Proctors provides an escape from bad news
On a daily basis, we are bombarded with news of bombings, sexual assault, ISIS atrocities, stolen emails, shootings, desperate refugees trying to escape horrific circumstances, tornadoes, floods and all manner of events that lay heavy on our minds.
On Oct. 19, I spent three hours at Proctors having my mind cleansed of all those negative things.
It stuck me when Adam, a character in “An American in Paris,” spoke about his enlightenment when he realized the secret for creating his symphony. To paraphrase his words, life can be dark, but art should be a celebration.
Sitting in a theater built 90 years ago, listening to fabulous music written 70-plus years ago, wonderfully sung and danced by young artists born not many years ago, I was thankful for this celebration and thankful that we have a venue that was saved, nurtured and blossomed, to bring myriad celebrations to Schenectady to give our lives balance.
Jacquie Hurd
Schenectady
Hypocrisy at heart of demands to disavow
It’s very surprising to see the level of hypocrisy that’s coming from some Democratic leaders and constituents with regards to recent events during this presidential campaign.
Democratic officials want Republican officials and candidates to disavow Donald Trump, yet they themselves will not do so for the negligent actions of their party’s candidate, Hillary Clinton.
I find it quite disturbing that they would even push this issue, when right now there are more pressing concerns for upstate New York. While our state continues to run off track with greed and corruption, Democratic leaders like Todd Kerner and Joe Landry are focusing on something that should not have any bearing on our local election. In fact, I don’t think it should matter who these officials vote for, because the last time I checked, we live in a democracy, not in a totalitarian society.
I suppose it’s only fair to challenge Democratic leaders such as Chairman Kerner and Landry, as well as Senate candidate Chad Putman to do the same and disavow themselves from supporting Hillary Clinton. She has put our country at risk, supported a husband who has allegedly abused women and had extramarital affairs, cut deals with donors to her foundation while engaging in pay-to-play politics, and was involved in the disaster in Benghazi that resulted in the death of Ambassador Chris Stevens. These actions are irreprehensible and show a level of character that could put our future at great risk.
So Ms. Kerner and Ms. Landry, if you want all of our local Republican officials to denounce Trump, then to make sure there is no double standard, you should instruct your party’s leaders and candidates to denounce Clinton. Or you could be like most reasonable people and understand that everyone has the right to vote for whom they choose. We live in a democracy and how one votes is their personal choice.
Now, let’s get back to the things that matter in upstate New York.
David F. Hwaszcz
Schenectady
Taxpayers shouldn’t have to fund abortion
This is regarding the column stating that Hillary Clinton is a threat to America’s religious liberty.
Clinton believes as president she will force religious conservatives to change their beliefs favoring taxpayer-funded abortion on demand. She and her partners in Planned Parenthood have to stop normalizing the killing of children. Planned Parenthood turned 100 and has killed over 7 million babies through abortion. Little babies in the womb die a most horrid death.
We hear their mantras. Safe and legal and rare. Keep your laws off my uterus. My body my choice. Abortion; It’s a blob of cell. All ignore the facts of life.
Planned Parenthood promotes and makes money on contraception, which fails. Then Planned Parenthood uses abortion to make more money. Why should we citizens be forced to pay for the abortion of babies who do not get to see the light of day?
Thanks to ultrasound and other high-tech tools allowing a peek inside the womb, scientists have discovered a virtual sensory playground in which your baby is living. The link between a mother and child is profound. Microchimerism is the persistent presence of a few genetically distinct cells in an organism. The pregnant mother who aborts her child continues to carry the aborted child’s cells in her own body, and sooner or later will begin to grieve at the loss of her child.
Hillary and her staff should study more science instead of using her radical agenda to force people to their ignorant view.
Joanne Clough
Guilderland
Economy, planet win with Teachout plan
Do politicians watch weather reports? Unusually severe droughts, floods, and storms fill the nightly news. But greenhouse gas emissions, one probable cause of many of these disturbances, receive scant mention from the people who compete to lead us.
One person who does not share the overall faintheartedness is Zephyr Teachout, who has publicly supported the idea of carbon fee-and-dividend as a way to combat climate change and at the same time to bolster the economy.
Regional Economic Models, Inc., a highly-regarded, non-partisan research firm, agrees that this plan would help the economy as well as the planet. In 20 years, the report states, it could reduce carbon emissions to 50 percent of 1990 levels and “generate more than $1.3 trillion in added overall economic activity.”
Yet Teachout’s opponent, John Faso, oversimplifies her comments, claiming that she is advocating a “national energy tax.”
A fee, by definition, is voluntary. If energy companies decide to find ways to produce energy without using carbon, they will not pay a fee and we all benefit.
A “tax” is not voluntary; it goes to the government; we must take it on faith that we benefit from it.
Rather than raising alarms about taxes, I hope Mr. Faso will join Ms. Teachout in her search for innovative solutions — such as carbon fee-and-dividend — that will lessen the quantity of greenhouse gases contributing to climate change.
Elizabeth Poreba
New Lebanon
Both candidates put America in jeopardy
What is at stake in the 2016 election for president is, America.
The presidential election between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump will decide whether our American culture will be irrevocably dismantled or whether we will have another chance to pull out of the nose dive we have been in for the last 50-odd years and salvage our national heritage.
My observation of the current socio-political landscape does not bode well for our country. Trump counts as his credentials: successful businessman, antiestablishment politician, anti-political correctness candidate with a history of fondling women. Clinton counts as her credentials: former secretary of state, first female candidate for president, political insider and supporter of political correctness with a history of attacking the women her husband sexually abused.
The race was pretty much neck and neck up until the most recent salacious past scandals involving Trump were broadcast and, as a result of these revelations, Hillary now has a significant lead in the polls.
The real issues facing America’s future, the future of Western civilization — of which America is the political, military and economic epicenter — have been obscured. Put off by this soap opera, perhaps the most immediate important consequence of a Hillary Clinton presidency, the composition of the Supreme Court, has been overshadowed while the media goes on a feeding frenzy and the public takes its eye off the ball.
Responsible, intelligent, hardworking, decent Americans have been distracted by a soap opera while the Republic is under siege. This nation, America, is in jeopardy of perishing from this Earth.
George Hughes
Burnt Hills
Letters
The Gazette welcomes letters to the editor from readers.
The deadline for letters related to the Nov. 8 general election is 5 p.m. Tuesday (Oct. 25). Letters received after that time will not be published prior to the election.
Keep letters as short as possible. There is no specific word limit, but shorter letters will get preference for publication and timeliness. About 200 words are suggested for election letters. Longer letters may be published online only without notice.
Writers are limited to one letter every 30 days.
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