Letters: 12/27/18

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Is Trump fighting a lost war?

Having declared himself a nationalist while being white and observing his fascist viewpoints as well as a penchant for assuming autocratic power like Putin, one can only assume that Donald proposes to see a decrease or even the riddance of minority DNA in The white American gene pool. Trump’s gassing of Honduran refugees at the border under his mantra that they are thieves, murderers and only wish to steal our jobs and rape our women while he employs an undocumented housemaid to change his bed sheets reveals a hypocrisy and paranoia that conveniently resonates well with his core constituency. Since DT is not interested in doing any research that may change his gut opinions or confide in actual facts he has launched himself into a series of ugly battles.

For one example, in the mid 1500s Spaniards came to America mixing their DNA with Mexican and North and South American Indians as they began to populate New Mexico, Arizona and California with rich mixtures of brown and red blood cells many of which I am a proud vessel.  DT trying to purge 370+ million of our great, well marinated population from 500 years of red, brown, black and yellow genes by building walls and separating babies from their parents simply represents futile skirmishes in a war long ago lost.

Tom Lopez/Longmont

Danish wrong on climate

Paul Danish (Re: “Macron and les deplorables,” Danish Plan, Dec. 6, 2018) cited strong opposition to recent gas taxes in France to suggest that any form of domestic carbon tax is similarly politically infeasible. But recent developments here in the US suggest otherwise. The bipartisan Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend Act was recently introduced in the House, followed by a companion bill in the Senate. These proposals provide an excellent template for a what an effective carbon tax could look like. A fee is imposed on fossil fuels at their point of entry into the economy, rather than specifically on gasoline, for which demand is known to be unresponsive to price changes. The proposal is revenue-neutral; all money raised is returned each month to the American people.

Danish also implies that efforts to reduce emissions are futile, but here too his pessimism is unwarranted. The science is unambiguous: the actions we take now can make the difference between 1.5 and 2 degrees of warming above pre-industrial levels. While Danish is correct that global warming is not yet “settled politics,” scientists, economists and citizens across the political spectrum are increasingly converging on a carbon tax as the best way to incentivize the transition to renewable energy sources.

Ben Brubaker/Boulder

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