Letters: Replace Thao | Reconsider RCV | Natural resources | Applying reason | Left to Congress | Unqualified opinion

East Bay Times Letters to the Editor for June 28, 2024

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Replace Mayor Thaowith ethical leader

Re: “Thao: ‘I will not be bullied’” (Page A1, June 25).

Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao showed a lack of character last year when her first impulse was to blast Oakland A’s ownership for its move to Las Vegas, rather than seeking first to understand the entirety of the decision. She managed the entire process with the Athletics like a petulant child rather than a clear-minded businessperson.

Mayor Thao is solving the city shortfall by selling assets rather than laying off employees. She lacks the insight to understand that layoffs are part of a healthy business cycle.

And now there is this raid on her home. On cue, she blames ulterior motives.

It’s not clear what will happen. What is clear is that Thao is another politician whom Stephen Covey describes as attracting voters with her Personality Ethic (emotions) rather than a (strong) Character Ethic. Let’s break the cycle and vote next time for someone who is boring and has high character.

Rich PatrickSan Ramon

The time is ripeto reconsider RCV

With all the upheaval about the mayor and district attorney going on in Oakland and some nearby cities, it is time that “ranked-choice voting” should be revisited. Wherever it has been enacted, it seems to bring a lot of frustration, and the people put in office do not deserve to be there.

Taxpayers and voters with common sense should think long and hard about keeping ranked-choice voting.

Diane WinkelSan Leandro

Antioch should useits natural resources

Instead of trying to bring tech companies to Antioch, the city, along with nearby cities such as Pittsburg, should use what they have naturally. They should create hydro-powered plants that run off of the water in the Delta to give the city energy; this would also create jobs.

Just like in the olden days, Antioch had the coal mines and people worked there. Then after that, there were the steel mills. It’s time to once again use what the city naturally has. Use those natural resources to create jobs, provide service and boost the economy.

Brandon LawsonAntioch

Court applied reasonto bump stock decision

Re: “Bump stocks decision flouts common sense” (Page A6, June 20).

Erwin Chemerminsky claims the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision on the use of bump stocks should have been made on the basis of common sense, or in the alternative, the Court should have relied on the so-called deference principle that a law is whatever a federal agency says it is.

While common sense tells us that bump stocks should be prohibited, the purpose of the Court in this case was to determine whether the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives’ rule prohibiting bump stocks was consistent with the federal law banning machine guns. That determination requires the application of reason, not the whims of common sense. And we should never trust government bureaucrats with the power to decide the legality of their own rules, a power that has already been much abused.

The Court made a reasoned decision and pointed out that it’s up to our inept Congress to fix the federal law on bump stocks.

Dick PattersonEl Cerrito

Court rightly left bumpstock ban to Congress

Re: “Bump stocks decision flouts common sense” (Page A6, June 20).

Erwin Chemerinsky further demonstrates that he is ill suited to be dean of a law school.

Unlike the executive and legislative branches of government, the Supreme Court does not seek to increase its powers, and Chereminsky should thank them for that. The 1934 law he cites is very specific in its definition of what constitutes a machine gun. The Court correctly decided that semiautomatic guns with bump stocks do not meet that definition.

I would wager that every person on the Court would like to have bump stocks banned. Fortunately, six of them had the courage to acknowledge that it is not their job to do that. Chemerinsky himself points out that Congress could write legislation to accomplish that. Claiming that the Court should do so because the gun lobby has prevented Congress from doing it is ridiculous.

Bill McGregorBerkeley

Stay away fromunqualified opinions

Re: “Rep. Ro Khanna talks about stumping for Biden’s reelection, contentious recount for House contest” (Page A1, June 24).

While reading the informative June 24 article on Rep. Ro Khanna, who commented that President Biden is engaged, involved and “keeping a rigorous schedule,” I was suddenly served up the musings of one Harmeet Dhillon, a Republican lawyer who opined that, from her perspective as a “casual observer,” Biden’s mental faculties appeared “consistently impaired.” She added that she rated Donald Trump to be even “sharper” than herself.

This interjection, from an obviously unqualified source, on the relative cognitive conditions of the candidates was totally uncalled for. I’m guessing it was an ill-conceived attempt to make the article appear “balanced.”

A piece on the views of a political figure does not require an out-of-the-blue refutation, especially from such a highly partisan source as a former official of the Republican Party who judges her own mental acuity to be inferior to Trump’s.

Bruce MendenhallNewark