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Letters to the Editor - July 3, 2008 |
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Written by Sentinel Readers
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California should be run like household
Dear Editor,
A message to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger regarding your budget expenditures: May I respectfully suggest that you levy a 1 cent sales tax; eliminate unnecessary boards, commissions and unnecessary salaried positions; and curtail legislature salaries as well as car allowances and living expenses.
Get the outflow to equal the income as most families do.
Good luck.
James R. Housel
Meadow Vista
Put a stop to Placer’s winery ordinance
Dear Editor,
It’s
bad enough that the county is trying to hijack our private road rights,
but now we learn that they want to allow not just wine tasting but also
commercial retail sales of food and merchandise along with “promotional
events” in our residential neighborhoods.
We knew we would have to
maintain our road and share with neighbors crossing our property when
we moved to our rural home. Agriculture is fine—growing grapes,
mandarins, and other crops with seasonal roadside sales is no problem.
However,
the jump from grape growing to grape processing opened the door for
winery operations. Now they want an ordinance that allows wine
tasting, promotional events, and full commercial retail sales with
public traffic using our private roads for profit.
The term
“Placer Grown” is out the window—grapes can be grown anywhere (even
Lodi or out of state). Wines can be brought in from anywhere (what
doesn’t sell elsewhere can be “cellared” and sold here). And the
capper? The public will be using our private roads to make the wine
tasting circuit. Tell supervisors to vote no on Placer County’s winery
ordinance at the hearing on July 8.
Matt Marin
Auburn
Oil is high because dollar is low
Dear Editor,
Oil hit $143 a barrel this week. There are many explanations for why it’s so high. Some reasons offered are: speculation by investors, lack of supply, lack of production capacity, liberals or environmentalists blocking oil exploration.
There’s a simple reason for the high price. Oil is traded in US dollars per barrel. In 2001, we could buy a euro for $0.88. Today it takes $1.58 to buy a euro. If the dollar was at its value of 2001, oil would be around $80 instead of $143 per barrel.
European countries are now discussing a raise of their interest rates, in an effort to slow their inflation. If they do, investments will shift to Europe and the dollar will get still weaker, resulting in still higher oil prices. It’s not the liberals and environmentalists who are responsible for high-priced oil, it’s simple economics and our weak dollar.
An appropriate question is, why has our dollar lost almost half its value to the euro?
Ron Paitich
Auburn
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