Thank you for the information on the May 20 Orcutt plane crash. I was in class online (I was homeschooled before COVID-19) and our teacher got a text about a plane crash near a student’s house. I was worried.
I feel bad for the pilot. Luckily, school wasn’t going on because that would’ve been their reccess.
Haley Casias
Santa Maria
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Politicians may be the last people to realize that lockdowns flatten curves (they don’t prevent a virus from moving through a population) and that increasing case numbers are the result of increased testing (not an increase in the spread of a disease).
Politicians may also be the last to know that no one is listening to them, that they are promoting unenforceable and totalitarian decrees, and that they must follow the will of the people, not the will of the temporarily elected.
Gov. Gavin Newsom is finally realizing that he can’t treat all California counties the same, that as we come out of lockdown, COVID-19 case numbers will naturally increase, and that he can’t be our savior and prevent viral spread through a population.
Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti is in for the same realizations, especially if he attempts to prevent Angelenos from going to the beach on Memorial Day weekend. Let’s see how quickly he reverses course when he is schooled by his constituents in basic Jeffersonian democracy, that politicians derive “… their just powers from the consent of the governed.”
Victor Dominocielo
Santa Barbara
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Both Ron Fink and Republican congressional candidate Andy Caldwell have addressed COVID-19 in perfect knuckle-dragging, banjo-people style. For that matter, so has Santa Barbara’s daily newspaper.
In the first week of May, Caldwell announced that the COVID-19 pandemic was over. On May 19, California added 132 new cases.
Matt McLaughlin
Santa Barbara
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Please know that what Noozhawk allowed Michelle de Werd of Los Olivos to post in the May 15 Letters to the Editor was grossly inaccurate. I don’t know what your criteria is for submitting comments, but I would ask that you consider factual accuracy as a criteria. I don’t mean to be flippant, but what she states is simply beyond the pale.
Thanks for the consideration.
Scott Cory, Superintendent
Santa Ynez Valley Union High School District
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In Ron Fink’s May 19 column, “Local Rancher Leases Squirrel Holes to Environmentalists,” he seems to think The Land Trust of Santa Barbara County is affiliated with or a part of the local government. It is not. The easement did not cost taxpayers anything.
This is a deal that both sides entered into voluntarily and both deemed “a good deal.” Fink should be happy for the farmer as well as The Land Trust.
Kathryn Denlinger
Santa Barbara
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The Drug Policy Alliance recently alerted the country to President Donald Trump’s plans to divert vital personal protective equipment funds away from health-care workers and funnel these funds to ramp up the international drug war.
It’s hard to believe the timing of this alleged action. Escalating the disastrous and failed drug war at any time is highly questionable. Doing so in the middle of a global pandemic is not the answer to the COVID-19 crisis, just as illegally attempting to defund the World Health Organization is a bad idea.
“Instead of doubling down on the war on drugs, we need to focus on rebuilding communities and fostering the health and safety for all people,” the DPA says. “This is true at all times, but especially during a pandemic.”
I agree that we should fund what works and might actually help fight substance dependence, but without diverting funds from funding vital medical equipment.
For decades I have been saying that loving parenting of wanted children in a supportive, emotionally healthy community is the best drug abuse prevention strategy. We need to have an economy that allows parents to have the time and money necessary to have the financial means and quality time to raise emotionally healthy children.
Using local, state and national government resources to support an environment calculated to raise healthy children makes sense. Putting health-care workers at risk during a pandemic makes no sense.
Instead of wasting tens of billions of dollars on arrest and incarceration of substance use and abuses, that money would be better spent building a vibrant economy with good-paying jobs. The result will be more intact, happy, caring families with reasonable paying jobs.
This is the best strategy to support promoting family values and developing self-esteem, good decision-making skills and personal responsibility in our children.
David Bearman M.D.
Goleta
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