Degradation follows collectivism

To the Editor,

Communism and fascism are but two branches of the same”collectivist” tree. 

Central authority is usurped by a single leader and his followers who make all major economic, social, and political decisions. 

The “people” then no longer represent the source of all political power but become merely a means of attaining the utopian ends desired by the “dear” leader. 

We, the people of the United States, are being led down this path to our destruction. 

This “soft” revolution over time incrementally erodes the traditional values that have made us free and prosperous. 

Through legislative fiat by self interested officials at every level, we are forced to accept their values. 

Everything starts to appear upside down. 

The current collectivist movement is being led by our own president. 

A man who has been befriended and mentored by collectivist activists throughout his entire life including Frank Marshall Davis, Jeremiah Wright, Bernardine Dohrn, and Bill Ayers. 

Ayers, as a member of the radical Weatherman Underground, once said “Kill all the rich people. Break up their cars and apartments. Bring the revolution home. Kill your parents.” 

This collectivist persuasion followed the president into the White House with executive appointments of like minded individuals including Van Jones, self proclaimed communist and Anita Dunn, Mao admirer. Our free enterprise system, our Constitution, our very way of life is threatened. History shows what follows every collectivist movement: human degradation 

Randy Meyer 

Sonora

Divisive campaigning

To the Editor,

In 1980, when President Reagan asked Americans, “Are you better off now than you were four years ago?” it was still possible to campaign on a theme as simple as the job performance of the other guy. But now, 32 years later, the campaign hinges on a much more fundamental split among the voting population.

Romney appeals to voters who are dissatisfied with the last four years. 

Obama appeals to voters who are dissatisfied with America.

Obama is targeting narrow groups, stirring up conflicts over issues aimed at those groups, whether it’s union pensions, racism, immigration or birth control — a frenzied rush to polarize as many groups as possible and join them together into an acrimonious coalition, not so much for anything, as against Republicans — groups who are unhappy with America, not in the last four years, but in the last two-hundred years. 

No optimism, just deeply rooted pessimism about this country as a whole — the Democratic Party’s coalition against democracy.

There isn’t a single Obama voter anywhere who believes that four more years will make this country better. 

They believe Obama will: make the country a worse place for those people that they hate; grant their group more special privileges while America goes to hell.

Obama is running an un-American, anti-American campaign — a campaign to divide up, carve up and toss aside the laws and traditions of the United States and replace them with the power of arrogance.

Obama cannot win an American election, but he isn’t running in an American election — he’s running in a post-American election.

By the way, if liberals understood math they wouldn’t be liberals.

Ray Anderson

Sonora

Degradation follows collectivism

To the Editor,

Communism and fascism are but two branches of the same”collectivist” tree. 

Central authority is usurped by a single leader and his followers who make all major economic, social, and political decisions. 

The “people” then no longer represent the source of all political power but become merely a means of attaining the utopian ends desired by the “dear” leader. 

We, the people of the United States, are being led down this path to our destruction. 

This “soft” revolution over time incrementally erodes the traditional values that have made us free and prosperous. 

Through legislative fiat by self interested officials at every level, we are forced to accept their values. 

Everything starts to appear upside down. 

The current collectivist movement is being led by our own president. 

A man who has been befriended and mentored by collectivist activists throughout his entire life including Frank Marshall Davis, Jeremiah Wright, Bernardine Dohrn, and Bill Ayers. 

Ayers, as a member of the radical Weatherman Underground, once said “Kill all the rich people. Break up their cars and apartments. Bring the revolution home. Kill your parents.” 

This collectivist persuasion followed the president into the White House with executive appointments of like minded individuals including Van Jones, self proclaimed communist and Anita Dunn, Mao admirer. Our free enterprise system, our Constitution, our very way of life is threatened. History shows what follows every collectivist movement: human degradation 

Randy Meyer 

Sonora

Divisive campaigning

To the Editor,

In 1980, when President Reagan asked Americans, “Are you better off now than you were four years ago?” it was still possible to campaign on a theme as simple as the job performance of the other guy. But now, 32 years later, the campaign hinges on a much more fundamental split among the voting population.

Romney appeals to voters who are dissatisfied with the last four years. 

Obama appeals to voters who are dissatisfied with America.

