Powerage

My argument: for those seniors on a fixed income, or those living in hospital beds or needing to refrigerate their meds, it’s tough to have a power outage for two days (“Paradise Glossed,” Nov. 21). PG&E said they wouldn’t reimburse groceries this year if they decided to turn off the power! And for folks who are ill, who had money to go buy a generator or fuel to start it or the ability to turn it on? What about those with a well? Their power outage means they can’t hose down their roof or barn?

Catherine Renee Gumina

Via Facebook

PG&E should not be turning off our power every time it gets windy to try and solve their transformers causing fires!

J. Kirk Feiereisen

Via Facebook

They have to. I know it seems rough, but when the winds get going and the dry trees snap . . . PG&E is being sued for the deaths last year, and will face more for Paradise. Gotta turn off the ignition factor.

Sharon Jane Hughes

Via Facebook

Opinion: We’ve Had Enough Clintonism

Twenty-five years ago, when I wrote False Hope: The Politics of Illusion in the Clinton Era, I didn’t expect that the Democratic Party would still be mired in Clintonism two and a half decades later. Such approaches to politics continue to haunt the party and the country.

The last two Democratic presidencies largely involved talking progressive while serving Wall Street and the military-industrial complex. The differences in personalities, and behavior, of Bill Clinton and Barack Obama diverted attention from their political similarities. In office, both men rarely fought for progressive principles, and routinely undermined them.

Clinton brought the country NAFTA, welfare “reform” that was an assault on low-income women and families, telecommunications “reform” that turned far more airwaves over to media conglomerates, the repeal of Glass-Steagall regulation of banks that led to the 2007–08 financial meltdown, and huge increases in mass incarceration.

Obama bailed out big banks while letting underwater homeowners sink, oversaw the launching of more missiles and bombs than his predecessor George W. Bush, ramped up a war on whistleblowers, turned mass surveillance and the shredding of the Fourth Amendment into bipartisan precedent and boosted corporate privatization of public education.

It wasn’t only a congressional majority that Democrats quickly lost and never regained under Obama. By the time he left the White House, nearly a thousand seats in state legislatures had been lost to Democrats during the Obama years.

Thanks to grassroots activism and revulsion toward President Trump, Democrats won back the House last month and recaptured one-third of the state legislative seats that had been lost while Obama led the party and the nation.

During the last two years, progressive momentum has exerted major pressure against the kind of corporatist policies that Clinton set into cement atop the Democratic Party. But today, the party’s congressional leaders, like Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer, are still in a mode loosely replicating Clinton’s sleight-of-tongue formulas that have proved so profitable for corporate America, while economic inequality has skyrocketed.

As 2018 nears its end, the top of the Democratic Party is looking to continue Clintonism without the Clintons. Or maybe Clintonism with the Clintons. A real possibility is now emerging that Hillary Clinton will run for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination—but whether she runs or not, Clintonism is a political blight with huge staying power. It can be overcome only if and when people at the grassroots effectively insist on moving the Democratic Party in a genuinely progressive direction.

Norman Solomon

Inverness Park

Road Rage Redux

Well, I could not have said it better than Russ Young did (Letters, Nov. 14). I live in Novato, and I drive a lot up to Petaluma and over to Sonoma each week, and I make every effort to obey the speed limits and rules of the road. However, what this seems to do is aggravate many of the other drivers out there. I seem to be always dealing with tailgaters, and they always look at me as they pass on the right like, “What is your problem, stupid?” I guess I am, but it has become a real problem for me. Where is the highway patrol these days? Think of the money it would bring in for them! I don’t have a good suggestion as to how to monitor this problem and survive, and I’m not sure if Russ’ idea is the answer. Anyone got a good thought?

Trent Anderson

Novato

New New Deal

In the last two years, we’ve watched wildfires sweep through our state and devastate communities. The smoke alone has become a national health issue. We must acknowledge the relationship between these massive fires and climate change. For our health and our safety, Californians must demand legislation, at all levels of government, that eliminates our structurally engrained dependence on fossil fuels and carbon emissions. Fortunately, an opportunity has presented itself at the national level via Representative-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. The purpose of this letter is to spur readers to learn about her Green New Deal proposal and contact elected officials to demand change.

I support Rep. Ocasio-Cortez’s resolution to create a House Select Committee for a Green New Deal in Congress because its scope matches the urgency of the task at hand. United Nations climate scientists tell us we have just 12 years to move our country off fossil fuels, to avoid catastrophic climate disaster. We need a Green New Deal to create millions of green jobs, move our country off fossil fuels, and protect working people of all backgrounds. Climate change impacts every part of our lives, and we should demand that our representatives support each other to deliver solutions that recognize it.

Buddy Burch

Santa Rosa

Face It: We’re Screwed

The current state of our country presents a challenging opportunity to integrate an autocratic president and a democratic citizenry. No problem for dictatorship countries where dissidence is forbidden; dissidents are imprisoned, tortured and/or murdered, and the only recourse “the people” have is to violently rebel. No problem for truly democratic countries where dissidence is allowed and dissenters are able to voice their dissatisfaction and disagreement in peaceful protest marches and demonstrations.

In our current autocratic democracy, the president “deals” with opponents through fear-inducing and fear-based sanctions, tariffs, border walls, firings, censure, criticism, judgment, blame, threats, untruths and unilateral decisions and behaviors that only create a false “oneness” through separatist and exclusionary one-sidedness—rather than achieve a true unifying relationship between parties. Yet we, “the American people,” may have some hope of unitedness through real legislative representation, governmental checks and balances, and a nonpartisan investigation of the presidency. That all may mitigate the rising and deplorable occurrences of civil rights violations, hate crimes, gun violence and mass murders.

Raymond Bart Vespe

Santa Rosa

Dept. of Corrections

In last week’s news story, “Paradise Glossed,” we errantly reported that PG&E had been found liable for the 2017 Tubbs fire. PG&E has been found liable for 11 of the 16 wildfires fires that broke out in California in late 2017, but no determination has yet been made as to the cause of the Tubbs fire. We regret the error.