A lot depends on voting rights
Without fair voting rights, we have no democracy. Without the America Cares Act, 31 million people will be without affordable health care. Without the wealthy paying a fair share of taxes, important programs — factual education, public safety, forest-fire protection, child care, a woman’s right to her own body, family services, justice ... will not be free.
Without infrastructure, bridges will collapse, roads will become unsafe. All costing American lives. Without federal gun laws, more innocent people will die due to illegal weapons.
Without science, we regress. Without knowing history, we are doomed. Without conserving our environment, the earth can no longer sustain our quality of life (selfish extremists say, “So what?”).
Without justice for political criminals, other despots with the same motive for greed and power will believe: “No one cares. Laws don’t matter. They can’t touch me.”
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Without social democracy — not socialism — fair treatment of all citizens as promised in our Constitution and its preamble, we will become an oligarchy. Without separation of church and state, a theocracy.
Sheldon Metz
Northeast side
Guarantees hold us back
Re: the June 25 article “The case against universal basic income.”
Richard Morrison makes a very effective argument against the universal basic income. He states: “There is little evidence to imagine that most of the people ‘liberated’ by a UBI would spend more time on community improvement or anything constructive than on TV, video games and smartphone apps.”
This is absolutely true. However it is not just a problem with the poor on UBI, but it is especially a problem with the rich on inherited income.
Forbes magazine has looked at the effect of inherited income on children of the very wealthy and have found that inheriting large sums of money has an almost universally negative effect on the both the children who inherit the money and on society.
Anthony Mendoza
Foothills
Fires’ ferocity is concerning
I am currently overseas, when I received the startling news of the huge fires that are happening in Arizona. I was shocked to find out that areas near Flagstaff were preparing to be evacuated while the Telegraph fire has already burned more than 180,000 acres.
The intensity of these fires is not normal. Their destructiveness is already making Arizona history as these fires continue to spread.
When speaking with my friends in Arizona, I was again shocked to see how little they heard about the fires. It is as if everyone is already acclimated to wildfires happening in Arizona.
While they might be the norm, their magnitude is not. As these fires increase in intensity, we face growing fears whether these fires will destroy our homes. These progressively intense fires are undoubtedly the result of climate change.
We need to start respecting the planet and acknowledging that the increased intensity of wildfires is one of the many consequences of climate change.
Merle Weidt
Downtown
Rooftop solar bailing out TEP
This heat wave currently has TEP fighting blackouts and requesting energy conservation. This is in spite of the rise of rooftop solar for the past several years.
It seems as if the entire grid would be down if not for personal investments in rooftop solar made by homeowners despite the reputation for utilities to actively fight these installations. Last year, the Arizona Corporation Commission even passed rules allowing utilities to block certain new installations outright.
After fighting them to generate our own power and even being denied outright, we are now bailing the electric utilities out of this power crunch, and what is our thanks? Continuing to receive fractions of the rate they charge us while they sell our power to other customers at full rate.
The Corporation Commission needs to stop empowering and force utilities to pay homeowners a fair rate for the power we produce and to restructure themselves for distributed generation. Besides dubious financial exchanges between the Corporation Commission and the utilities, there is no excuse why this cannot be accomplished.
Steve Meyer
Vail
Help protect Arctic refuge
Advocates have been battling the special interests of the oil and gas industry and Alaska’s congressional delegation for decades, all while the ongoing climate crisis worsens.
Much like Arizona, the Arctic is on the front lines of climate change. Alaska has been warming twice as quickly as the global average since the 1950s and faster than any other U.S. state.
As a result of higher temperatures, permafrost is thawing, sea ice is thinning and wildfires are increasing. More drilling in the Arctic will only further the devastating impacts already being felt from climate change.
Protection of the Arctic refuge is critical for one of the world’s most imperiled polar bear populations and species like wolves, migratory birds and the Porcupine caribou herd, a species that the Gwich’in Nation rely on for survival.
The well-being of the Arctic is connected to the entire world, not just Alaska, which is why Sens. Kyrsten Sinema and Mark Kelly should support the Arctic Refuge Protection Act and repeal the gas drilling program.
Danielle Hargett
Midtown