Obama is targeting narrow groups, stirring up conflicts over issues aimed at those groups, whether it’s union pensions, racism, immigration or birth control — a frenzied rush to polarize as many groups as possible and join them together into an acrimonious coalition, not so much for anything, as against Republicans — groups who are unhappy with America, not in the last four years, but in the last two-hundred years. 

No optimism, just deeply rooted pessimism about this country as a whole — the Democratic Party’s coalition against democracy.

There isn’t a single Obama voter anywhere who believes that four more years will make this country better. 

They believe Obama will: make the country a worse place for those people that they hate; grant their group more special privileges while America goes to hell.

Obama is running an un-American, anti-American campaign — a campaign to divide up, carve up and toss aside the laws and traditions of the United States and replace them with the power of arrogance.

Obama cannot win an American election, but he isn’t running in an American election — he’s running in a post-American election.

By the way, if liberals understood math they wouldn’t be liberals.

Ray Anderson

Sonora

Walmart lawsuit

To the Editor,                                                                                    

In response to the article in the Aug. 23 Union Democrat regarding the lawsuit aimed at curbing Walmart’s expansion, I object to the fact that others are deciding how I can save money.  

What does it matter that Walmart can implement its own zoning rules without the requirement to complete an environmental impact review?  Why is this needed?

When Walmart originally bought or leased (I don’t know which) the property, the extra lot was included in the deal. The consensus, at that time, was they would be able to expand their store. Isn’t it the future now?

Mr. Domenic Torchia said he was against the expansion because he wanted to save jobs for the other grocery stores. Considering the economy and the prices of groceries today, I am in favor of it.  

I am a senior living on a fixed income. Any way I can save money would be helpful to me.  Would these other stores help me to save money and lower their prices?

Marge Jones

Sonora

GOP wants to privatize Medicare

To the Editor,

In response to Patricia DuFur’s Aug. 22 Letter to the Editor: 

Where is the $716 billion coming from that Patricia DuFur is talking about? I am sure she believes in the alleged raid on Medicare that Romney/Ryan have been campaigning on in one minute ads. 

Let’s look where it really comes from. According to the Affordable Healthcare Act it will come from reducing annual increases in federal reimbursement to hospitals, nursing homes and home health care agencies — to force a notoriously inefficient system to find ways of improving productivity. Another source will come from drug makers, device makers, and insurers — fees they can surely afford since expanded coverage for the uninsured will increase their markets and revenues. 

More will be saved by reducing unjustifiably high subsidies to private Medicare Advantage plans that enroll beneficiaries at a higher than average cost than Medicare. 

Romney/Ryan recently said they would restore the entire $716 billion in cuts by repealing the Affordable Care Act. 

The Congressional Budget Office says that would increase the deficit by $109 billion in the next 10 years. The Republicans have long had a goal of privatizing Medicare. Romney/Ryan would see that plan would begin. 

Carol Malispina 

Sonora

Hooliganism jailings

To the Editor,

Media outlets are condemning Russia’s two year imprisonment judgement of the Pussy Riot Three for hooliganism in Moscow’s Christ the Savior Cathedral. After watching their stunt on Youtube, I agree imprisonment is warranted but two years is excessive.  

A modification may give appropriate justice: reduction to three months upon good behavior, sign agreement not to perform publicly for 2 years, all monetary gain from stunt go to the Cathedral they embarrassed. 

The U.S. media should not be shocked and exploit this event because of our prisons being crowded with long sentences for illegal drug transactors and three-strike trivial offenders.

Dennis Schneider

Angels Camp

The conservative agenda on unions

To the Editor,

The conservative agenda is anti-union. Apparently we’re better off when workers have no voice. Our government could foster labor and business cooperation, but it doesn’t. Since the 1970’s, union membership has declined from 40 percent to 9 percent. 

Graph the decline in union membership and the decline in middle class wages since the 1970s they nearly match. American workers are more productive but profits aren’t shared. Busting unions keeps your wages low. 

In “Upward Mobility,” America ranks 47th among the 47 industrialized economies, so much for the American dream. If worker wages had grown at post World War II rates, wages would be 30 percent higher today. 

Healthy unions fight wage gouging that funds excessive executive pay, and exports jobs overseas.

We deregulated the banks (another conservative idea), creating the recession. 

The bankers got off — what had been illegal was deregulated. It costs money to create jobs but we hate stimulus. 

The Tea Party thinks we create jobs by making the “recession creators” wealthier but there’s no evidence this happens. 

