Letters to the editor for Saturday, July 13, 2024

Saving burrowing owls

Please come out to the Cape's Council meeting to celebrate the council approving a Florida Wildlife Commission's grant for $900,000 to the city of Cape Coral to buy lots with burrowing owls on them. Cape Coral Friends of Wildlife asked for the grant, and we got it for the city. Help us cheer the council chambers for the Cape's wildlife. I want to emphasize that no taxpayer money will be used to buy the lots. This money all comes from the money you give to destroy an owl burrow when you wish to build on the lot with a burrow on it. They call this a mitigation fee. So please come to the City Council meeting on Wednesday, July 17, at 4;30 p.m. in chambers and help Cape Coral Friends of Wildlife's mission. Tell the council green space makes happy voters and thank them for voting to buy environmental lots with owls on them.  

Then come right after the vote to party with us at Maria's Pizzeria & Restaurant at 1224 SE 46th Lane in Cape Coral after the council passes the grant to celebrate buying over 70 lots with burrowing owls and gopher tortoises on them and even the city now doing this for the owls. We get a percentage on everything you will purchase that evening so eat lots of pizza or a huge dinner. Or donate a large sum and help us buy a lot. Everyone is welcome. Of course, if not a member we urge you to become one. Don't have to be a member to eat with us but mention us to get our percentage of money. There will be a mystery birthday cake as well. Hope to see you there. The owls thank you.

Carl Veaux, Cape Coral

Let the voters decide

If pro-choice were not such a critical issue, I would be more amused at the great lengths the DeSantis government is going through to defeat Amendment 4. The most recent "fiscal impact statement" to be crafted for the November ballot is patently absurd. Was the fiscal impact considered before DeSantis hired the plane to transport immigrants to Martha's Vineyard? How about the fiscal impact from DeSantis' culture wars legislation − his attack on Disney, the prohibition of African American Studies, DEI programs, the anti-LGBTQ and transgender legislation? The Miami Herald reported in December 2022 that Florida taxpayers spent $16.7 million for litigation costs, and these were for things the Florida taxpayers did not decide. The litigation costs, if any, from passing Amendment 4 this November would at least result from a decision by the voters themselves. The amendment and its wording were legitimately put on the ballot by the necessary number of petitioners and approved by the Florida Supreme Court. Please go back to addressing the real pressing issues, governor and cronies, and let the voters decide − we're not stupid and we know what the stakes are in Amendment 4

Janet Callear, Naples

Right to clean water

Calusa Waterkeeper Codty Pierce published an editorial about the plight of Manuel’s Branch in downtown Fort Myers. The Calusa Waterkeeper organization has been testing the waters of this creek for several years. And, although the City of Fort Myers is four years into a consent decree to clean the waters in its jurisdiction, the fecal bacteria present at Manuel’s Branch is consistently extreme – i.e. it far exceeds allowed amounts based on the EPA standards and represents a health hazard.Kids and adults continue to play, fish, and swim in and around these unsafe waters. With all this fecal bacteria present, I cannot help but wonder, isn’t it likely that there is a lot of other negative “junk” present as well? The answer is most probable. While Calusa Waterkeeper attempts to address the concerns with state and local officials, the question remains, how does this happen and why isn’t this fixed? I mean, people/officials have known about this problem for years!The answer is that polluters are allowed to continue because no one, agency, or law is stopping them. The ONLY way to bring back health, safety, and beauty to our waters is if we, the people, are given a fundamental right to clean and healthy water. That is what the Right to Clean Water’s petition initiative is all about. Go to floridarighttocleanwater.org right now. Print, sign, and send in the petition for you, your family, and your friends.

Mary Kay Robbins-Kralapp, Cape Coral

Ukraine and NATO

The admission of The Ukraine to NATO seems, on the surface, a good idea, but let’s think this through. Ukraine is bordered by Russia, Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania and Belarus. Except for Russia and Belarus, each of these countries is a member of NATO. There are 32 countries that comprise the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (including world powers Germany, France and the United Kingdom). And each NATO member has agreed to the terms of the NATO Treaty including Article 5 which states, “The Parties agree that an armed attack against one or more of them in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack against them all and consequently they agree that, if such an armed attack occurs, each of them, in exercise of the right of individual or collective self-defense recognized by Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations, will assist the Party or Parties so attacked by taking forthwith, individually and in concert with the other Parties, such action as it deems necessary, including the use of armed force, to restore and maintain the security of the North Atlantic area.”Once Ukraine is a member of NATO, the deployment of NATO troops to repel the Russian invasion becomes an option, not a mandated action, but clearly an anticipated next move. If Russia sees this deployment as a threat, the possible use of nuclear weapons overshadows the conflict. Some NATO members may conclude that they are required to step into the fray, especially those NATO members bordering Ukraine.  The mere threat of NATO troops coming to the aid of Ukraine will not dissuade Putin. He invaded Ukraine notwithstanding the fact that four of its abutting neighbors are members of NATO.And once Ukraine is a NATO member, President Zelensky will demand that the Article 5 obligations be fulfilled. So, let’s think this through.Read McCaffrey, Naples

