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Article’s point was really
clear ballot language
Re: “At some point, taxes must be paid equally” (Page A6, Dec. 2).
A writer complained about the recent article on Proposition 19. He said the article was one-sided. I disagree. The author presented arguments in favor of the proposition. For example, when children inherit a home and then rent it, some would say they are not paying their fair share of property taxes.
The question the article posed was did voters truly know what they were voting for. Many believe the campaign was deceptive and not transparent. As the article pointed out, people voted for the proposition but did not fully understand its ramifications.
While people who purchase a $2 million home pay more property taxes than their neighbors, they obviously have the ability to pay more taxes. But if the child who inherits his or her family home wants to live there and is a middle-income wage earner, he or she may not be able to do so.
Douglas Abbott
Union City
Nuclear power is
safe, green alternative
Re: “Battery plant fire spewed toxins” (Page A1, Dec. 3).
The giant Moss Landing storage plant fire released massive amounts of toxic materials. Consider that with 70 years of experience, the U.S. commercial nuclear industry has built nearly 100 nuclear power plants, with almost 100 GW of capacity. In that time, in the U.S., there has been only one incident, and this release was tiny and did not hurt anybody.
Solar power needs backup for when the sun doesn’t shine — not just the early evening hours, but when we have cloudy weather for a week. Moss Landing was designed to back us up for a total of four hours. The petroleum industry loves the idea of solar backed up by natural gas, for obvious reasons.
Nuclear power is the best solution right now. We’ve got to learn to build them as cheaply as France or China and get as many online as we can, ASAP.
Cliff Gold
Fremont
Boat strikes another
Trump distraction
For all the time, money, military personnel and FOX propaganda that America spent playing “Battleship” on so-called Venezuelan drug smugglers, we have forsaken our Ukrainian allies. Our resources should have won major ground for Ukraine against Russian forces, but instead, our support is wasted in a Caribbean photo-op.
This publicity stunt is a cheap damage control distraction from the Epstein scandal, a bad economy, civil rights violations, carrying the water for dictators and ignoring a broken immigration system. This administration is Russia’s patsy, and we are weak on the world stage.
In other words, this administration failed, cannot function, and lied to us. It’s time for the impeachment of the president, the whole cabinet, and the Supreme Court. .
Jean Paulsen
Livermore
Stop U.S. drug abuse
and you stop the cartels
Blowing up a small boat and then using more firepower to kill the survivors in the water must cost millions. Using the most powerful military ever, jet planes and aircraft carriers to sink small boats with the excuse of a drug war embarrass Vietnam vets like me.
American drug users are the problem. The cost of this military farce would be better spent trying to deal with addicts. If Americans would stop using, the cartels would cease to exist. Frustration, anxiety, anger, body shaming and ignorance caused by social media addictions add to drug addiction. The money spent on sinking tiny specks in the ocean would be better spent helping people to deal with drug addiction.
Norman Weiss
Orinda
We shouldn’t undermine
a chance at peace
I read with disgust the two full pages of the Nov. 23 newspaper (Pages A4 and A9) devoted to attacking the leaked report of the unfinished peace proposals negotiated by Steve Witcoff and Kiril Dmitrief in a realistic attempt to end the disastrous Russia-Ukraine proxy war that has consumed hundreds of thousands of lives. Instead of supporting genuine peace negotiations, in “U.S. senators rip Trump’s Ukraine peace proposal,” Sen. Thom Tillis bitterly slandered President Putin as a “murderer, rapist and assassin” with whom we must not negotiate.
Ukraine’s deepening military crisis and the decimation of its army have not been reported in the mainstream media or in this newspaper. The recent fall of Pokrovsk, the last major bastion in the Donbas, threatens to trigger a complete collapse. The situation is desperate.
We must acknowledge the failure of our proxy war to weaken and isolate Russia. To deny reality and persist in delusions of ultimate victory risks the very survival of a viable Ukrainian state.
Michael Dunlap
Oakland