Kevin McCarthy will have to take climate action if he wants a future in politics | Opinion
McCarthy’s inaction
“Kevin McCarthy goes down in infamy as the first deposed House speaker. He earned it | Opinion,” (fresnobee.com, Oct. 4)
Recently, 150 members of the Sunrise Movement occupied Kevin McCarthy’s office. This coincided with a battle over the federal budget, and ended when McCarthy reached across the aisle for Democratic support.
These two events provide McCarthy a vision of his possible climate futures: either he abides by the will of the American people, or protects oil interests and finds his life disrupted. This is not a threat. Rather, it’s a dose of reality.
Inaction threatens the lives and livelihoods of all Americans. Given that statistics say most Americans want action on climate change, this inaction is also fundamentally undemocratic.
McCarthy could choose to work with the climate organizations who’ve reached out to him. He’ll have to take action on climate if he wants to have a peaceful future in politics.
C.J. Wilson
Fresno
Different perspective
“Giant sequoias burned because of humans. Of course we should try to help | Opinion,” (fresnobee.com, Sept. 29)
In the words of a biologist who carried out this research himself, Dr. Chad Hanson: “Given the universally acknowledged massive failure of sequoia reproduction over the past century due to suppression of mixed-intensity wildfires that sequoias need to effectively regenerate, I would go so far as to say that the super-abundant natural sequoia regeneration that we are seeing currently in the high-intensity fire patch within the wilderness area in Redwood Mountain Grove in Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks is the greatest sequoia reproduction that any human beings have personally witnessed since the late 1800s.”
Mixed-intensity fires are natural, including high-intensity fire patches small and large, and giant sequoias have evolved over tens of millions of years to depend on such fires. But the park is saying they intend to use chainsaws and dynamite to create clear cuts in this wilderness area so they can fly in squadrons of helicopters to drop off tens of thousands of nursery-grown seedlings and equipment.
This must not go forward.
Emily S. Brandt
Fresno
Opinion
Meaningless lawsuit
“Climate change forces Americans to reconsider profit, greed, power and truth | Opinion,” (fresnobee.com, Sept. 22)
Andrew Fiala opinion piece regarding greed, power and truth in relation to climate change completely overlooks the fact that the lawsuits against the five oil companies will have no impact on climate change.
Not only that, the suits are meant to fill the coffers of our large and expensive state government (greed), make our leaders seem effective (power) and ultimately distract us from their financial mismanagement and day-to-day failures.
This effort seems a lot like the state’s tobacco lawsuit settled in 1998, which resulted in … no benefit to anyone besides the handful of attorneys who became multimillionaires.
Alan Kelton
Clovis
Trump is a criminal
“Donald Trump’s lawyers seek to halt civil fraud trial and block ruling disrupting real estate empire,” (fresnobee.com, Sept. 6)
A New York judge just found Donald Trump liable for fraud for inflating his net worth by over $2 billion and canceled the Trump Organization’s business certification. Will this recent charge against him be enough to discourage his followers? I seriously doubt it.
He was impeached twice during his presidency. He has four indictments pending with a total of 91 charges. When he did not like the result of the election, he encouraged his followers to attack the building of his own government, thus making it clear he did not believe in democracy. The only thing he has on his mind is to retaliate against anybody who opposes him.
It is incredible that some people still support — and even worship — him. Do we really want a criminal to represent this country? Trump should not even be allowed to run for president. We need someone with higher moral values, who follows and obeys laws and puts this country first.
We all need to show a little more respect for this country. We can do better.
Ryoichi Morita
Coarsegold
Homophobic action
“Clovis Unified board needs to publicly address its policies for LGBTQ students | Opinion,” (fresnobee.com, Oct. 1)
Clovis Unified decided to completely reject any outside organizations to be held within their schools facilities rather than allow one LGBTQ+ group to hold a one-hour session of reading to elementary children. The decision displays child-like behavior from the school board members.
The board is excluding the LGBTQ+ community and displaying a closed mindset. If the district had allowed the group to use their facility, it would not have been a big deal. Closing access to everyone and revealing the board’s homophobia and transphobia just because one group wanted to read to children is a shame.
Mila Eng
Fresno
Unprofitable process
“Can Valley farmers use water wisely & re-purpose land when needed? That’s the question | Opinion,” (fresnobee.com, Sept. 24)
Turning flood-damaged land into solar farms could be a very unprofitable way for farmers to repurpose their unproductive land. Anticipating the increasing demand for a stronger energy grid, there has been an oversupply of renewable energy projects, making it an incredibly long and unprofitable process to start a solar farm. On July 27, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission Acting Chairman Willie Phillips stated that there were more than 2,000 gigawatts of renewable energy projects waiting to be connected to the power grid.
It would take years for these existing projects to get permitted and attached to the power grid. If completed, it would double the supply of renewable energy accessible to the power grid. To build a solar farm would require years of permitting, and by the time the solar panels are connected to the grid, the cost of electricity would have gone through a correction making them unprofitable in future years.
Kenny Bekedam, Fresno
Vote them out
“McCarthy rejects Senate spending bill while scrambling for a House plan that averts a shutdown,” (fresnobee.com, Sept. 28)
It’s about time we put a stop to the total dysfunction of Congress. We, the voters, voters have the power to do something about it. How? Vote out the 45 members of the Republican “Freedom Caucas” holding us hostage. These folks are stonewalling anything proposed by either party that might avoid a shutdown of the government.
True, we are unable to do anything in California to vote out any of these members since none are from California. I am asking Rep. Tom McClintock: “Are you supporting efforts to avoid a shutdown or are you supporting the obstructionist Freedom Caucus?
Carole Moore
Fresno
