Letters to the Editor: 12.03.15

Homecoming

East Hampton

November 19, 2015

Dear Mr. Rattray, 

I’d like to extend my gratitude to you and your staff for the photos and story regarding my daughter’s, Lt. Elizabeth Mamay’s, homecoming. The “likes” and “shares” and comments from our community to congratulate and in support of her have been amazing as well as humbling; especially knowing that too many mothers, fathers, and families are not as fortunate.

I also wish to express my thanks to the East Hampton Village Police and Volunteer Fire Department personnel for escorting her into town to meet her family members and friends by Hook Mill. My heart was already bursting with happiness to have her home, but the police cars and fire trucks with lights and sirens completely overwhelmed me, and, in addition, created a memory to last a lifetime for my daughter. 

Then, to my family and friends, colleagues and acquaintances, and everyone in town who has been supportive and praying for her safe return, I am forever thankful. Let’s keep all our military personnel, those on American soil and those still deployed around the world, in our thoughts and prayers until they are all home safe too.

Sincerely, 

DIANE McNALLY

 

A Crucial Organization

East Hampton

November 27, 2015

Dear Editor,

I was so surprised to read in your article on our East Hampton Meals on Wheels that they do not receive any local government or federal funding. I always assumed they did since I know some other local organizations that do. It is upsetting to hear they are running out of money.

It is such a crucial organization, and not just for elderly people. I knew a young woman who lived alone who severely injured her leg. She received Meals on Wheels for several weeks until she was literally back on her feet again.

I hope people will consider giving to East Hampton Meals on Wheels for their year-end tax deduction charity giving, as they are about as local an organization as we have out here. They come right to your home if for any reason you become homebound. 

Sincerely,

JENNIFER CUNNINGHAM

In the Ice Boat

East Hampton

November 30, 2015

Dear Editor,

With Tom, Megs, and their dad, Everett Halsey, steering, we laid in the ice boat going at an incredible speed across Mecox Bay.  The “silence” of this sport has to be experienced. Over 60 years later, I remember it well.

LALLY MOCKLER

Embedded Commitment

Amagansett

November 27, 2015

To the Editor,

I was puzzled and put off by your lead-in to your article of Nov. 19 “BookHampton: One Sold, One to Go.” After 16 years of embedded commitment to the community offering a consistent lively and cultured center in a miasma of changing storefronts and new crops of franchised designer stores, BookHampton and its owners are unique, and should be applauded for their efforts.

To imply that BookHampton is just another business to unload on the chopping block is unfair to all of us who know and greatly appreciate what Charline Spektor and Jeremy Nussbaum brought to East Hampton. In no way has Ms. Spektor been dismissive of the town (quite the opposite). So why is The East Hampton Star dismissing her in the opening line?

She may be ready to “move on” as you say, but that statement diminishes the efforts she is making to ensure the store’s survival. Too far into the article do you hit on the responsibility she feels toward keeping the bookstore and making every effort to make sure it continues in the right hands.

That, to me, should’ve been the lead-in. Few who’ve been on Main Street have taken such care. 

Sincerely,

MARDEE KRAVIT

People From Illinois

Springs

November 24, 2015

Editor:

I just can’t believe how many people from the wonderful state of Illinois vacation out here during the summer as well as the winter and in between! 

They couldn’t possibly live here, for if they did, I’m sure they would know they have to turn in their license plates and get New York State plates within 30 days.

CAPT. KEN RAFFERTY

 

Little Children

Amagansett

November 23, 2015

Dear David, 

What a blessing that Amagansett School may once again be filled with little children!

Sincerely, 

GEROMA GURNEY 



 

Must Support Hunters

Amagansett

November 30, 2015

To the Editor,

As we are in the midst of the fall bow-and-arrow hunting season, it’s a good time to remember to support hunters and to increase their access to land, both private and public.

Without hunters, there is no solution to the problem of deer overabundance. It is unlikely that East Hampton will ever find acceptable a cull with hired sharpshooters. Not only has East Hampton Village been criticized for its efforts to sterilize does, there is emerging evidence from Cornell that sterilization efforts may be less effective than hoped, because sterilized does live longer than unsterilized ones — birth is risky, and fertile does have higher mortality rates. Finally, the evidence from Fire Islandemonstrates that to date birth control for deer is an expensive failure. 

