Letters to the editor for Wednesday, May 11, 2022

What's ailing homeowner insurance

The May 9 editorial about homeowner insurance claims suggests that the only answer to Florida’s “tsunami of lawsuits” is “tort reform.”

What the insurance industry calls “tort reform“ is collecting your premiums then paying their attorneys to keep you from collecting for all of the losses you thought were covered by your insurance policy.

What we need is more good faith settlements of claims by insurance carriers, clearer and more easy to understand insurance policies, and more reasonable salaries for insurance executives -- not to mention more money spent restoring homeowners’ property and less paying insurance attorneys and homeowners’ attorneys.

It’s probably a good thing for my former colleagues who represent homeowners that our GOP elected officials will ignore this advice because attorneys can’t make money without insurers continuing to act in bad faith, forcing homeowners to file lawsuits that would be unnecessary if insurers simply timely paid valid claims.

But you will continue to vote for these guys anyway. Or, will you?

Robert Geltner, Esq., North Fort Myers

Oh, woe is Florida

After a four-month hiatus, I returned to find Florida facing disaster. Apparently the place is awash in illegal aliens. The voting system is in shambles. Gays have taken over Disney World. Abortion is rampant and must be curtailed. Gas is over $4. Transgenders have taken over the schools, and math textbooks need to be purged. Tallahassee sure has its hands full. Glad to see they’re on the job.

I live in San Diego most of the year and thank heavens we don’t have Florida's problems. We are on the Mexican border, but immigration is only a minor problem for us. Our trans population is small and mostly invisible. Abortion hasn’t been a big problem for us. We vote by mail which eliminates that problem. Nobody is complaining about math books except students who have to study them.

California does have problems, of course. We’d love to have $4 gas, and we have global warming, drought, infrastructure and supply chain issues, COVID, cyber threats and too many Uzis in the 'hood, but these seem trivial compared to Florida’s problems. Fortunately the state is running a surplus, so Sacramento is getting on top of things.

Bob Schmidt, Sanibel

Governor veers into the outrageous

I am an 80-year-old woman who has been a nurse for over 50 years. Recently, I read a letter to the editor that made me chuckle. But, it wasn't funny! The man who wrote the letter was spot on. He said he has been reading letters to the editor ever since he retired and had seen many adjectives used in reference to Gov. DeSantis, but never "honest." I also read that Gov. DeSantis is lobbying for a "Constitutional right to carry a firearm" without a gun permit! As a young nurse I sat with young girls and women who died from raging infections caused by back alley abortions before Roe v. Wade. I support abortion especially when rape, incest, violence or the health of the mother is involved. But I do understand the other side of the issue. After being shot as a victim of domestic violence by a controlling, angry spouse WITH a gun permit, I am totally disgusted by the latest ploy to garner votes by Gov. DeSantis. With all the war, increase in school shootings and crime in our cities, how can anyone agree and promote such a thing? He is supposedly well educated, Harvard and Yale. He is also delusional, dangerous, narcissistic and has no common sense. I have lived in Florida for 20 years and am ashamed to be part of the "winning elections" debacle at the price of the unnecessary killings that will occur. There are many laws Gov. DeSantis has signed I do not agree with but this is outrageous!

Jan Florence, RN, Naples

A lesson from history

Over 100 years ago, our nation had been enjoying many years of general freedom in the consumption of alcoholic beverages. But in 1920, the government rescinded that right in the form of the 18th Amendment, enacted against the will of many, but with the strong support of religious groups often centered in rural America. The following prohibition era was highlighted by uneven application of this law among the various states, together with disapproval manifested by covert and widespread lawbreaking. This prior freedom was later restored in 1933 in the form of the 21st Amendment. Lesson: Removing an already well-established freedom against the will of the majority is likely to be an abject failure.

Now our government is poised to remove another well-established and widespread freedom — that of voluntary interruption of early pregnancies. If we have learned anything from history, the majority of the populace, spearheaded by women, will again bring down a proposed heavy-handed government ruling.

Warning to the Republicans: You are about to confront an oncoming freight train that will likely endanger your political lives for many years to come!

Morton Tavel, MD, Fort Myers

Pressures limit women's choice on abortion

It is unnatural for a mother to want the new life she carries destroyed. As such, the "choice" she makes to do so must be the result of unnatural pressures.

In our society of abundance insufficient resources to care for the child is often caused by the few hoarding so much more than they could possibly use in 10 lifetimes. Where else in nature can we find this?

And when a would-be parent or parents have enough to bring a new life into this world and raise it but choose not to because it is inconvenient, it is a stark indictment of the materialism which has poisoned their minds.

Around the world, people with so much less find a way to welcome a child's birth and do whatever they can to give it a chance in this world. In their value system, a new child is more important that a bigger house, a newer car, the latest smartphone or a vacation in Cancun. Perhaps none of these are real possibilities for them, but would these "possibilities" really make a better life or world for them?

If these choices would drive them to kill a baby in the womb, what kind of choices are they really?

In our society, "elective abortions" are a symptom of an underlying fundamental problem: the unwanted child. The unwanted child is the product of kind of society we encourage, or at least tolerate.

The "woman's choice" for which so many are arguing is an illusion. That woman's "choice" is walled in by so many pressures, material, social and psychological, that deprive her of what she believes to be any option other than abortion. So much for choice.

Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel observed: "that in a free society, some are guilty, but all are responsible.” The 7,500 or more babies killed in the womb last year in Lee County were the victims not of their mothers or of the medical personnel that aided and abetted their decision. To discover the parties truly "responsible" for these deaths, all we need do is look in the mirror.

Bruce Diamond, Fort Myers

Hypocrisy in America

Our ruling government of the moment is set to strip constitutional abortion rights from our Constitution, turn women into murderers, and make doctors or anyone who assists or advises an abortion seeker a criminal themselves. And you have a problem with the Taliban making women wear burkas? Look in the mirror America.

David Liebenguth, Fort Myers

This article originally appeared on Fort Myers News-Press: Letters to the editor for Wednesday, May 11, 2022