Letters to the Editor – Issue of Aug. 2, 2012
Letters from the News Chieftain
Appreciates ‘City in the Country’
We moved here 26 years ago for the good schools and have been delighted, time and time again, with the people and the place.
All our kids, and now a grandkid, have benefited from community swim and dance lessons, sports, and the lake and parks. We have had parties and even a wedding in community facilities over the years.
I always have appreciated how our little “City in the Country” is among the most fiscally sound in the county and maybe the state — even with the state robbing our coffers of our redevelopment savings.
Also, our roads are kept in good repair: you can tell by the pavement on Poway Road exactly where Poway ends (no potholes — for very long, at least) and the city of San Diego begins (nasty, flaky pavement).
Anybody can request service online at www.poway.org for streetlight and signal outages, water or drainage problems, trees, graffiti, code compliance for unkempt private property, etc.
So we can all keep our fair city a great place to live!
Andra Hansen, Poway
Vaus brings people together
Our family has Poway roots that go way back. Though we lived in Ramona for a time we’ve always been Powegians first and foremost.
We’re thrilled that Steve Vaus is running for City Council and that he has won Merrilee Boyack’s endorsement. She has been the most people-oriented council member for the last eight years and Steve is perfect to take her place.
He has a way of bringing people together and getting things done. The recall in 2010 and the Town Hall meeting on teen substance abuse are just two examples of his leadership. You’ll find him with a shovel in his hands on Poway Spirit Day, on horseback as a Reserve Park Ranger, in the announcer’s chair for Poway High School girls’ lacrosse and so much more. In fact, this year the Palomar Council PTA gave him their highest honor, an Honorary Service Award for his work fighting substance abuse. Watching all Vaus has done for this community, truly shows his compassion for it, and made moving back to Poway a greater place to be a part of with individuals like him.
Joey and Sherri Cortez, Poway
Letters from the News Journal
HOV column not attractive
How could a heavily regulated community such as Rancho Bernardo, a community that is so picky about roofs, tree height, and fence locations, have allowed such an ugly cement column supported addition to the freeway for the HOV lanes? Where can the community now place a mass transit train system? Why didn’t they spend the money on that project first?
I have been gone from Rancho Bernardo for six years and when I returned I was dismayed at the freeway changes made since then. What an ugly change to the beauty of Rancho Bernardo, where I have lived since 1972. How could citizens have allowed this?
Karen Williams Berardo, Rancho Bernardo
High-speed rail is too slow
Anyone who has spent time on a fast motorcycle knows that even without any wind, the air itself is a brutally powerful force working against your engine as you get up above 125 mph (200 kph). In fact, air resistance is the number one problem to combat as speeds increase. Airliners have to fly 40,000 feet up in the air to take advantage of the reduced drag you get when the air thins out a bit. And even with this advantage, they still can’t cruise much faster than 570 mph (917 kph) without being horribly inefficient.
Take air resistance and rolling resistance away by operating in a vacuum and magnetically levitating your vehicle, and it takes more or less the same amount of energy to accelerate from 3,000 to 3,050 mph (4,828 to 4,908 kph) as it takes to get from 50 to 100 mph (80 to 161 kph). And once you reach your top speed, you simply stop accelerating, apply no further energy, and coast. You lose very little speed until you reach your destination, at which point you can slow your vehicle down electromagnetically and recapture almost all the energy you put in to speed it up.
This is all easily accomplished by using vacuum technology. By building a transportation system with this technology, we will create lots of jobs and have the world buying it from us rather than us buying it from China.
Ron Jaenisch, Poway
Letter from the News Chieftain and News Journal
Change energy policies
As we speak, our naval forces are being put in harm’s way in the Strait of Hormuz to face the Iranian threat to close it. Closing the strait to shipping will cause a major oil shortage and huge price increases. The first shots have already been fired at a small craft harassing our naval ships.
We are endangering the lives of our service men and woman for what? Mideast oil.
This administration have done everything in its power to handcuff the exploration, drilling and production of our own country’s huge untapped resources. If we had aggressively started our own program three years ago we would be well on our way to energy self reliance.
Imagine what the Keystone Pipeline and the $10 billion loan to Brazil for oil drilling would have done for our job crisis and staggering economy here in the U.S.?
We need to change these policies for the sake of our military personnel, the future of our children and our economy.
If not now, when?
Herb Tuttle, Rancho Bernardo
Letters should be limited to 250 words. They may be emailed to editor@pomeradonews.com or composed online at www.pomeradonews.com.
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Posted by Staff
on Aug 1 2012. Filed under Letters to the Editor, Opinion.
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Herb – Remember the 1973 Oil Crisis? 75 cents a gallon, price freeze, alternate day rationing, etc.?
Remember the collective cry "Never Again – We Will Never Again Be Dependent on Foreign Oil!!"?
Next year we'll celebrate the 40th anniversary of that great American resolve. Hooray for us! We can finally now enter phase 2 of that crusade. Phase 2 involves stepping up from whining about it for 4 decades and commencing to wail about it for the next few decades. Hooray!
Herb.
Great point. This administration perpetuates the tax subsidies to the fossil fuel industry at $4.3B per year. This is a write-off for exploration that is being given to an industry making record profits. It has minimal impact on what we pay for petroleum products so these resources could be used for national needs like providing medical facilities and care for our Veterans. Get beyond the rhetoric at: http://www.propublica.org/article/despite-rhetori...
The debate over the Keystone Pipeline is a farce. Any substantial increase in jobs would be limited to the construction phase, the product would not be used in the US but sold to foreign markets, and the US would be incurring the economic and ecological risks of transporting very hazardous tar sands. Get beyond the rhetoric at with cited studies at: http://www.nrdc.org/energy/keystone-pipeline/?gcl...