The top 20 percent of Americans hold 84 percent of the nation wealth — so where are those jobs?

And who’s paying for this recession? 

Who’s losing their homes, jobs, benefits, and pensions…the wealthy? 

“The recession creators” get tax cuts, while they’re claiming huge wage increases, and bonuses…why? 

Who’s there to stop them? 

American workers are paying for this recession.

In Scranton, Penn., the wages of the public workers including police and firemen were cut to minimum wage of $7.25. 

Wages, benefits and pensions are declining. You’re next. 

And the recession creators are just laughing, saying, “No new taxes… unions are bad.” 

And when wages are low enough, “You can shine my shoes!”

Robert Carabas

Sonora

Something’s fishy

To the Editor,

In a recent article “Muddy Water No Fish Danger,” that ran Aug. 28, it is stated by Forest Service biologist, Crispin Holland, that “Our native species are adapted to these kind of natural disturbances,” in reply to the excessive amount of sedimentation in our waterways lately because of Sierra Nevada thunderstorms, downpours, and hail storms.

He also goes on to state this sediment introduced into the waterways is actually beneficial to certain species and helps keep the natural balance. 

No, what is odd to me is it’s supposedly sedimentation that us dredgers were supposedly causing that was evidently “harming,” the fish, and the ecology of the water way? 

As dredgers and the past studies have shown, we know that what we were doing was not harming the fish either, yet it was still banned. It is also odd that there has been record salmon runs the last few years?

What gives? Something smells fishy … and its not the fish.

C. Stemler 

Sonora

Safety is everyone’s responsibility

To the Editor,

Regarding the Aug. 22 guest column from the Los Angeles Times, “How to make Yosemite Safer.”

Thanks the Boy Scouts of America for making our wilderness national parks safer for so many years. Kids in scuffy blue and yellow uniforms experienced their first hikes and tents thanks to the BSA, and the uniforms they wore were insignias of safety: The scout bandana was a cravat — first aid!   

Most of that technical know-how — how to survive in a wilderness place — has gone to the BSA wayside, but the main roads to wild places are still much traveled.

What we need to do is to rekindle an interest in the awareness of dangers and survival, as the CERT (Community Emergency Response Team) training of the American Red Cross does. 

I say teach CERT in schools as a requirement for high school graduation.

Likewise, we need to instruct park visitors in routine safety.  

More signs (a.k.a. speed limits) will be ignored. Handing out leaflets is asinine where functional illiteracy hovers at the rate of 1 in 2. What we need to do is to invent a comic strip feature that teaches kids (and adults) safety in the parks, Yosemite included.    

How many people see in the depths of their mind’s eye the slick-rock scenario that takes lives year after year and fall after fall — the same lesson pending ad infi-nauseum. 

Blame the parks! How to make Yosemite safer, as if we can engineer safety into wilderness.  

 Bah, humbug!   

We need to teach people painlessly (even those who read poorly) about the dangers inherent in nature and the need for personal survival skills.

Safety is not just the responsibility of those who wear the broad-rimmed hats — it’s your responsibility too ... and yours ... and yours!

Bud Hoekstra

San Andreas

No such thing as ‘legitimate’ rape

To the Editor,

In regards to Todd Akin.

There is never, never such a thing as a “legitimate rape,” as per Todd Akin.

Rape is a horrific crime with terrible consequence to the victim — sometimes venereal disease and even worse, a pregnancy.

For Akin and others of his ilk, I think a little middle-school sex education might broaden his intellect, if he has any.

If a woman is not on birth control and the cycle of her menses is at the fertile time when she is raped — pregnancy can happen. 

As to what she chooses to do at that time is her business alone. Not yours, not mine and certainly not Akin’s.

Nancy Czito

Jamestown

Electoral college

To the Editor,

I take exception to many of the statements in CB Maxwell’s letter in the Aug. 14 paper.

First, “The Electoral College is a foundation of our republic and constitution” — Huh!

Isn’t it just a method of electing the president and vice-president. This antiquated method may have been useful in the early days of this country when transportation and communication were primitive, but it certainly isn’t needed today.

In most states, all of the electoral votes go to the candidate who received the majority of that state’s vote. In effect, nobody else’s vote counts. If you happen to live in a state where the majority of the votes are Democrat, for example, and you vote for a Republican or Independent presidential candidate, sorry your vote won’t count toward electing the Prez.

