Marin IJ Readers’ Forum for Dec. 9, 2020

Second, Third streets must stay three lanes

I am writing in response to the recent article about roadwork to accommodate cyclists and pedestrians (“San Rafael unveils early design for Third Street overhaul,” Dec. 4). How can San Rafael even consider reducing the number of traffic lanes on Second or Third streets from three lanes to two? This is madness.

These two one-way streets are the main access for residents of San Rafael, San Anselmo and Fairfax to Highway 101. At peak times, it can already take as long as 30 minutes to go the mile from San Rafael’s West End neighborhood to Highway 101. There are plenty of other less-important streets to use for a bike lane. This “renovation” plan will make getting around downtown San Rafael next to impossible for the 99% of us who must drive. It will further diminish our quality of life.

Keep Second and Third streets three lanes each.

— Michael Alexin, San Rafael

Does Chinese slave labor benefit U.S. corporations?

According to a recent article published in the New York Times (“Nike and Coca-Cola lobby against Xinjiang forced labor bill,” Nov. 29), Apple, Nike, Adidas and many others are spending hundreds of thousand of dollars to weaken the Chinese/Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act. Lobbyist groups claim the supply chain will be disrupted if slave labor camps are reduced or questioned. The law forces each mega-corporation to prove its products are not made by slave labor.

The Australian Policy Institute reports that about 80% of Xinjiang cotton, used in clothing, is picked in large part by Uyghur slaves.

Does this sound familiar to anyone? These corporations are making the same argument as the slave labor southern states before the Civil War in the United States. Those companies claimed that they could not make cotton unless they had slaves. They did not give a damn if American workers starved trying to compete with slavery.

It will be interesting to see if all that money which, according to some reports, passed through Hunter Biden will make this all go away. I suspect that killing the bill will get us nothing but unemployment. Meanwhile, Chinese slaves remain slaves and government scraps fall to the floor for our enjoyment. We will be “back to normal” again.

— Tim Peterson, San Anselmo

Questionable record for those doubting election

It is beyond ironic that the very same people who decried the COVID-19 pandemic and the investigation into Russian election interference as “hoaxes,” now believe that millions of Americans conspired together for months or years to rig an election, and kept it secret from everyone who voted for Donald Trump.

— Charles Kelly, Fairfax

Rigging elections a specialty for some

Were the presidential elections rigged? Considering the GOP’s systematic perpetration of gerrymandering, disenfranchisement and intimidations, you better believe those who know best.

— Sergio Franco, San Rafael

Follow the politicians, set up vaccination center

To make sure our important public officials can properly serve us during the pandemic, I propose we consider recent reports about Gov. Gavin Newsom and San Francisco Mayor London Breed appearing to violate health guidelines. I think we should set up a testing and vaccination center at the French Laundry restaurant in Napa County.

— Leon Kunstenaar, Woodacre

Sacrifice, decency replaced by selfishness

All of my life, I believed selfishness was a character flaw. Now, in my old age, I find that it is a political philosophy. How else to explain people who won’t wear masks, who refuse to aid the unemployed and failing businesses, while ridiculing those who do the responsible things to help fight a pandemic and its consequences?

This country used to be guided by principles of common good, patriotic sacrifice and plain decency. Now, for a vocal group, that’s been changed to, “What’s in it for me?”

The irony is that lifting up the most vulnerable benefits all of us.

Especially during this harsh winter of disease and political gridlock, please let us model kindness, compassion, generosity and humanity. If we do, both individually and as a country, we can get to a spring of renewed prosperity. If we don’t, the results of this pandemic will linger long after it is over.

— Elaine Levy, San Rafael

Using library during pandemic can help

I have heard people asking when the library will be open. As part of the Friends of the Larkspur Library group, I can tell you the library is open for business online and for curbside pickup.

Since June, the Larkspur Library has been offering curbside service to patrons who reserve their books online at larkspurlibrary.org. The service is very popular. An average of more than 1,300 books, films and audiobooks per week are checked out to hundreds of patrons who have requested and reserved their selections online.

Quarantine bakers get their recipes for sourdough bread from library cookbooks. Armchair travelers borrow library DVDs set in Venice and Tokyo. Mystery fans can take their minds off masks and hand sanitizer to try to solve any number of murders in Sweden — just search for a “list” of “Scandinavian mystery writers” at marinet.lib.ca.us. Learn a new language, prepare for a new career, watch a movie all for free.

Readers don’t have to wait for a vaccine to access the world. Libraries continue to be essential.

— Alice Kaufman, Larkspur

Congress must stay in session until aid approved

I strongly feel that our senators and representatives need to stay in session until a new pandemic aid bill is passed. It would be criminal for them to leave for vacation when the current aid package is set to expire by the end of this year. This should not be a partisan issue. People and businesses in our country need help now and our paid representatives have an obligation to stop fighting amongst themselves and take action to make this happen.

— Mark Schatz, Novato

Walters lacked context on Harris replacement

I’m writing in response to Dan Walters’ column published in the Marin IJ about identity politics (“Governor faces identity politics vs. melting-pot vision in replacing Harris,” Nov. 29). What is interesting to me is that, for him, identity politics — in which talent and accomplishment “become secondary to being defined by their race, ethnicity, gender, age, and/or sexual orientation” is a recent phenomenon.

Perhaps as a White male, he has not noticed that for most of our nation and our state’s history, identity politics was the name of the game: Candidates seemingly had to be White, male and heterosexual to be considered for public office.

He also says that Californians “happily live in integrated neighborhoods.” Hmm, he must not have read about the recent study saying otherwise (“Marin dominates racial segregation rankings in UC study,” Nov. 30). Marin could better be described as largely happily segregated neighborhoods. He also may have missed last year’s news about the state’s desegregation order for the Sausalito Marin City School District. So much for the melting pot.

Years of under-representation and non-representation created pressure to finally redress some of these wrongs. It evened the identity playing field to more accurately mirror the ethnically and culturally complex population here in California.

So when Walters ended his column by writing that it should matter that whomever Gov. Gavin Newsom chooses to replace Vice President-elect Kamala Harris in the U.S. Senate “will be seen as representing every Californian,” he should have noted how many years that was never the case.

— Jana Zanetto, San Rafael