Shame, shame on all the Republican senators who did not have the moral fiber to stand up to an increasingly unhinged president and voted for the atrocity of a tax reform bill.
Who is going to benefit from these tax cuts? Obviously, the Trump family and his band of billionaires in the Cabinet, and the mostly rich, white and old Republican senators who engineered this travesty.
The bill was rammed through Congress without hearings and the final bill came with illegible handwritten adjustments that Democrats had 20 minutes to look at. Talk about self-serving legislation.
The same group of senators, who bleated about not raising the deficit in the Obama years, are now complicit in voting for a bill that is likely to raise the deficit by as much as $1 trillion. Such hypocrites!
Who will be paying for these tax cuts? Not the rich, for sure. Besides raising the deficit, cuts are promised to social services, including Medicare, in the next two years. There will be cuts to the State Department, already in sad shape under the Trump administration, and cuts to agencies that protect the environment, health, consumers, etc. As for the poor, they can just expect cuts to Medicare, Medicaid and other social services in the future. Shame.
However, it is not too late for these Republican senators to gain a moral conscience and vote no on this bill when it comes up for a vote in the reconciliation process in Congress. Let’s hope they do.
Rosamond Orford
Norwich
For those who have never been to Quail Hollow senior community, drive south from Hanover on Route 10, about 2 miles, turn right, go down the hill, take another right to the end of the lane. I live in the rear of that building, facing where a new building is proposed, a stone’s throw away.
What those of us in 29 apartments now share is our little view of nature. We watch deer, our own flock of “wild” turkeys that show no fear of us, and other wildlife that come out on the sunny hill we face. We will lose that view and, to a large extent, our privacy if that building is built. Plus it will block some sunlight.
Some of the present renters have lived here in comfort for years. And some folks cannot afford to move, even if other rentals are available. The artist’s rendition of the proposed building shows some distance between our buildings. In reality, we have measured the distance based upon that picture, and it’s about 50 feet from my building to the proposed new one.
How can we, with such a short distance, maintain any hint of privacy? The only answer I see is keeping the blinds drawn. All this to jam a building for 40 new apartments in close proximity to us. What encouraged me to write this was a quote in a Valley News article from ownership that the proposed building “likely will not block any view.” For that to be the case for me and my neighbors on the top floor, the new building could not be very tall. And the two lower floors would be totally blocked.
Robert P. Camarra
West Lebanon
The Plainfield and Cornish energy committees have both officially endorsed a goal of powering their towns with 100 percent renewable electricity by 2030 and 100 percent renewable heat and transportation by 2050. The two energy committees also have drafted warrant articles, which will be voted on during the Cornish and Plainfield Town Meetings in March, to formally set a goal of powering the two towns with 100 percent renewable energy.
We consider that renewable energy is the future of this country and that it is important to drive these changes at the local level. We would like our towns to join the 50 towns and cities across the U.S. that have committed to a goal of powering their communities with all renewable sources of energy by 2050. Hanover is among them.
The two energy committees will host the last of this year’s Renewable Energy Educational Series on Tuesday at 7 p.m. at the Philip Read Memorial Library in Plainfield, with a film screening and discussion about clean energy. We will be showing Clean Disruption, in which Tony Seba argues that the electric vehicle, battery storage and solar power, along with autonomous vehicles, are a perfect example of a 10-times exponential process which will wipe fossil fuels off the market in about a decade.
Evan Oxenham
Plainfield Energy Committee
Hagar Was Horrible
I must object to the Hagar the Horrible strip in Monday’s Valley News. If the artist thinks that depicting torture is funny, he should be ashamed of himself, and this paper should be ashamed to publish such things. I’m all for free speech and freedom of the press, but to show our younger generation that adults find humor in the torture of others is wrong.
Stephen Raymond
Sharon
If Ronald Reagan were around today, he’d say to Jim Kenyon, “there you go again.” In the Dec. 6 issue of the Valley News, Kenyon continued his tradition of extraordinary investigative reporting, this time devoting an entire column (“Uprooted in Norwich”) to the scandalous planting of seven elm trees in Norwich.
Many Valley News readers, oblivious to the horrible horticultural events occurring in their own backyard, were probably focused on far more trivial issues, such as Russian involvement in our elections, health care, tax policy and the impending crisis with North Korea.
Thankfully, as he has done so often in the past, Kenyon helped redirect readers’ attention to what’s really important. Some readers may not be aware of prior columns in which Kenyon alerted us to other equally shocking scandals, such as the paving of the Montshire Museum parking lot and the provision of free parking in Hanover during the Christmas shopping season.
In an era dominated by fake news, it’s nice to see Jim Kenyon and the Valley News take investigative reporting to such new heights.
Hal Manning
Hanover