Thus, to have any impact at all on reversing the environmental degradation caused by deer herds that are larger than what the land can support sustainably, we must support hunters and give them as much access as possible to public and private land for hunting. To limit access undercuts hunting as the only effective tool available for managing deer herds that otherwise will double in size every year with the birth of two fawns per female.

It is interesting to note that the conservation movement had its origins among hunters: think Teddy Roosevelt and Aldo Leopold. Hunters are the original land managers, motivated by a strong set of ethics that guides their actions in the context of the ecosystem as a whole. In general, they know the land and nature better than most of us. To spend 10 or 12 hours in a tree stand quietly watching nature gives them insights the rest of us will never have, and they deserve our understanding and respect.

Jim Sterba, author of “Nature Wars,” reminds us that today, with an absolute majority of people living in suburbs rather than on farms and cities, we spend 90 percent of our time indoors and think of nature as the view from our windows. Our opinions about hunting are shaped by movies like “Bambi” that anthropomorphize animals, rather than by knowing the hunters and farmers who provide the meat for our table. This is a shocking change from centuries of human history, where our connection to the sources of our food defined much of our daily lives. We are in danger, Sterba notes, of “an historic abdication of our stewardship responsibilities . . . to manage the natural landscape for the health and benefit of all species of plants and animals, including people.”

To support the expansion of public lands for hunting is the ultimate expression of an environmental ethic. It ensures the survival of songbirds and the many other creatures and plants that inhabit the forest understory, currently in such serious shape that in the next 50 or so years, the forest fragments that beautify East Hampton’s landscapes will disappear. These same forests, in a healthy condition, are critical to the effective filtering of the rainwater that resupplies the natural aquifers we rely on for our drinking water. We have so much to gain from spending the time to understand the important role hunters play in preserving the quality of the environment on the East End.

Thus I urge readers to write to the town board in care of Town Supervisor Larry Cantwell ([email protected]) and tell them to vote yes to expand bow-and-arrow hunting.

Yours truly,

JULIE SAKELLARIADIS

Hunters of a Certain Age

Amagansett

November 20, 2015

Dear David, 

It may well be a reaction to attending deer-management meetings. But I don’t like to think about the dying animals: There is a plan afoot to expand bow hunting onto certain East Hampton Town properties.

A problem, as I see it, is that in spite of packing newfangled semiautomatic bows and arrows, the three to four qualified East Hampton Town bow hunters are of a certain age. They will definitely need to pull eyeglasses out of the quiver (maybe a chair). 

I took archery in school. It was an alternative to having anything to do with a ball (for the moment). I obliterated cabbages.

What is the future of deer-slaying? The young don’t want to. Will we be dependent on the assisted living set to bring down Bambi? I’m just asking. 

All good things, 

DIANA WALKER

Ethics Complaint

Manorville

November 30, 2015

Dear Editor:

Is there an unethical relationship among State Senator Dean Skelos, the law firm Ruskin Moscou Faltischek, and Caithness Energy, whose Long Island president is Ross Ain? 

Mr. Ain employs Senator Skelos’s law firm Ruskin Moscou Faltischek to represent its interests, which include the construction of the Caithness II fossil-fuel plant, before the Long Island Power Authority and the New York State Public Service Commission. In May 2015, I filed an ethics complaint with New York State’s Joint Committee on Public Ethics, stating that “the intimate relationship among Senator Dean Skelos, the law firm Ruskin Moscou Faltischek, and Caithness Energy violates the spirit, intent, and word of New York State ethics law.” I have yet to receive a response.  

I will now forward a copy of my ethics complaint to U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara asking him to investigate this matter.

Newsday has reported that “federal prosecutors say there was no wall separating Senator Dean Skelos and clients at Ruskin Moscow Faltischek.” Among those clients is Caithness Energy. I trust that U.S. Attorney Bharara can hold his nose and wade into this cesspool of apparent ethics corruption and begin to clean it up.

