Treat pot like tobacco
This is just too stupid to believe [Re:
“Is Denver ready to allow public cannabis consumption?,” Weed Between the Lines, June 25]. One should be able to use cannabis anywhere tobacco smoking is permitted.
Dave Lane/Santa Cruz, CA
Where we grow old matters
Aging in place is the number one goal of the older adults I often see. As Dave Anderson writes in [Re: “Who will look after you someday?” Commentary, June 18], “There are at least 40 million adults in this country who are caregivers for an aging parent, a spouse or other loved one who needs additional assistance.”
We know older adults want to age in place; and there are benefits. Older adults remain in the community, in the familiarity of their own homes and, hopefully, near family and friends. Family is first to provide care (I did so with my mother) and doing so is often expensive. But there are cost-friendly alternatives including home care, organizations providing low-cost home modifications, services to coordinate care or government-administered day programs like the Program of All-inclusive Care for the Elderly, which builds relationships among older adults who prefer to age in place.
My mother was one of the lucky ones: she aged in place. Those of us who provide services to older adults have a responsibility to ensure the millions who want to age in place don’t have to rely on luck.
Maureen Hewitt/Denver
CWA
Several thousand people attended the CWA this year. I spent three entire days there. I never saw nor was I asked to complete a post-conference survey. 559 out of thousands? Prof. Griffin seems to think the survey results are important.
Marsha Caplan/Boulder
Shame on you BW
With regards to June 4, 2015 “In Case You Missed It”…. Wow… I really wish I missed it! Your off the cuff editorial rant column went a bit far, don’t you think, with the damning and demonizing remarks about cats? “Pieces of garbage?” Really??? Gees!
I have long looked to the Weekly as a source of liberal leaning, non-corporate news that attempts to defend minorities and create tolerance and within a presentation of local news. As a longtime cat owner who values all animals, I found the pathetic attempt at wittiness, stemming from an isolated medical incident, to push way beyond any sense of tolerance to instead backfire creating a sense of hatred … a hatred towards a mere domestic pet that many Boulder County citizens adore every day. If whoever wrote that column really is so hell bent on hating mere cats, what other animals/groups do you hate? That dog hanging around the Weekly’s office too? I’ll assume you are knowledgable enough to know they too can unknowingly bring their human guardians some serious afflictions: ever heard of rabies, bubonic plague, tularemia or toxocariasis? Or how about that cute rabbit on your walk around the Weekly’s offices in South Boulder? Do you hate them too?
“You decide.”
Nicholas Saucier/Boulder
About that Rachel Dolezal ICUMI
Actually, trans-racial and transgender concepts are identical except in the specific genetic trait that is being appropriated from an oppressed minority — the minorities being people of color and women, respectively. Members of a privileged, oppressing caste cannot and should not steal the identity of an oppressed group, for a variety of reasons.
In the same way that a white woman cannot change her genetic heritage to make herself a person of recent African descent, a man cannot change his chromosomes or spontaneously grow functioning female sex organs in order to become a woman.
More importantly, a white woman who was raised with white privilege (not knowing what it’s like to be considered a criminal until proven innocent, for example), or a man who was raised with male privilege (not knowing what it’s like to get a smaller salary for equal work, to get threatened with rape and murder every time he walks down the street, to be expected to alter his body in harmful ways to meet insane “beauty” standards, or to be considered stupid, weak and incompetent compared to any member of the other sex) cannot in any way take on the identity of black people or women, because they were socialised to be white and male, and therefore have no concept of what it means to be black or female.
This is not a popular or fashionable opinion in today’s political climate, but it is the clear and obvious truth. And I know I am not the only person capable of calling a spade a spade, and standing up for the most down-trodden members of society. I would strongly encourage anyone who cares about the struggles of people of color and women to speak up against this very harmful “trans” fad.
S.V. Santamaria/Longmont
Gun control and the Confederate flag
This letter is in response to the coverage of the fatal shooting at Emmanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina and the subsequent surge of momentum to take down the Confederate Flag from all public and private places.
The second amendment of the United States Constitution states:
“A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
Obviously the need for a state militia has been replaced by the National Guard and Coast Guard whereby trained military personnel are entrusted with the defense of this country against domestic enemies. Their weapons are tightly controlled and safeguarded.
The only two reasons for a citizen to own a firearm are for hunting or defense of the household from intruders. In either case, ownership of a handgun, shotgun or rifle is more than adequate to satisfy these purposes.
There is absolutely no need for any U.S. civilian to own any weapon more powerful or sophisticated than these.
Accordingly, all handguns, shotguns and rifles must be licensed and registered to the degree necessary to match weapon to owner at the click of a computer key. Furthermore, we must guarantee that the mentally ill do not gain access to them under any circumstances. Finally, if we had prohibited the purchase of more sophisticated weapons several innocent victims would not have died or been harmed at shopping malls, college campuses, Congressional meetings and now churches.
As for the Confederate Flag I agree that it should be removed from all government buildings because it is neither a national nor state flag. But the outpouring of yanking it [no pun intended] from everywhere else seems a bit extreme. Neither the flag used by the Army of Northern Virginia nor the official flag of the Confederacy had anything to do with being a symbol of proslavery, but rather were the colors adopted by men who chose to fight for the preservation of state’s rights against what was perceived as the growing encroachment of the Federal Government. Slavery may have been the straw that finally broke the Union’s back but it was the wealthy plantation owners who stood to lose most from the loss of their “peculiar institution.” Instead of following the North’s industrial push they left themselves behind only to be crushed by a more powerful enemy. Billy Yank and Johnny Reb did not enlist [or get drafted] into their respective armies to aid or oppose slavery; they did it because from each side’s point of view, it was the right thing to do. The ending of slavery was just a positive result stemming from the outcome of America’s second revolutionary war. Everyone is certainly entitled to their own opinion of the Civil War but fortunately they are not entitled to their own facts.
Joe Bialek/Cleveland, OH
