How to avoid using nuclear energy

(Hank Herdt’s Nov. 5 letter, “Nuclear power unavoidable answer”) recently asked if any readers knew how the U.S. energy demand could be met without massive nuclear energy.

If one goes to www.helencaldicott.com and clicks on “resources,” there will be a document entitled “Carbon-Free and Nuclear-Free: A Roadmap for U.S. Energy Policy.” This document clearly outlines how we can meet all U.S. energy needs without the use of nuclear or coal.

Dr. Helen Caldicott’s Web site also has resources which will elaborate on the insanity of utilizing nuclear energy. Nuclear power is not clean, and it is not safe; No how, no way.

Jonathan Carroll, Corvallis

Most landlords are doing a good job

In response to the Nov. 1 article, “City targets owners to tame trouble tenants“:

I am disturbed by the recent rash of bad press that landlords have received in the Gazette-Times.

My experience is that the vast majority of property owners are very responsible to their tenants and their neighbors. Indeed, their investment depends upon it. Now the city is attempting to hold property owners responsible for the behavior of their tenants. By extension then, should the bank that holds the deed to my house be responsible for my behavior?

I understand that people are frustrated with consistently problematic tenants, but the right way to deal with these individuals is to hold them responsible for their own behavior. Let’s strengthen existing laws regarding this type of behavior and then consistently prosecute the guilty individuals.

Amy Harding, Corvallis

SSI not comparable to stock earnings

John Brennan’s Nov. 4 letter illustrates why it is so hard to have an intelligent discussion about Social Security.

There is always someone who has done well in life, or expects to do well, who can make a simple calculation showing that “the stock market beats Social Security.” Usually their calculations are wrong, but mostly their calculation is irrelevant. We have always known that you CAN do better on the stock market than Social Security, “if only” your luck holds out.

To get a more honest sense of the importance of Social Security, Brennan should look at the earnings of the average, or below average, worker. And he needs to consider what his own earnings would have looked like if his luck had not held: a heart attack or accident, or having his job out-sourced at age 50.

The point is that Social Security is INSURANCE. It’s not welfare, and it’s not an investment plan. It is just the worker putting aside a small part of his income to GUARANTEE that he will have at least enough to live on when he gets old, or if he gets disabled, or dies with dependents.

For most workers, the “return” on Social Security is better than anything they could get in the Market. For Brennan to brag that he “could have” done better, “if only,” is about as useful as showing how rich you could have gotten if only you had put all your car insurance money into the stock market.

Dale Coberly, Corvallis

‘Spreading wealth’ is a form of slavery

The essence of slavery is forcing a person to serve the purposes of another. It is tragically ironic that a bi-racial president in a post-racial society will support a form of slavery and, incredibly, promote its expansion.

The cornerstone in President-elect Obama’s tax policy is “to spread the wealth around.” He thinks doing so “is good for everybody.” His method is clear: forcibly take income from some and redistribute the money to others who didn’t earn it. And if the income earner resists, dispatch armed government officials to compel compliance.

This is not about the common good. If it was, Obama’s priority would be to encourage each of us to voluntarily extend a hand up to our fellow man. Instead, he resorts to thrusting the greedy fingers of government into some of our wallets.

Obama’s approach differs only in degree, but not in essence, from slavery. Full-time slaves earn no income. Present-day slaves have all of their earnings confiscated only part of the tax year. But all slaves at all times are forced to be a means to another’s end.

Gordon L. Shadle, Albany

Give President-elect Obama a fair chance

Larry Daley’s Nov. 5 letter, “What abuses will Obama bring?” is incomprehensible.

The Fairness Doctrine is not Orwellian; Larry needs to understand the meaning of the word. As for “muzzling”: The Fairness Doctrine does no such thing.

I don’t know where his other comments of show trials, pro-Obama militia, abandonment of Israel, leaving troops without support, or support of Cuban racist government comes from, but there is nothing in Obama’s history or speeches to support any of this tripe. It is basic fear-mongering and ignorance.

It is anger that his choice for president, John McCain, who had a lot of support from the media that helped hide or minimize his flaws, lost. It is denial of the disaster of the last eight years.

When Bush took office, I gave him the benefit of the doubt. Too bad Larry Daley is so afraid of that which is different to do the same.

Jeffery K. McGonagill, Corvallis

Obama’s election part of Lord’s plan

In his Nov. 6 letter, Larry Daley wrote “only the Lord knows” what “flaws” President-elect Barack Obama will bring to the presidency. The Bush presidency brought us imprisonment without habeus corpus, torture, government prevarication, un-warranted spying on American citizens, the Patriotic Act, etc. — all far more Orwellian than the Fairness Doctrine.

And the only “show trials” in this country have been the House Unamerican Activies Committee hearings held by Republican Sen. Joseph McCarthy under a Republican president, Dwight Eisenhower, which targeted the political left.

It obviously was part of the Lord’s plan that Obama should win, otherwise, according to that way of thinking, he would not have.

Bush’s presidency was also part of this “plan.” It brought the country to its knees and taught us humility and the dangers of hubris, greed and ego-centrism cloaked in the mantle of individualism. It is time we accepted that lesson.

The era of fear-, hate-, and war-mongering that we have just passed through was Christian neither in its tone nor its results. Moreover, continuation of the rhetoric of fear is certainly not in the spirit of John McCain’s concession speech, which emphasized the difficult task ahead, the competency of Obama to face it and called for McCain’s proponents to support the new president-elect.

Additionally, it doesn’t accept the worldwide sighs of relief and expressions of hope that provide the U.S. with a sterling opportunity to relight its beacon of democracy, equality and justice that has so dimmed in the past eight years.

Martin R. Mulford, Corvallis

Sign vandals struck on Election Night

Evidently some people weren’t so happy at Barack Obama’s win on Tuesday night.

Our yard signs for Obama and Jeff Merkley were slashed sometime during the night of Nov. 4. They couldn’t slash the Kurt Schrader sign because it is cardboard.

Happy Obama Day!

Lisa Anderson, Corvallis

We’ve seen historic change of the guard

I was born after the moon landing and was too young to remember the Vietnam War and the Watergate scandal.

I did sense the repercussions, though, of an America which, perhaps for the first time, lost faith in its government.

Since I became cognizant of the events that happened in the United States, most of them were negative and even tragic: Iran-Contra, recessions, Iraq wars, 9/11, Reagan being shot, the explosion of the space shuttle Challenger — until now.

When I turned 18, it was a presidential election year and I voted then and every four years ever since but not without having a Bush or Clinton on the ballot — until now.

When I heard that Barack Obama was our president-elect, tears were in my eyes as I realized that this was the dawning of something auspicious in the USA, and the changing of the guard.

Katherine Hoffman, Corvallis