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Greg’s Corner

By Greg Ritchie

Messenger Reporter

Editor’s note: Greg’s Corner is a section where Messenger Reporter Greg Ritchie shares odds and ends from the job and unusual or interesting facts from across the world and across time.

MESSENGER OFFICE –  Is it just me or has the world just gone crazy? Here are a few of my thoughts about some of the news we are swimming in. 

– What will we do without science? Dr. Anthony Fauci  is the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) and the Chief Medical Advisor to the President. He is also the face of the COVID crisis and one of the highest paid officials in government. He once said that to criticize him was to criticize science. Now there’s ego for you! Well, science will be retiring at the end of this year. No mention of vaccine side effects, no mention of the lost time for kids stuck in lockdowns. No mention of the thousands of businesses that went under. And I still see people wearing masks alone while driving. Science!

– The Biden administration wants to forgive student college debt in some situations. This is a tough one, because I feel bad for the young people. As someone who had to take student loans to go to college – and then find a way to pay them back – it’s not easy. You’re 18 years old and the only way you can go to college is to just sign the dotted line. Everyone else does it. You’ll pay it back with that college degree and that huge salary you will get the day after you graduate. It’s really not the kids’ fault – but it is their responsibility. A deal is a deal. What do you say to the people who worked hard and already paid their debt? Do they get a refund? Is it fair to take money from the carpenter that never went to college to pay for someone who did? Should we subsidize degrees in gender studies or 19th Century French poetry? In my opinion the government is, once again, the culprit in all of this. If the government wasn’t sponsoring these loans, universities would never be able to charge what they charge. They only cost as much as they do because they know the students are directly paying for it…yet. In the old days colleges had to offer practical classes and a good education to motivate students to study there. They couldn’t afford so many activist luxuries because the students had to get mom and dad to help pay for it. They had to take part-time jobs. The whole situation has become a nightmare. As Ronald Reagan once said, “The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: ‘I’m from the government and I’m here to help.’”

 – We need to talk about Ukraine. The invasion of that country has been a tragedy for just about everyone involved. I have traveled to both Russia and Ukraine many times and speak the Russian language pretty well. Well enough to order a meal and find the bathroom at least! I still see Ukraine flags on social media and around Houston County. I will make no apologies here for Putin or any of that regime! But the conflict is much more complicated than we are being told. It goes back to the early 1990’s and the breakup of the Soviet Union. More than 14,000 ethnic Russians were killed by the Ukrainian government before the Russians invaded. Again, not taking sides, just want to make sure we have all the facts. I pray for Ukraine too, by the way. I pray more for us here – brother, do we need some prayer in this country! For anyone unquestionably supporting Ukraine I would ask only three questions: Can you find Ukraine on the map? Would you be comfortable with the Chinese communists signing a mutual defense treaty and placing troops in Mexico or Canada? And lastly, how many of our young people in Houston County are you willing to sacrifice for Ukraine? Historically, invading armies do poorly when they try to take on Russia. Just ask Napoleon or Hitler. As great as our victory was in Europe in World War II, nine out of every 10 Germans killed in the war died in Russia. 

Greg Ritchie can be reached at [email protected]

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