Trump and Project 2025

Project 2025 proposes reclassifying tens of thousands of federal civil service workers as political appointees in order to replace them with Trump’s (unvetted and inexperienced) loyalists, who would be willing to bend or break protocol, or perhaps in some cases violate laws, to achieve his goals.

According to Politifact, there are 215 Trump administrators that have been criminally indicted: far, far more than any other president. Now imagine his thousands of appointed loyalists if he and Project 2025 succeed.

Add to that, Trump and Project 2025 want to move the Department of Justice under presidential control and significantly reorganize the FBI (some call it weaponizing), so who knows if any of them will be held accountable.   

So, honestly, is this what you really want?

Then do not vote for Trump – you know, the one who said that Lt. Commander John McCain wasn’t a hero and “I like people who weren’t captured,” or when Marine general and chief of staff, John Kelly confirmed Trump called dead veterans “suckers” back in 2018. Is this what we want in a commander-in-chief?

It’s a shame we don’t have better candidates to choose from, but we don’t. And I’m not a big fan of Biden either, but I wish the Republicans could find someone who doesn’t try to divide us and lose our faith in our government institutions – just what Putin wants.

Steve Hostick, Cape Coral

Immunity decision

It didn’t take long for former President Trump’s legal team to use the Supreme Court decision last week  granting him virtually absolute immunity from criminal prosecution to seek overturning the 34 count felony convictions in the New York “hush money” case.

Team Trump has asked the judge there to throw out the verdict because his conduct is shielded from criminality as “official” conduct within the scope of that immunity doctrine.

Despite the breadth of the Supreme Court’s unprecedented ruling, a question remains: in what universe do a   president’s “official” duties include having extramarital sex with a porn star and then participate in a fraudulent scheme to disguise the payment to her as a legitimate, tax-deductible business expense for legal fees.

Chief Justice John Roberts, author of the immunity ruling, and his right-wing cohorts will have a hard time coming up with an affirmative answer to that question if the case comes before them.

Justice Clarence Thomas may have to reach out to one of his ultra-wealthy benefactors for some guidance on that one. In making that decision, his extremist colleague Justice Samuel Alito will have to run that up his wife’s proverbial flagpole to see who salutes it.

Marshall H. Tanick, Naples

Abortion unthinkable

Total left wing political hack job regarding today’s article (7/10) on DeSantis and abortion.

Are you aware over $15 million has come to get Amendment 4 on ballot and assure it gets a yes!

Are you even aware that hundreds of thousands of pro-life people annually have marched on DC in January every single year since 1974 to protest Roe v Wade and it’s the largest annual continual march in the history of America.

Abortion is a bane to America and the largest human holocaust in the history of mankind and needs to become unthinkable in the hearts and minds of all human beings and is an atrocity against mankind and Almighty creator Lord God of the universe and not a right. You and I and everyone has free will to choose to sin or resist sin. If you and I or anyone chooses to have sex we must teach that there will be consequences like one you could get hurt physically, mentally and emotionally and you definitely get hurt spiritually in choosing to have sex outside the marital embrace and you could get a disease and you could get pregnant and if you do get pregnant you have no right to destroy an innocent baby who has a separate DNA and no voice.

You and over 90% of the media in our country are a one-sided embarrassment to traditional American values and virtues.

Praying for you and all, for conversion. God bless!

Charles DeFeo, Fort Myers 

Blind loyalty to political party

There are people in Naples who are as pro Biden as I am anti Biden. These people are saying how wonderful Joe is and how great a job he has done. I want to ask them when they last went to the supermarket and paid $5 for a half a loaf of bread or how it feels to pay upwards of $3.50 for a gallon of gas when it was under $2 when Trump was president. I would also like to ask them why when Biden depletes the U.S. Strategic Oil Reserve they praise him for lowering gas prices by one cent. The SOR is in place for U.S. security reasons not to get this mentally diminished man re-elected. His Cabinet must rank as the biggest conglomeration of non-doers in U.S. history.

