I have a thing I’d like you to pass on to ComEd and Nicor. I received an energy report from them for the past few months and it’s none of their business how much electricity and how much gas I use. Matter of fact, I’m on the very low end, but if they’re sending me this to use less gas or less electricity, that means when they split the bills up for distribution and cost factoring the line charge, I’m actually paying more for less electricity. This is the most ridiculous thing I have ever received in my mail. It’s none of their business to help me use my electricity or gas more efficiently. Let them do what they do and produce, and I will buy and use what I want, for this is America. Thank you.

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Our President Obama sent pink slips to commanders in the fighting field last month. Now he has sent pink slips to majors, letting them know they will be let go when they come home. Do these cuts to soldiers with 10-15 years leading, with all this experience, make you feel safer in this time of terrorists who want to destroy America? Think about what our president is doing. Vote Republican.

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President Obama is on vacation again, says my Republican neighbor, but during his eight-year presidency, Bush took 879 days of vacation. So far, Obama has taken about 150 days off. These are partisan attacks; no president is really on vacation.

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A clarification to a comment in the Aug. 20 SPEAK OUT. The total federal debt of the U.S. Government has increased more than $7 trillion since Obama took office in 2009. That’s trillion, with a “T,” not billion, with a “B.” So the figure is off by about $6,993,000,000,000. I suppose the deep-thinking Obama apologists will respond that it’s not Obama’s fault that our debt has skyrocketed, and that Fox News is bad.

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Well, a couple of car nights left—sorry to say, a relief to those who live in downtown condos. In my opinion, next year, please split the car nights between downtown and Yorktown which has huge lots. It’s really a long summer, every Saturday night dealing with traffic, noise, exhaust and litter. As a resident of the downtown, it would be nice to sit on my balcony one Saturday night in the summer. Thanks for listening to my side.

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This is Lombard calling about the dead green ash trees. I read in a SPEAK OUT that the Village of Lombard is designing a plan to have all the dead green ash trees taken down in one year. I think that is wonderful. I hope the village makes that plan public. I wonder, how does the village prioritize which neighborhood and trees are taken down? I recently went by a cul-de-sac where almost all 16-plus homes have ash trees; some were dead and some just starting to die, and all the trees are down. Wow. How do you get that to happen? In my neighborhood there are many dead trees that have been dead for two years. The village has some explaining to do and let’s hear about your new plan.

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It’s too bad the people who are securing Obama’s college transcripts cannot provide a similar level of security to the U.S. border with Mexico. If our government thought some of the illegals were crossing the border to research our leader’s academic records, we might see some progress.

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It’s called SPEAK OUT, not Let’s Talk About Lombard and Villa Park. Some of us think that being interested in our country and keeping our country is more important than fire pits and someone smoking in the park—which, by the way, I grew up with both and I’m still here and so are all the people who are older than I am. So that should be the least of your worries. I’m more concerned about no one flying the American flag, English as a second language, entitlements for everyone, etc. That’s not what made America great. We need to get back to working for a living; being open-minded and reading different opinions on all subjects is what makes SPEAK OUT interesting.

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Good afternoon. In the paper a couple of weeks ago, the village public works director said there are still fish in the pond. I’m sure there are still fish in Terrace View Pond. I think the village should hold a fishing derby like they have at Lombard Lagoon. The village should come out and host the derby and show us how you access the pond for recreational use. Show us where the fish are and how to safely access across the mud flats and everything. How about it, Lombard? Let’s have a fishing derby in Terrace View Pond.

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Hi. I am of Polish and German descent, and I am sick and tired of hearing about immigration reform and everything else. I am not prejudiced or anything like that, but why don’t we make all our signs, all of our brochures, in Polish, German, Russian, Albanian, Middle Eastern and everything else, along with the Hispanic signs, so everybody who’s an immigrant can understand what the heck is going on? I think our language is English and that’s the way it should be. Thank you.

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Hi. I live in Lombard and I had gone to Culver’s in Lombard with my brother; we were sitting there eating lunch and a group of boys came in, approximately 10-12 of them, and I have to say how impressed I was at how wonderful they were. They were quiet, they were polite; I couldn’t believe the behavior of all these boys. So I asked them where they go to school and they said, Glenbard East. I said, “Are you football players?” and they said, “Yes, ma’am.” I said, “I think your coach needs to know just how wonderful you are,” and they said, “Thank you very much for saying that. I just can’t get over that you noticed.” I notice things like that because I can’t believe how many of them there were and how wonderful they acted, so I wanted to call in to make sure their coach from the Glenbard East football team knows how wonderful he is with those kids. I was just so impressed. I’m in my 50s and I don’t get impressed normally.

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Lombard calling. To the person who was defending the Glenbard West parents who were supporting their kids, they said you should never judge, that you don’t know what these parents do for their kids. These parents are actually doing their kids a disservice. They are supporting underage drinking. Folks, there’s one thing to say about that. You can’t ever support underage drinking. Then this person said nobody should judge. Really? then we should get rid of most of our laws because most of our laws, like jaywalking, robbery, those are all judging people. That’s what we do in a civilized society. We judge people. These parents should be outraged that their underage kids drink and they still want them to play football. We, the taxpayers, pay for these kids to play football at the high school. We have rules.

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Hi, Lombard calling. In reply to the person who said, “Oh my goodness, have you seen Terrace View Pond? It’s absolutely gone. Was it really necessary to destroy a pond with fish and visibly beautiful surroundings so that the houses’ basements won’t flood?” To answer your question, Absolutely, positively yes. From somebody who has lived two blocks south of there for seven years now and in this time I have cleaned up sewage out of my basement twice as it is. I invite you next time it happens to come over here and help me. It is back-breaking work, and I’m pretty much in shape. So, yes, I apologize for the bad look, but that was already a swampy area so we turned it back to the way it was and now my basement is not a swamp, so God bless you too. But understand that when you put up residential properties around an area you’re going to have to put things back the way they were. Thank you.

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On the St. Louis situation, Obama on Fox, our president said the DOJ works for him. I beg to differ with you, Mr. President. The DOJ works for us, the people.

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Hi, Villa Park calling. I just received a phone call allegedly from the Villa Park police union requesting I give a pledge. They have got to be out of their minds. My taxes pay the pension fund plenty.

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I live in the Pinebrook subdivision and I believe there should be some patrolling by the police every once in awhile. I know the police can’t be everywhere, but there are a lot of people who are driving in the Pinebrook subdivision like it’s a drag strip. I know some of the people who are doing it. But the police should at least patrol this area a little bit more. One of these days somebody’s going to get hurt; somebody’s going to get killed. Let these people know this is not a drag strip, this is a residential area. I don’t think you want to have that on your hands.