Sincerely,

PETER MANISCALCO

Terrorists and Immigrants

East Hampton

November 30, 2015

Dear David,

It’s Thanksgiving, so it is time to celebrate the first immigrants who came to the U.S. Seems an appropriate subject, given the fabricated furor that connects immigration to terrorism. At least 95 percent of Americans come from immigrant stock, certainly the largest percentage in the world. 

For certain we killed off the native population when we claimed the country for ourselves — the first real connection of immigration to terror. But that was 400 years ago. We continued to terrorize the natives, but it was no longer their country.

Connecting immigration to terror in current times is based more on ignorance and neofascist manipulation. Getting into the U.S. through normal immigration procedures is brutal, exhausting, and takes forever. Terrorists would need a very long-term plan to go that route. It is far easier to slip in through our borders, which are the longest in the world, than to face the immigration authorities.

Why do conservatives wet their pants over ISIS when their predecessors held their water during the cold war? The Soviet Union had a two-million-man army and 5,000 nuclear missiles ready to fight us with, while ISIS has Kalashnikovs, roadside bombs, and teenage girls in explosive vests. The Soviets were a real threat, until they weren’t, but we seem to have lost so much of our man-and-womanhood that every provocation sends us into spirals of raging outrage. Instead of planning and executing an attack that will destroy our enemy, we drop bombs on anyone who happens to be in a certain place. We are really good at dropping bombs, but nothing seems to change.

ISIS is a product of colonialism in the Middle East and the West’s willingness to support some brutal dictators. The belief that the Arab Spring would engender a peaceful transition from dictatorship to democracy had no basis in reality. The idea that this transition would be short term and without problems had even less. It is easy to blame Bush for not having a plan or a clue, but the germs of this problem go much further back in the 20th century and our need to keep oil flowing from the region. Add to the instability of regime change the Saudi support for Wahabism and extreme Islam, and it is easy to understand the genesis of ISIS and how it fills the void of rudderless nations without strong leadership and viable institutions.

We consistently give the Saudis a pass and they keep biting us in the back?

The connection between terrorist attacks and refugees (immigrants) is an easy one, but only if one is completely brain-dead and xenophobic. Of course all Arabs are the same. All Muslims are Arabs. And all Arabs are terrorists?

The problem for the U.S. is, what to do? Every time we lead we make a mess. Often when we don’t lead we still have a mess. None of the politicians who are screaming for war ever went to war. If we are really concerned about our values, especially our good ones, we need to put them on display. Find a way to make democracy a viable alternative to the brutality of ISIS and the Saudis. Let go of the colonial ideology of America first, last, and always, and lead with our souls, not with our bombs. 

NEIL HAUSIG

Lies and Misstatements

East Hampton

November 23, 2015

Dear Editor,

Many people believe that a very long lead-up to a national election is a good and healthy thing. If the conduct of the likes of Trump and Carson and Cruz and the rest of them can be classified as a good thing, then all of us out here who have to listen to their lies and brags and false histories once and then listen to the media and talking heads dissect each fabrication and untruth again and again have to find some good books or music to listen to.

Now comes Donald Trump, an unglued, unmitigated liar, phony, bully and self-indulgent gutless wonder, who has gone past the furthest outpost of depravity to totally fabricate statistics from alleged legitimate research bureaus across the country that don’t even exist and denigrate blacks, Hispanics, Mexicans, war heroes, women, Muslims, and even stupid politicians.

Trump cites and publishes a totally false set of black vs. white crime statistics and sets about getting his gang of retarded followers to become violent animals. Trump’s previous lies and misstatements have been characterized by some as just puffery and campaign rhetoric. But his latest foray into the world where real people live, work, and raise families puts the lie to that description and reduces our love for our country and fellow Americans. The man is a despicable human being who will say anything at any time when he thinks it will get applause and approval from the white Republican voters who deem him presidential material, even if the applause is for hatred, cowardice, and antihuman values.

Trump is for forcing Muslim religionists to wear an M on their sleeves, or have it tattooed on their arms; he is for closing Muslim places of worship; he is for condemning those different from him as unworthy, unstable, and anti-American. He calls the president of the United States gutter names, says he saw Muslims cheer 9/11, is a “birther.” He would deny refuge to men, women, and children driven from their homes by war and death, and he is just a total piece of garbage without the guts to take responsibility for the thousands he put out of work with his five bankruptcies. He has lawyers write threatening letters to those who oppose him even before they utter their opposition.

