Letters for February 3, 2011

Short but sweet

Re “All the right moves” (Bridal Guide, Jan. 27):

Great article, great senator, and certainly a great couple!

Eddie Floyd
Reno

Better man

Re “The new man” (Feature story, Jan. 27):

Thank Dennis Myers for a comprehensive and thoughtful article on Gov. Sandoval. I would hope that Washoe County citizens will contact their legislators to let them know that if we are to share the burden, then let us share increased taxes. Cut, slash and burn is not the way to attract businesses to our state and it supports a brain drain of our young people leaving the state for a better education and better job opportunities. Putting the burden on public employees and teachers, working and retired, is, in my mind, small-minded and mean-spirited, as well as short-sighted.

Martha Gould
Reno

Be the solution

President Obama’s State of the Union speech was very uplifting. He reached out his hand to everyone in America, both houses of the legislature and both political parties. I sincerely appreciate that this president really understands what is important to Americans. He understands the challenges of this economy, the desperate needs for jobs, and how vital it is to change our educational system to teach our young people so they will be able to someday run this country. We must work together as a nation that cares about one another, and it’s time to ignore anybody not interested in working toward resolutions to our shared problems. Please think about the future. I don’t worry about myself, but I do worry about my grandchildren and great grandchildren. This president is offering America the chance to reach beyond the partisanship that has historically limited our ability to “win the future” that America is capable of. I hope everybody is prepared to support President Obama as he helps us address the many challenges we face and leave a better country for future Americans.

Barbara Stone
Sparks

Too little, too late?

Re “Weird science” (Letters to the Editor, Jan. 20):

I need to respond to Ted Beecher’s comfortable position. There is a book he should research: Mark Lynas’s Six Degrees: Future of a Hotter Planet. It is just possible that we don’t have 30 years to get the carbon dioxide problem under control. We have just given our children 30 years of debt, but the consequences of too much CO2 are far greater—and totally irreversible. That means what’s already been lost will never come back in anyone’s lifetime. That is scientific fact. What the people who are in charge are not telling us truthfully is how much is already gone and how much will be gone no matter what we do. And why have we waited so long to fix this?

Theresa McMahon
via email

Now you’re cookin’

One third of the world’s population depends on diminishing supplies of firewood to cook their food. This is not sustainable. It leads to deforestation, which leads to less oxygen and more global warming. It also cuts into quality family time as women have to spend time searching for the firewood.

Most of these people do not have safe drinking water.

With solar cookers, there wouldn’t be the need to cut down trees, and there could be more quality family time. It would also pasteurize the water. Solar cookers can be provided inexpensively ($25 per family) by Solar Cookers International. Their address is: 1919 21st Street, Suite 101, Sacramento, Calif.

A.M. Sokolow
Santa Monica, Calif.

Train strain

Re “That’s just mean” (Letters to the Editor, Jan. 20):

Granted, the railroad played an integral part in founding the pit stop we now know as Reno, but I fail to see how cheery overpasses and viewing areas can possibly generate any revenue whatsoever. We already have many viewing areas, cleverly referred to as “railroad crossings,” The last breathtaking vista that I beheld was a seven-minute graffiti extravaganza crawling by, including 24 “fucks,” or variations thereof. Hardly a marquee attraction.

How can one romanticize one aspect of Reno’s history while demonizing its primary foundations? History has an ugly face, and the only way it can show its good side is by seizing opportunity. What you see as greed, those people saw as necessity. Those “lowlife types” didn’t get to ride here being lulled to sleep on an Amtrak sleeper car. Many died on the journey, and many more perished by going to work everyday, including miners, working girls and Chinese railworkers.

So without greedy miners, the skewed gene pool of immoral cardsharps and those magnificent red light ladies to forge the way, there would be what here exactly? Train tracks.

Matthew Kendig
Reno

Enough already

Re “Taxing state workers has ripple effect” (View from the Fray, Jan. 20):

I loved this column, and the writer the nail on the head! As a select few believe, we state employees are not overpaid—well, the majority of us—and our benefits—well, let’s just say they really aren’t worth crap! I feel that this state has done nothing but discriminate against the state employees.

We, too, are suffering. We have lost our homes, have to decide between medication we need and putting food on the table, trying to figure how to pay our bills so we can at least keep the utilities on. How much more are the state employees to suffer?

We understand the no new taxes, but the majority doesn’t agree with it. After all, how much would the state raise by adding even 1/4 percent tax rate? Not to mention that then everyone is pitching in, not just a select few. If we don’t want to raise the taxes, then how about adding a tax on, say, snack foods, as California has done?

Maybe those in office should forgo their wages or at least be paid the way we do. I barely make it on just under $30,000 a year, thanks to the 4.6 percent cut. Gee governor, can you and your family survive on that and still keep the lifestyle that you are accustomed to?

When are we to pay attention to the reports that Nevada cannot keep going the way it is without a tax base? Those in power continue to ignore that and decide to discriminate against a select group so they can keep their wages and promises to not raise taxes. When that is not enough, they take it from education! We wonder as a state why we are on the bottom of the list for education. Look to your government first.

You may ask why I stay at my job. You’re right, I can leave my job. But I stay here because I love my job and our students!

Chris Tognarelli
Reno

Wayback machine

Re “10 things I hate about Burning Man” (Feature story, Sept. 6, 2007):

It’s people such as yourself who are ruining the spirit of Burning Man. If you ever read up on where Burning Man got its start, you would know that these “yahoos” of which you speak are true burners who keep Burning Man alive. It’s more than just a big party, and that’s what sets it apart. The guy who stole your brother’s bike most likely had the same bad attitude as yourself.

Captain Pajama Pants
Black Rock City