Gas Prices Talking Point

• High gas prices concern us all as mid-Michigan families drive their children to school or operate the small family business.  Mike Rogers is working hard to make gasoline more affordable and reducing America's dependency on foreign oil by getting more ethanol to more gas stations, enacting a $3 billion hydrogen fuel cell program, enacting tax credits for hybrid cars, building more oil refineries and getting oil from 2,000 out of ANWR's 98 million acres in Alaska.
• Mike's support of funding to Michigan State for ethanol research is helping the scientists there as they pursue $0.99 ethanol at the pump from things like woodchips and switchgrass.  What a great day for America's economy and national security would that be?  It would allow us to tell nations such as Iran, Venezuela and Syria, "no thanks, we're not interested in your oil anymore."

Tips for Writing a Letter

• Be sure to provide all your contact information in the spaces provided.  Some editors may have questions about your letter and need to contact you and many papers will not publish a letter without the name, address, and phone number of the author. 
• Be sure to choose a topic that matters to you.  Passion is important.  The talking points provided below are there to provide an outline of the issue and to server as a starting point to your own letter.  You letter will have more merit and will be more likely to be published if it is in your own words.
• Focus on relevant issues in the news, particularly those that were recently published in the paper you are writing.  If possible cite a specific article, the more recent your topic made news the more likely you are to be published.
• Finally, keep your letter around 250 words.  Wordy dissertations and letters longer than 250 words are never published.  A letter to the editor should be brief and to the point.