It would take an amendment to the U.S. Constitution to change the system, and would be extremely difficult to accomplish. But, if enough state voting laws are changed, the method of electing the president could, in effect, be changed to the popular vote. This change has already been made in several states. 

Let’s encourage our state to do the same.

The means to accomplish this is very simple — have the state’s electoral votes go to the candidate who receives the most popular votes (in the whole country). 

Voila, the president (and VP) would, in effect, be elected by the popular vote (so, everyone’s vote counts).

Another benefit of eliminating the Electoral College would be the elimination of “battleground states!” 

Hoorah!

Jerry Fueslein

Groveland

Correction

 An Aug. 15 letter from Dolores Kipp contained incorrect information regarding Union Bank of California and its advertisements. It also contained incorrect information about President Obama’s chief of staff.  

Something’s fishy

To the Editor,

In a recent article “Muddy Water No Fish Danger,” that ran Aug. 28, it is stated by Forest Service biologist, Crispin Holland, that “Our native species are adapted to these kind of natural disturbances,” in reply to the excessive amount of sedimentation in our waterways lately because of Sierra Nevada thunderstorms, downpours, and hail storms.

He also goes on to state this sediment introduced into the waterways is actually beneficial to certain species and helps keep the natural balance. 

No, what is odd to me is it’s supposedly sedimentation that us dredgers were supposedly causing that was evidently “harming,” the fish, and the ecology of the water way? 

As dredgers and the past studies have shown, we know that what we were doing was not harming the fish either, yet it was still banned. It is also odd that there has been record salmon runs the last few years?

What gives? Something smells fishy … and its not the fish.

C. Stemler 

Sonora

Safety is everyone’s responsibility

To the Editor,

Regarding the Aug. 22 guest column from the Los Angeles Times, “How to make Yosemite Safer.”

Thanks the Boy Scouts of America for making our wilderness national parks safer for so many years. Kids in scuffy blue and yellow uniforms experienced their first hikes and tents thanks to the BSA, and the uniforms they wore were insignias of safety: The scout bandana was a cravat — first aid!   

Most of that technical know-how — how to survive in a wilderness place — has gone to the BSA wayside, but the main roads to wild places are still much traveled.

What we need to do is to rekindle an interest in the awareness of dangers and survival, as the CERT (Community Emergency Response Team) training of the American Red Cross does. 

I say teach CERT in schools as a requirement for high school graduation.

Likewise, we need to instruct park visitors in routine safety.  

More signs (a.k.a. speed limits) will be ignored. Handing out leaflets is asinine where functional illiteracy hovers at the rate of 1 in 2. What we need to do is to invent a comic strip feature that teaches kids (and adults) safety in the parks, Yosemite included.    

How many people see in the depths of their mind’s eye the slick-rock scenario that takes lives year after year and fall after fall — the same lesson pending ad infi-nauseum. 

Blame the parks! How to make Yosemite safer, as if we can engineer safety into wilderness.  

 Bah, humbug!   

We need to teach people painlessly (even those who read poorly) about the dangers inherent in nature and the need for personal survival skills.

Safety is not just the responsibility of those who wear the broad-rimmed hats — it’s your responsibility too ... and yours ... and yours!

Bud Hoekstra

San Andreas

No such thing as ‘legitimate’ rape

To the Editor,

In regards to Todd Akin.

There is never, never such a thing as a “legitimate rape,” as per Todd Akin.

Rape is a horrific crime with terrible consequence to the victim — sometimes venereal disease and even worse, a pregnancy.

For Akin and others of his ilk, I think a little middle-school sex education might broaden his intellect, if he has any.

If a woman is not on birth control and the cycle of her menses is at the fertile time when she is raped — pregnancy can happen. 

As to what she chooses to do at that time is her business alone. Not yours, not mine and certainly not Akin’s.

Nancy Czito

Jamestown

Electoral college

To the Editor,

I take exception to many of the statements in CB Maxwell’s letter in the Aug. 14 paper.

First, “The Electoral College is a foundation of our republic and constitution” — Huh!

Isn’t it just a method of electing the president and vice-president. This antiquated method may have been useful in the early days of this country when transportation and communication were primitive, but it certainly isn’t needed today.

