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To The Editor:

The opinion “Are we a banana republic?” opens with the idea that the human gift is to think and analyze while apes only mimic what they have been programmed to do. This asks us to put ourselves into an analytical mode and to not blindly accept what we are told. To question what we see and come to conclusions based on the facts around us.

But this opinion fails to analyze anything and only asks “questions” that are meant to lead you down conspiracy rabbit holes. This is just a repeating of fear-mongering conspiracies that doesn’t take into context actual circumstances of events today. So I’m going to do the second part of our human gift and analyze and answer a few of the questions that I have the most problems with.

“Is there really a coin shortage or are you being prepared for a new monetary system?” The “new monetary system” is a conspiracy. COVID happened and banks and businesses shut down. This led to coins circulating less. Coins are coming or going from banks/businesses so they’ve naturally started to run dry. As things pick back up I’ve been asked less and less for exact change. Things are balancing back out.

“The Black Lives Matter group marches city to city. This costs money. Who is paying them to protest?” This sounds really close to the George Soros conspiracies that say Soros is bank rolling groups like BLM and Antifa. But saying that Black Lives Matter is a group that moves from city to city is wrong. BLM is a movement, not a group, that has supporters in cities all over the country. You see BLM everywhere because it is everywhere. Everyone who marched here on Main Street is from here. I was there and know most of them. The farthest out of town someone came from was Charlotte County.

“Who is controlling the narrative of the information you are fed and allowed to read?” Well, the news outlets. I’m allowed to read whatever from wherever, but news outlets pick and choose what stories they want to run. But they want to make sure they run something that is profitable. They want to have the most people reading as possible. This leads to trying to run stories that will snag a lot of people. This is how business works in capitalism.

“Are we a democracy or banana republic?” Some definitions. A democracy is a system of government by the whole population or all the eligible members of a state, typically through elected representatives, while a banana republic is an unstable country with an economy dependent upon the exportation of a limited-resource product, such as bananas or minerals. The U.S. is a representative democracy where we elect leaders and the leaders speak for us. We don’t rely on a limited resource for our economy, so we can rule out a banana republic.

I couldn’t get to every question but I hope this is a good starting point for anyone reading to perform their own analysis on these topics. I set out to make sure people were informed on what I see to be conspiracies and what are actual questions. We are smart beings who are capable of great things. But we as people are susceptible to fear. And sometimes these questions just act as gasoline on a fire. So be sure to wear your personal protective gear.