Letters to the editor | Sunday, Aug. 8, 2021: We must be better on water, climate, vaccinations
We must do better on water
Water policies developed after the Little Ice Age 100 years ago are not scientifically sound or sustainable for California.
Juan Cabrillo wrote of snowcapped mountains around Carmel in 1542, when the period of global cooling known as the Little Ice Age began. Juan Crespí, on the Portolá expedition in 1769, wrote that Indians in the Santa Lucia Mountains in present-day Monterey County said they had deep winter snow.
My grandmother grew up a gold miner’s daughter 120 years ago on the southern ridge of the Yuba River above Downieville when our water policies were developed. They had several feet of snow every winter at 4,500 feet in elevation. We rarely have permanent winter snow at that elevation anymore.
People who believe we can use as much water as we want are basically spending our inheritance with no regard for the kids and grandkids. Farmers are pumping more water from our aquifers than is being replaced, causing permanent subsidence in the land. We cannot dam our way out of our historical aridity because we rarely fill the reservoirs we have.
It’s time we learn to live within our means, and that means California is far drier that we previously thought.
Keith Ensminger, Merced
Redirect military funds to climate
We, the people of the planet and the United States are on the cusp of a climate change that will destroy our civilization as we know it. We have passed the point where we can escape all the effects.
I suggest that we reduce the military budget significantly and use that money to mitigate the climate change that is in progress. But that would require Congress to act, and if there is a more useless group of people on the planet than Congress (House and Senate) I would be hard pressed to name them.
Maybe it is time to change our form of government from a capitalist/profit at any cost, “representative” democracy to another more responsive form. By reducing the military budget we are reducing two existential threats at once. Nuclear War and Climate Change. Sounds like a winner to me.
Remember the Declaration of Independence “.... that to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, – That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government ...”
Andrew Ogilvie, Modesto
A McCarthy threat
Nancy Pelosi must be quaking in her Gucci’s since Minor Leader Kevin McCarthy suggested he might not be able to keep from “gaveling “her when (not if !) Republicans retake the House and he is anointed Speaker.
Who would not fear this renowned he-man, who scurries to every golf venue where the dear leader is recalculating his scorecard in order to get his marching orders and visit his spine?
The perfect rep for a Congress overflowing with Republicans whose sole agenda item is self-preservation and who bend over backward to kneel to Trump. (Ouch!)
Jack Heinsius, Modesto
No reason not to get vaxxed
In the movie “Forest Gump,” Forest (Tom Hanks) says, “Stupid is as stupid does.” Well, we have a situation right now in this country that is a real life depiction of stupidity. I’m speaking about the coronavirus vaccinations.
Some people have rationalized all kinds of “stupid” reasons not to get a Covid vax. We have taken vaccine shots for measles, small pox, whooping cough and polio and many more. We do this to be healthy and make everyone around us disease free.
The reasons for not taking the vaccine are so bizarre that it boggles your mind. There isn’t any logical explanation. If you value your life and other people around you, you just take the shot. It’s that simple.
This vaccination avoidance has become a cultural difference in this country..
On one hand we have reasonable and logical people who follow the science. On the other hand we have a large group of people that are unreasonable and without logic.
Only 35% of our county are fully vaxxed. So how do you persuade 60% of this county to take the shot. You can”t. They are just too stupid to understand the consequences of their decision. God help us!
Dennis Thomas, Modesto
A third shot, please
It is essential that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Biden Administration immediately make a third COVID booster shot available to vulnerable people who request it. These booster shots are needed to counter breakthrough COVID cases caused by the delta variant, which is causing deadly and debilitating cases in people who have previously been vaccinated against the initial form of the virus, as well as those who are unvaccinated.
When I received my two Pfizer shots earlier this year, I assumed I would need a third shot, a booster, within a year, similar to my need for an annual flu shot. The time has come for the CDC to make this prudent third injection available. The life-sucking delta variant is now known to be more contagious than the common cold, and much deadlier.
It is a common characteristic of viruses to mutate over time. Some viruses mutate, become weaker and die out. Others, like the delta, get stronger and increase their ability to sicken and kill people. To date, over 600,000 people are dead in the United States because of the COVID disease. Over 4 million people throughout the world have been killed by the virus.
Last week, Israel was the first country to make a third (booster) vaccination available to seniors and other vulnerable populations. CDC and the Biden Administration need to do the same immediately.
Richard Vesperman, Turlock
This story was originally published August 8, 2021 at 5:00 AM.