In most states, all of the electoral votes go to the candidate who received the majority of that state’s vote. In effect, nobody else’s vote counts. If you happen to live in a state where the majority of the votes are Democrat, for example, and you vote for a Republican or Independent presidential candidate, sorry your vote won’t count toward electing the Prez.

It would take an amendment to the U.S. Constitution to change the system, and would be extremely difficult to accomplish. But, if enough state voting laws are changed, the method of electing the president could, in effect, be changed to the popular vote. This change has already been made in several states. 

Let’s encourage our state to do the same.

The means to accomplish this is very simple — have the state’s electoral votes go to the candidate who receives the most popular votes (in the whole country). 

Voila, the president (and VP) would, in effect, be elected by the popular vote (so, everyone’s vote counts).

Another benefit of eliminating the Electoral College would be the elimination of “battleground states!” 

Hoorah!

Jerry Fueslein

Groveland

Correction

 An Aug. 15 letter from Dolores Kipp contained incorrect information regarding Union Bank of California and its advertisements. It also contained incorrect information about President Obama’s chief of staff.  

Thanks to good samaritans

To the Editor,

On Aug. 20 at approximately 12:20 p.m. our GMC Acadia was hit by a driver not paying attention on a dangerous stretch of O’Brynes Ferry Road just south of Lake Tulloch Bridge. It was a very terrifying experience. 

Due to a dead cellular area, cellulars did not work but our 2-meter amateur radio did. AE6LA/Ken answered our call for aid by calling 911. 

A Mom and teen daughter came to our aide with moist towels, water and comfort while we waited for EMS. 

An off duty paramedic assisted in calming me while the first responders were assisting in freeing my husband from the car. Names were shared with me but I was so traumatized that I can’t remember the names of those who offered aid. 

You know who you are; know that you hold a very special place in our hearts. Thank you!

Miriam Brown

Copperopolis

Tax cheats

To the Editor,

Tax cheaters are traitors. If Mitt Romney won’t prove that he’s not one then he’s unqualified to be president.

Bob Wetzel 

Murphys

Good neighbors

To the Editor,

We too were affected by the Monte Grande Road fire on Aug. 7. We are thankful that Cal Fire did a wonderful job and the fire was stopped across the road from our home. 

Talking with neighbors further up the road, a special vote of thanks goes to all the Covers over the hill. Had it not been for their quick response and a big caterpillar plugging up the hill toward our subdivision, several more homes could have been lost. We may not know the Covers personally, but we have never heard anything but good about them and their work efforts. Maybe it is time that some of us get better acquainted with them.

Ramona Cook

Monte Grande Heights

Misconception
of  AB109

To the Editor,

AB109 was put into effect to reduce the prison population and give counties jurisdiction over the sentencing and housing of inmates that otherwise would have gone to prison. Prison population has reduced, but on the other hand Tuolumne County and other counties like it have increased in population size. Before AB109, if you were sentenced to prison, you would serve your time and, when released, you had a parole officer who would monitor your employment, your living environment and monthly drug tests. Being on parole, you had the opportunity to have a full time job with no interruptions of daily reporting. 

Since AB109 has come into effect, Tuolumne County has taken it upon itself to give all their released inmates daily reporting, classes and random drug tests multiple times during the week resulting in missing a check in or dirty test. Results: More county time payed for by the tax dollar. Does anybody see a pattern here? 

Wake up people. AB109 is a straight setup for failure for people wanting to get back on their feet. How could you possibly make ends meet or have an employer that will hire you when you have to take so much time off for these unnecessary guidelines of Tuolumne County probation? With this said, the results end in more crime when otherwise decent people trying to make ends meet end up having to resort back to crime in order to survive because of these extreme guidelines that they have to follow. AB109 is a setup for failure.

Richard Klidies 

Sonora

Courthouse rock?

To the Editor, 

I would like to thank the appropriate local governmental agency for their newest art installation. Most counties would not waste time to improve the sonic architecture around us, so I’m grateful to live in one that does. 

I’d like to know what the work is called and who the artist is, because whoever thought of having the courthouse bell tower ring a random amount of times every day at 6:50 a.m. is a genius. I’m sure the artist was influenced by the composer John Cage, who would have appreciated having the bells ring 31, 14, 72 or any random number so that everyone who is asleep can start the day with a vivid conception of the beauty of art. 

To use such a basic symbol as the small town bell tower for a medium is evocative; akin to dipping the U.S. flag in a different color every day. 

