Letters: Saskatchewan taxpayers deserve better answers from minister

After a request in November in the legislature went unanswered, the NDP has revealed it submitted a freedom of information request on Dec. 12 asking to see: the Ministry of Social Services policy on housing clients in hotels/motels as emergency shelters and list of hotels that the ministry uses.

If an emergency arose today, what list is in use? Release it. Minister Gene Makowsky has said the ministry does business with “about a dozen or so” hotels province wide (Saskatoon StarPhoenix, Jan. 26).

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Why then, (in the same article) does Minister Makowsky say, “it does take time, for a thorough and comprehensive list?” The list is about 12 businesses long … isn’t it? Who provided/approved the list? What was their authority to do so? What was it based on?

Why did $2.25 million of such payments in 2022 NOT show up in the province’s public accounts? Regardless of political stripe, we are all taxpayers and deserve better than this gobbledegook.

Ian Striemer, Saskatoon

Trump support shows a drastic turn in U.S.

Americans, ad nauseam, boast about the democratic principles on which the republic is firmly rooted. At the same time they conveniently forget the deeply embedded imperfections inherent in the American polity.

This intellectual amnesia started with the founding fathers and has continued for the last three hundred years.

When the republic was established, the framers of the constitution conveniently decided not to extend the right to vote to Black people. Understandably, a number of the founding fathers, including George Washington were slave owners and so did not find the need to enfranchise the Black population.

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With slavery widely prevalent, such a move was almost impossible. It took another 100 years and a civil war, which finally led president Abraham Lincoln to take steps to correct the grievous error and extend voting rights to Black people.

This type of intellectual amnesia is vividly evident in the current American politics. The stark manifestation of populism and the emergence of Trumpism show that the Americans have not learned from their history.

Donald Trump has no redeeming qualities, his personal character is deplorable; yet a significant section of the Republicans and evangelicals flock to him. No questions asked, they blindly follow him, an example of conveniently forgetting unpleasant truths.

Supporting such a person of dubious ethical and moral standards prove that American political life has taken a drastic turn for the worst.

Joe Jeerakathil, Saskatoon

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