Letters to the Editor
Published Letters: 252 Editor's Choice: 20
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The Conductor
[Read the article: King Kaufman's Sports Daily]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]A coach is nothing more than a symphony conductor. The conductor stands in front of the orchestra and waves a baton. He doesn't do much on stage. 99% of his work is in practice, correcting errors, explaining difficult passages, and massaging the orchestra into stage form.
Pro coaches are the same. By game time, it is too late for them to make major changes. Coaches make substitutions, but that is about all the executive authority they exercise. The game is up to the players.
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Here's One for the Vegans
[Read the article: Drop that salmon!]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]In the Midwest, farmers pour tons of fertilizers into the soil. The fertilizers end up in the runoff in the Mississippi, Ohio, and Missouri river valleys. This nitrogen-rich water flows to the Gulf of Mexico, where it stimulates massive algae blooms that cause enormous fish kills and one of the largest dead zones in North America. The dead zone off the coast of Louisiana is larger than the state of Massachusetts in the summertime.
So it is false that the vegan contributes nothing to global environmental damage. Vegans have to be just as careful about what they eat as non-vegans do.
It is not that simple. And in this discussion I am not even getting into the amount of oil consumed in planting, maintaining, and harvesting, or the amount of water wasted in irrigation.
Yes, I know organic farms can overcome much of that. But organic farming is by its nature small scale, and costs more per acre, and thus is no solution to the billions of poor people in this world.
The solution is not banning things, it is harvesting them in a socially conscious way. I might give up meat, at least mostly, for the environment, but lets be adults here and recognize that the solution is not a few garden salads away.
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Who Are Your Friends, Obama?
[Read the article: What should Obama do about Rev. Jeremiah Wright?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I can understand that Rev. Wright is hurt. He was kicked around by the media like a dog, and Obama, in his famous speech, more or less said some of the things Wright has said are irresponsible.(Actually, the words Obama used were "made me cringe.")
But if Wright gave a damn about Obama at all, or at least cared about the ideal of electing the first black president, he could have kept his trap shut until after Election Day. He kept his mouth shut for a month, so what difference would 5 more months make?
The thing about this controversy that makes me cringe is that it is apparent that Obama's campaign may be brought down not by the KKK or the boy's club on Wall Street, but by his own constituency. Wright is willing to provoke Obama into an argument that could alienate him from African-Americans, the very group that has been willing to turn out 90% in his favor.
Wright is correct to say that pastors speak one way and politicians speak another, but he is stupid to pretend that he does not understand that the political process is very prickly, and very important. Wright's unwillingness to recognize the difficulty of Obama's position means Wright is now Obama's enemy. Wright couldn't have harmed Obama more with this timing if Hillary Clinton had paid him.
Obama has no choice but to disown Wright as a Farrukan. The more forcefully the better. He has to hope the majority of blacks will follow. Obama's greatest political liability is the suspicion that he is a closet Rev. Wright, and he will have to risk his entire candidacy to leave no doubt that suspicion is false.
Either that or bow out. Barack, you play the nice guy very well, but if you want to win, you have to kick this guy in the teeth.
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Dunno Much About Oil Exploration
[Read the article: The education of an oil reporter]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]But I can look at the world and tell that it is finite. There can only be so much oil on the earth, and with a rising human population oil has to peak, doesn't it? How can it not?
Even if we have a ways to go it makes sense to plan. Since we really don't know how long it makes a whole lot of sense to plan. I can't understand why anyone would consider not planning.
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It's Just a A Game, You Know
[Read the article: The sex that plays fair?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]The "it's just a game" adage cuts both ways. On one hand, it is refreshing when athletes put aside technical interpretations of the rules to be fair, as in this case. On the other hand, if the game is not very important, does it really matter if they don't?
When I was in college our dorm soccer team went undefeated in intramural play. We won the championship game 6-0 but were disqualified because several players that played in the game were not registered on the preseason roster. In other words, 4 people on our hall played in all the games but forgot to sign in before the season started. They were not ringers. They really lived in our building and were eligible players. They simply forgot to sign.
The manager of the other team noticed this discrepancy and filed a complaint. His team was awarded the championship, even though we shellacked them in the final.
Do you know what we did about it? Absolutely nothing. We knew we were the best and cared nothing about the stupid trophy. They beat us on a technicality. But the outcome was not worth fighting about. It was just a game, after all.