And the length of the piece is refreshing. For years it would toll 14 times at 7 a.m. and when people complained, they were told it would be fixed. As if you can fix art. 

There is a piece by John Cage that will take 689 years to complete. Who knows how long this local work will last? And if it tolls 72 times on some days now, what ecstasy will next year bring? 

Personally, I wish the art was more like Cage’s 4’33,” which is 4 minutes and 33 seconds of silence, but I’m just so proud to live in such an artistic community, I’ll wake up happily to the sound of art. 

Well, I’ll wake up for sure. 

Christopher Van Tuyl 

Sonora

Continuing to Occupy Sonora

To the Editor,

Why, passersby, may wonder, does our small “Occupy Sonora” band continue to stand Saturday mornings with our signs at Courthouse Square? 

Mainly it’s because of our deep dismay about two closely entwined political and economic realities: 

1. the impact of extraordinary amounts of money on American politics; and 

2. the hugely unequal distribution of wealth in present-day America.

The 2012 Supreme Court ruling in Citizens United allowed unlimited private donations to election campaigns at all levels.

Time Magazine projects that $5.8 billion will be spent on presidential and congressional races by the two parties this year (the figure was $4.1 billion in 2004). 

Karl Rove’s super PAC expects to raise $240 million chiefly for anti-Obama attack ads. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is expected to give $50 million to Republican candidates. The single biggest disclosed donor, Sheldon Adelson, reportedly contributed $50 million and has pledged $100 million all told to the Romney/Ryan campaign. 

Government offices and candidates can, and are, literally being bought.

Exercise of political power by moneyed interests over legislative and regulatory bodies has preserved and increased the wealth of the nation’s uber-affluent economic elite — the “one percent,” as they have been dubbed. 

They are able to protect themselves by tax rates and breaks and other financial practices that are questionable legally and, certainly, ethically. 

Needing fewer public services, they use their influence to curtail government spending for the general good — on infrastructure, health care and education, for example. Favoritism for the rich, that is, rather than services and opportunities for the overwhelming majority — that “ninety-nine percent.”

In short, we “Occupiers” are appalled by money-driven electioneering and the massive concentration of wealth at the socioeconomic top. These twin realities make a mockery of American democracy.

Our objectives are not grand. 

Dick Peterson

Sonora

No force or effect resolutions

To the Editor,

Why would the Board of Supervisors vote on a resolution that essentially has no force and effect? In the same vein one might ask: Why would a couple get engaged if they had no intention of getting married?

On Tuesday, the Board of Supervisors approved a resolution that board Chairman, Dick Pland said is not binding on the county. 

The three board members approving the resolution assured the sparse audience that the resolution is “only advisory” and has no force and effect of law. 

So why bother to vote on something that means nothing? 

The dirty little secret is that it does have meaning. An engagement ring is a visible commitment to the future marriage of two people. 

The board resolution is a visible commitment to a future marriage of the Blueprint Plan and the county General Plan. 

The Blueprint Plan is what the Board adopted by resolution and it provides guidance to county staff on all future planning issues. 

Even though it supposedly has no force and effect the resolution will be the gorilla in the room whenever the county General Plan is updated. 

The gorilla may not have a vote, but it won’t need one because he has all the bananas. Don’t go along with the gorilla and you don’t get your state and federal grant funds. 

What is the Blueprint Plan? Hint: Government control of how you live. 

If you are a concerned citizen and value your liberty you will take the time to find out about the Blueprint Plan. Thanks to Supervisors Evan Royce and Randy Hanvelt for standing up against this invasion of Big Brother. Visit http://portal.co.tuolumne.ca.us Search ‘Tuolumne Tomorrow.’ 

David Wynne 

Columbia

Water conservation

To the Editor,

Again we are being told to conserve water. We should be doing this all year for good reasons. We should also conserve propane, electricity and gasoline as much as practical.  The questions are: 

1. Besides telling us what to do, what is the water company(s) doing to help now and for the future? 

2. Are they selling what we conserve to others? 

3. Are they taking on new customers?  

If the shortage is real, more water consumers should not be added to the problem. 

Roy Jueal

Twain Harte

Playing God with world markets

To the Editor,

I think it is time, long overdue, to speak out against popular myths about the nature of the economy when in a recession, and our real possibilities for recovery.

