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30150 Telegraph, Suite 444 Bingham Farms, MI 48025 Your Financial Issues THAV GROSS has been solving problems since 1982. Be sure to tune in to Law and Reality – Sunday mornings at 11 AM on TV20. Your Legal Issues thavgross.com lawandreality.com Do NOT use your IRA or Retirement to Pay Credit Card Debt. Elderly clients often come to our office seeking help with their debt situation. In almost every case, before they have come to see us, they have withdrawn retirement funds - IRAs and 401ks - to pay bills. I cringe at this. It is a terrible mistake. Retirement funds are there to provide the supplemental income beyond social security that is needed to cover living expenses through retirement. When we stop working – our income is capped but inflation and our lifespans are not. You must make sure retirement funds are used wisely. IRAs and retirement funds are protected in bankruptcy – which means you can keep that money and eliminate the credit card debt. Another little known fact is that a normal creditor cannot garnish or levy on your social security income. These two facts – combined – mean that you should NOT use your retirement funds to pay down debt. If you're retired and in this situation – you should come see us right away. If your parents are in this situation – you need to take action now. When their funds are exhausted, providing for their support is on you. "You can't just keep paying until you're broke." Ask Attorney Ken Gross about... viewpoints » S e n d l e t t e r s t o : l e t t e r s @ t h e j e w i s h n e w s . c o m June 9 • 2016 5 for openers Weather … Or Not W hether it's cold or whether it's hot, we'll have weather, whether or not. If there is one thing all people around the United States seem to have an opinion on it is the weath- er. All the recent scares brought on by global warming have only added rain to the flood, as it were. Perhaps, then, we can get a bet- ter perspective on conditions by considering some of the worst the U.S. has experienced. Cold weather seems to cause some contention when it comes to "bragging" rights. One has to consider the air tem- perature and then figure in wind chill. You can see why there will be areas of argument. In January of 1885, Mount Washington, N.H., recorded 50 below zero, and that was not with wind chill. That temperature was matched in Utah in 1913, Vermont in 1933, in Nevada in 1937, in New Mexico in 1951 and Maine in 2009. We are led then to consider snowfall. Of course, there will be records noted for the Great Lakes areas and the East Coast, where snow is not foreign. However, consider the folks for whom snow is a rarity. In 1895, Batesville, Miss., recorded 15 inches of snow. Other warm-weather states had surprises in more recent years with the appearance of significant amounts of the white stuff: 2008 in New Orleans, 2009 in Florence, Fla., and 2012 in Little Rock. In that last one, the folks of Arkansas had a surprise with a truly white Christmas. Floods have plagued the U.S. throughout the years. Consider these: Johnstown in 1889 had 10 inches of rain in 24 hours; Galveston in 1900 experienced a 16-foot storm surge; in 1972 in the Black Hills of South Dakota, a 15-inch down- fall caused a breech in a dam in Canyon Lake, flooding Rapid City; in 1993, the Mississippi River stayed at flood stage for 81 days and covered 17,000 square miles of land; and, in 2005, Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast and 80 percent of New Orleans was flooded and stayed so for weeks. All this has happened, with new records set as recently as 2015; and we have yet to consider heat and drought. So, you see, it really can be worse. That reminds me of the story of the teacher, who, when check- ing a student's paper, found the words sno, rayn, flud and drowt. It was the worst spell of weather she had ever encountered. * Sy Manello Editorial Assistant letters StandWithUs Is Not Extreme Toby Citrin, co-chair of J Street, Ann Arbor, divides today's college students into four groups according to their political leanings, citing "right-leaning" students who support StandWithUs as one of "the extremes." ("Jewish College Students: Activists In A Political Crucible," May 19, page 5) Is it "extreme" to support StandWithUs (SWU), an organiza- tion whose mission is to educate about Israel's history and the Israeli-Arab conflict using verifiable facts? SWU also recognizes that Israel, like every other nation, is not perfect, but has achieved remarkable successes given the chal- lenges it has faced. Unlike J Street, which received $576,500 from the Ploughshares Fund for supporting the Iran nuclear deal, our membership is nonpartisan. It includes people of all ages and every political stripe, from those concerned with global warming and a woman's right to choose abortion to those who defend the reli- gious rights of individuals and want less government control. I would include J Street students with the "left-leaning" Jewish Voice for Peace. Neither of these groups accepts the real- ity of a Jewish state that has the power and responsibility to protect its citizens against terrorism, requiring actions not in keeping with what J Street supporters perceive as Jewish values. Those who support organizations like StandWithUs know that although Israel lives in a very imperfect neighborhood, it strives to adhere to Jewish values even under the stress of war. After acting as an observer of the last Gaza War, British Colonel Richard Kemp said this in an address to the UN: " I believe Israel to be world leaders in ac tions to minimize civilian casualties; and this is borne out by the efforts made by the U.S. Army, the most sophisticated and powerful in the world, to learn from the IDF on this issue." And, lastly, those students who Citrin groups as not engaged with Israel still need to read accurate materials about the Arab-Israel conflict, which StandWithUs provides, in keeping with its mission statement that "education is the road to peace." They need only to go to www.standwithus.com. Margot Gardner Bloomfield Hills Member of SWU-MI Hamas And Gaza The JN says we should distinguish between Hamas and the people of Gaza (May 26, page 6). I'm having a problem with that. As I recall, the people of Gaza elected the Hamas government. So, as best I can tell, this is a distinction with- out a difference. Dennis L. Green Farmington Hills SHAVUOT On Shvuoth, mir hobn gikrign* the Law. Our Torah in Sinai, it was long ago. Undzer** Torah is cool, so zahy nisht*** a fool. On Shvuoth, tzuzamen tzu**** shul we will go. * mir hobn gikrign — we received ** Undzer — ou r *** zahy nisht — don't be **** tzuzamen tzu — together to — Rachel Kapen Yiddish Limerick