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Waste, fraud have
ruined SNAP program
Re: “Hold the government accountable on SNAP” (Page A6, Nov. 12).
SNAP fraud exceeds $10 billion a year. Total benefits in 2024 alone were nearly $100 billion. Currently, more than 12% of Americans (almost 42 million people) receive benefits — a 942.5% increase since 1970. California tops the list, paying out over $12 billion in October 2024. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins called the food stamps program “broken and corrupt.”
Why are people worried about 42 million people losing SNAP benefits, and not worried about why so many people are on SNAP in the first place? No American should ever struggle to buy groceries while others swipe a government card for theirs. We turned food stamps into foreign aid and pretended it was compassion.
Jon Rego
Clayton
Pause in SNAP
is hardly critical
Re: “$21M will be disbursed to SNAP recipients” (Page A1, Nov. 9).
I am a bit puzzled that your Sunday article on pausing the SNAP program describes it as “a critical lifeline,” since that implies people will die in the short term if it’s not available. Isn’t that a little over the top since the USDA classifies over 43% of the population as obese? TV news coverage shows most recipients looking well fed, and some likely to benefit from missing a meal or two.
Please do your part to keep this discussion a little more reasonable and less about feeling sorry for people who can obviously afford newer clothes, cell phones and even tattoos.
Tom Shastid
Walnut Creek
Flip attitude toward debt
is what got us in mess
Re: “Shutdowns a destructive way to negotiate budget” (Page A6, Nov. 11).
I was incredulous when reading Wallace Clark’s letter. Clark believes the shutdown was a result of “… allocated funds exceed funds available.” That was not the issue at all. The issue was how the money was to be spent. And then he proposes: “An available alternative, increasing the national debt, is already available and a well-used procedure.”
And that is exactly the attitude that has gotten us into the fiscal trap that we are now in. “This debt does cause a problem over the long term,” and “A large part of our current spending is paying off the current deficit.” The last statement is a woeful understatement. We spent more money on interest on the national debt last year than we spent on defense. Every deficit adds to our debt, and all our debt incurs interest. It will only get worse until we get it under control.
John Griggs
Danville
Editorial’s conclusion
points to plutocracy
Re: “This has gone too far. We’ve seen enough.” (Page A8, Nov. 9).
I strongly disagree with your conclusion in the piece.
If your ending paragraph is accepted, then we don’t have a democracy, we have a plutocracy. Your printed conclusion further cements the helplessness of 7 million Bay Area citizens to determine the government that should rule us. That you should thank the oligarchs for protecting us further disdains the fundamental right in a democracy of “one person, one vote.”
Eric Eschen
Oakland
Ex-parks GM leaves
context out of critique
Re: “Ex-parks GM may sue after resigning” (Page B1, Nov. 11).
East Bay residents love our regional parks, but few follow the internal politics of district management.
Past general manager Sabrina Landreth, following her resignation Nov. 7, has angrily denounced the elected board of directors. Missing from her narrative are two crucial precursor events:
First, results from a survey conducted by the employee union were privately revealed the day Landreth resigned. Landreth was generally unpopular with staff because of her inflexible policies.
Second, her budget was far from balanced. There has been significant public objection to her recent budget proposal, which would have diverted up to $42 million in Measure WW funds that voters had approved for parkland acquisition. Previous GM Robert Doyle had written a ten-page letter opposing these transfers.
Amelia Marshall
Oakland
Election results prove
protest creates change
On Nov. 7, voters throughout the country soundly repudiated Donald Trump and the malfeasance, corruption and meanness his administration embodies. While commentators ascribe many reasons for the Democrats’ success, including the economy, Jeffrey Epstein and election protection, they missed the important effect of powerful public protests. Nearly 8 million people took to the streets across the country, with hand-drawn signs and peaceful presence, and that action engaged others to get out and vote.
Many people who feel dissatisfied, fearful and angry about Trump’s misadministration of our government saw that they are not alone. We can resist Trump’s dictatorship. They saw friends and strangers coming to protest and realized that they also could participate, at least by voting.
While MAGA media mouthpieces ask, disingenuously, “What do those protesters want?” people are saying on protest signs and on ballots, “no dictators,” “no corruption,” “rule of law,” “democracy.”
Join in. You are not alone.
Bruce Joffe
Piedmont