Uncritical support of the “Full Employment Act of 1946” without modification is no longer a realistic approach to the application of fiscal and monetary policy in Washington. 

Clearly our dependency on shifts in aggregate demand — largely the realm of business expectations that govern final results in ‘Employment, Interest and money’ — are a severe miscalculation we can no longer entertain in the halls of government or amongst our political leadership. 

National, state and local policies that have emerged since Ronald Reagan restructured economic expectations when he moved to mobilized the nation to put an end to the Cold War, have perhaps permanently crippled our ability to respond to such global crises.

Yes, we wanted to put an end to the terror that accompanied the contest between superpowers. 

Yes, adding the ‘second sex’ to the work force enriched and benefited the entire nation. 

But implementing the Welfare Reform Act did not reduce the roles of the working poor at subsistence level living. 

Signing the international NAFTA Treaty did not enhance our competitive edge with the European Union, China  (or Japan and South East Asia). 

And realization of the World Trade Organization (WTO) as the final ingredient of global capitalism, and a living monument to John Maynard Keynes at Bretton Woods, may prove our undying nightmare as such globalization moves to the next phase of corporate monopoly capital. 

Surely we can no longer play God with world markets as if we were the only players that mattered...

Tim K. Fitzgerald

Sonora

Obamacare takes from Medicare

To the Editor,

In response to Lloyd Kramer’s Aug. 17 letter: 

Do you not realize that Obama is taking from $716-$750 billion dollars from our Medicare funds to support his Obamacare? Just what do you think that will do to Medicare? 

I worked insurance most of my life. This is the worst thing that can happen to our Medicare. We will have 15 non-medical people telling our doctors what they can do and not do for us. It will take months to get an MRI or CAT scan. The ERs will have 8 to 10 hour waiting to be seen. 

I worked with Canadians who had socialized medicine and they came to the U.S. to get their medical care because it took forever to get tests done, etc., in Canada. 

If we put Obama back in office, you will lose a lot more than your Medicare. 

With Paul Ryan, he will see that nothing changes for those who have it now or are just getting on it. 

Obama is not telling the truth about any of this. He hasn’t told the truth about much of anything. 

I pray the seniors wake up before election day and study what is really the truth. I know because I worked with Medicare and Medicaid for years. 

Obama’s plan will destroy Medicare/Medical. 

Patricia DuFur 

Sonora

Obama sign is offensive

To the Editor,

What is it that Dorothy Stevens (July 27 Letter to the Editor) finds “uplifting” about the Phoenix Lake Road display? 

It it connecting her president to the man responsible for the murder of 6 million Jews and the deaths of millions of allied soldiers in World War II? Is it the black portrayal of her president? One can disagree with the current administration, as many did with the last, but some level of decency should be exercised. 

This display is shameful and I think Mike Macon’s letter expressed it best, “Sir, have you no decency?”

Sharon Petersen 

Twain Harte

It’s time to
shake up TUD

To the Editor,

Californians know earthquakes; the earth’s plates are held in check by friction for decades. Then one day the forces of change because movements that release a force causing the whole thing to erupt. Social change can look a bit like tectonic events. 

Years of resentments and frustrations can suddenly erupt, fracturing long-held relationships or understandings. In 1773, English tea was dumped in Boston Harbor by frustrated colonists. 

In 2010, Tea Party freshman took ideological control of Congress successfully changing the conversation around federal spending limits. 

Today in Tuolumne we face a fault line that runs through the residents and Tuolumne Utilities District. Tensions are mounting. 

Humans cannot survive five days without water. Every community depends on successful water management. 

The board overseeing TUD swore a promise to be good stewards of public funds. No other authority has access to the water district organizational assets: minutes, files, policies, records, emails, invoices, contracts, request for bids, accounting ledgers, memorandums of understanding, etc. That data describes exactly how the district operates. 

However, unlike the bankrupt counties in our state, our county will suffer no surprises going forward, right? 

Tectonic tension builds over-time as multiple small infractions occur. Disasters are often a combination of small infractions that reinforce one another. 

We need a water Board that we can trust. Trust isn’t simply about truthfulness — its a matter of amity and goodwill. 

Laws don’t have to be broken for trust to be squandered. When management is willing to sacrifice long-term economic security for short-term political advantage — trust is eroded. It’s time to shake up the board at TUD.

Ruanne Mikkelsen 

Sonora