No one who has ever done business with this weasel has anything good to say about the experience.

C’mon, Donald, you big turd, sue me for telling the truth about you.

Vote. Please vote.

RICHARD P. HIGER

The Climate Without

Amagansett

November 30, 2015

To the Editor:

“My thanksgiving is perpetual,” wrote Thoreau, and we should all be grateful we have not very recently had a tragedy like the one that shocked Paris, the city that my grandfather liberated a lifetime ago. American foreign policy instigated the chaos in Iraq, whose disenfranchised commanders made ISIS possible. 

One enormous factor, not commonly recognized, is the dire drought there, one that will make habitation there in a few decades all but impossible. James Cameron’s “Years of Living Dangerously” highlights the upheaval of the climate in that part of the world. When you can’t drink clean water and the infrastructure is shot, hell commands the human condition, and human viruses breed! 

The terror, the pollution, the outright toxins of an overbearing and unconscious civility we as a species have imposed on the weather is coming back to bite us. That is why Paris is so crucial a litmus test for civilization. Paris is about whether so-called civilization unravels or not! It is about war and peace.

It is perhaps no coincidence that the last hope for some kind of climate accord happens on the very soil on which tragedy has just struck. Paris was about liberation from tyranny in World War II. It is also about the rights of humanity, liberty, equality, and fraternity. But liberty and equality and fraternity for whom? Not the five million Muslims living in fear from a former colonial power. The karma of the French and British and Americans has come back to bite them. But a bigger threat looms, not just from angry young men and women from the Middle East, it is also from that great intangible tangible, the climate without that threatens us all. 

For most of the last half century, America and the West, and industrial society as a whole, believed they won the Second World War, and transferred their victory onto an innocent agent in their lives, the natural elements — the wind, the water, oceans, forests, and countless, guileless species of existence that are the foundation of our survival. That force field that supports life is splitting in two: on one side of the DNA spiral, humankind, and on the other, the natural world. 

In a time when the natural world is grieving on all sides from the onslaught of the human spectrum, where dams are bursting in Brazil with poisons, when the peat bogs are aflame in Indonesia, when elephants continue to be cyanided in Zimbabwe, when Fukushima remains unresolved, when the great ice sheets of Greenland are melting, the natural world is demanding a truce from the ignominy of our kind. As the most important conference for addressing the climate crisis unfurls in Paris, trophy hunters and poachers continue to deplete the gene pool of the innocent. Lions as we have known them may lose another 50 percent of their population within the next decade. The last northern white rhinos are on their last legs, another 100 elephants were just cyanided in Zimbabwe for the ivory trade, and Japan has resumed whaling despite interdictions from the U.N. 

    Our relationship to nature has become apoplectic and barbaric. The elite, the 1 percent, the cabal of coal, oil, and gas magnates funded by the macro-managers of Golem, have devastated the world’s resources just as a new cold war looms on the horizon. A plethora of electronic gadgets surround us but still we comport ourselves like troglodytes who have yet to connect the dots. The drought without can only be matched by a drought of meaning within. We have instilled fear on the world politically and economically and ecologically. And we have made it possible by trying to be the world’s policeman instead of being a great gardener of care, concern, and compassion. 

The hydra in the Middle East we sought to kill has now sprung many more heads than we can ever hope to control. And that doesn’t even include the full impact of El Nino and the harpies of fully dislodged atmospheric gods. Paris, in its resilience to the recent attacks, is the true beginning of the 21st century, just as 1914 was the true beginning of the 20th. Let Paris be the place where fear is banished, as we start conducting ourselves as a viable species on this planet. 

I quote from the writer with most nitroglycerine in his soul, Henry Miller: ”Fear, hydra-headed fear, which is rampant in all of us, is a hangover from lower forms of life. We are straddling two worlds, the one from which we have emerged and the one towards which we are heading. That is the deepest meaning of the word human, that we are a link, a bridge, a promise. We have a tremendous responsibility and it is the gravity of that which awakens our fears. We know that if we do not move forward, if we do not realize our potential being, we shall relapse, sputter out, and drag the world down with us. We have choice — and all creation is our range.”  

CYRIL CHRISTO