstrates that the funding Congress provided last year as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act played a vital role in supporting the transportation construction sector and its suppliers and helped set the groundwork for economic recovery.

The ARRA provided $48.1 billion for transportation investments in highways, roads, transit, bridges, and airport construction and maintenance to help spur job creation. These funds are being invested throughout the country and are creating or sustaining jobs in the process.

The $34.3 billion for highway and transit projects has created or sustained more than 250,000 direct, on-project jobs and over 760,000 direct, indirect and induced jobs.

These investments provided a needed lifeline for the transportation construction industry and their suppliers. Transportation investment has been and should remain a bipartisan issue because transportation investments improve the quality of life, safety and economic competitiveness of all Americans.

David and Mayleen Christensen

Fernley

Just a little

bit conservative

Chuck Muth recently opined that Sen. Harry Reid is no conservative under any definition. Some might disagree. For example, the Web site thatsmycongress.com rates Harry Reid the 46th most conservative of the Senate's 59 Democrats, way down the list from Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania at No. 15 and Mary Landrieu of Louisiana at No. 28. His score ties him with Blue Dog conservatives Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas and Tom Carper of Delaware.

"Harry Reid is no liberal," Las Vegas CityLife Editor Steve Sebelius wrote in 2006. "We wish he was a liberal. We wish he'd take a single liberal stand and dig in his heels." I'm guessing he'd give Sen. Reid more credit now, but his overall assessment of our senior senator's record still rings true.

Let's review, shall we? Harry Reid believes that marriage should be between a man and a woman. He favors overturning Roe v. Wade. He voted to ban partial-birth abortion. He favors the death penalty. He has the NRA's unqualified endorsement. He wants to give oil companies

$15 billion in tax breaks. He's the Senate's staunchest supporter of hard-rock mining on royalty and pollution issues. He voted for the liberation of Kuwait, the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, and the surge.

Unlike a certain governor, Sen. Reid's an observant Mormon and isn't a skirt chaser. Unlike a certain senator, he doesn't have to pay hush money to any former mistresses. Face it, Harry Reid is a little on the conservative side, though not under any definition known to Chuck Muth.

Rich Dunn

Carson City