I am amazed and flabbergasted by people who really think Biden has done a great job. Don’t they see the problems at the border, the diminished stature of the U.S., the level of inflation. Are their lives and the lives of their children and grandchildren any better? I doubt it. I just don’t understand this blind loyalty to a political party that cares only about keeping their jobs and becoming rich fat cats, vis a vis Pelosi, Schumer etc. I guess blind loyalty beats open eyed awareness.

Michael Zubrow, Naples

Passing the baton

In the words of Dylan Thomas, “Do not go gentle into that good night.Rage, rage against the dying of the light.”

We all will ultimately face the dying of the light and to rage, rage against this inevitably can initially give us a second wind, but the time will still come when we must humbly surrender to that good night.Perhaps it’s time for President Biden to exhibit one final act of his remarkably successful and storied public service leadership and show us how a great man goes gently into that good night by passing democracy’s sacred baton on to younger hands whose firmer grip will hold fast against bad actors with nefarious intents.

J. Cant, Naples

Misleading from the Left

You have to wonder what those on the Left are thinking after having been gaslighted on so many different issues. For years, they were fed the Russian collusion story and it turned out to be a hoax. Then they were fed the story that Trump had called neo-Nazis good people and some seven years later, Snopes finally came out and admitted it was not true. For years now they had been fed with the story that Biden was as sharp as ever and then came the debate to show otherwise. They were told that the Hunter Biden laptop was Russian disinformation and then finally over three years later the FBI actually used that laptop to charge and convict Hunter of a gun purchase crime. There are multiple other stories that they have been fed that have also turned out to be false. I wonder what they think as new so-called bombshells, mostly about Trump, continue to be promoted without any factual background. Will they finally come around to doing a little investigation on their own to try to verify the "stories"? I would add one more from my personal perspective. Trump supposedly mishandled the response to COVID. It seems that the basic argument is that he did not take it seriously. There are a lot of facts that should make anyone question that position. First of all, he very quickly shut down flights from China. When he did this, Joe Biden called him xenophobic, so who was taking it more seriously? Second, even Dr. Fauci at one point said that masks were not productive, and then later he said they were. It was under Trump that the vaccine was developed and was being administered prior to Biden taking office. More people died from COVID in the first year of Biden's presidency than in the last year of Trump's presidency and Biden had the vaccine. I think that the issue of who handled COVID better is open to debate.

Ron Wobbeking, Naples

Left right, right wrong

It always amuses me when I hear or read the term, "those on the left" as if something is amiss here.It brings back memories of my youthful days as a teenager when the single earring thing was beginning for boys.Having never being able to remember which ear a single earring was to go in, I remember the phrase very candidly."Left is right, and right is wrong."Many thanks to you Trumpers for the praise.

Steve Zihala, Naples

Democrat conspiracy

Kamala Harris, the White House, the DNC, and mainstream media are complicit in covering up Biden's obvious mental health issues. The media and White House have suppressed any narrative casting doubt on Biden's fitness for office. The mainstream media selectively reports on Biden, emphasizing scripted appearances and avoiding unscripted moments that might expose his cognitive decline. Kamala's coverup precludes her from consideration to be president. This silence undermines transparency and is a deliberate attempt to deceive the public for political gain. The American public, regardless of party, deserves better and should hold the Democrats accountable in the November elections for this blatant conspiracy. This makes Watergate look like child’s play.

Hart Kelley, Bokeelia

A path to fascism

Thinking that your way, and only your way, is the indisputable best way, can so easily turn into fascism. Who on the political scene thinks that much of himself? Easy answer — Trump. How can he succeed? He caters to those who choose to be uninformed, who welcome drastic change, and who want an ideology to latch onto. What is that intriguing mindset?It’s isolationist and nationalistic. It’s self-important men who think they know what’s best concerning the reproductive rights of women. It’s phony evangelicalism that insists our god is superior to your god. It’s distrust of our elections and our courts. It’s an aversion to bipartisanship. It’s a mentality that’s not fond of diversity. It’s subordinating the individual to the state. It’s a weaponized DOJ to exact political retribution. It’s opposition to any talk of gun control or serious consideration of climate change. It’s tax breaks for the rich and big business and a disdain for the IRS.His clueless cultists don’t appreciate that Trumpism will lead to autocracy, militarism, and suppression of opposition. It sounds like fascism. Will thoughtful, reasonable people who cherish democracy be comfortable in Trump World?The Dems have their own problems, but they don’t include turning our democracy inside out.

Kevin McNally, Bonita Springs