Readers sound off on bike safety and Martin Scorsese.
Cycling Solution
Re: “Never Forget Josh Alper” (Cover, Jan. 8): Thank you for the article and remembrance of Josh Alper.
As a lifetime cyclist, I learned early on that cars are a threat on the road. I have been hit on Bay Street by a delivery truck, and I have been hit by a vehicle traveling over 50 mph on Hwy 1 (both while riding in the bike lane with no other traffic on the road). Both times, I was miraculously okay. I have lost three friends on Hwy 1 to cars: Cathy Oretsky (1995), Joshua Leven (2011) and Josh Alper (2013).
I have come to only one solution: In recognition of the dangers of driving, I choose to ride my bicycle as safely as possible.
That doesn't mean I never drive, but it means that when I do, I recognize that I have the potential to kill. I often think that this is the root of the animosity between cyclists and motorists: Cyclists don't like cars because they are lethal and no cyclist wants to die, and motorists don't like cyclists because they are vulnerable and no driver wants to end up a killer. It is a very understandable conflict.
I have made my choice and work for safer cycling and advocate for better infrastructure that provides, as Cory Calleti put it, “mobility for people,” not cars. By riding my bicycle, I am making our roads safer, if not for myself, then for you.
Josh Muir
Santa Cruz
Keep It What?
In response to your December 25 cover, how about “Keep Santa Cruz Unique,” or “Keep Santa Cruz Special” or even “Keep Santa Cruz Wonderful?
I agree that “Keep Santa Cruz Weird” has had its day.
LeAnn Meyer
Santa Cruz
Crying Wolf
Re: “The Wolf of Wall Street” (Film, Dec. 25): Normally I would see anything made by Martin Scorsese, but have never understood his man-crush on Leonardo Di Caprio, one of Hollywood’s most overrated pretty boys. I have been forced to cringe through five weeks of the over-the-top trailer for this film, vowing never to waste my money, and reading Richard Von Busack's very witty review (a classic) confirms my first instincts. Thank you, Richard.
Judy Slattum
Capitola
Dark Skies
Re: “Our Great Wet Hope” (Currents, Dec. 8): I think that the “drought” that we are experiencing here in Santa Cruz is being created artificially by the planes flying overhead spraying us with chemicals. Geo-engineering clouds fill our sky day after day. What are we breathing? Aluminum, barium, thorium.
NASA also lists lithium and metal oxide–which metals?
“The Metal Oxide Space Cloud (MOSC) experiment is to demonstrate increases in ionospheric density for future application in technology to mitigate and/or control scintillation effects on COM/NAV operational systems. The secondary objective is to provide a technical basis for DSC use of on-demand space plasma generation (e.g., HF [high frequency] propagation).”
What the hell are they doing to our sky?
No informed consent or permission from the public, no public hearings, nothing but silence.
Geo-engineering companies, experts and advocates met at Asilomar in 2010. The public was not allowed.
These are government and military projects, weather modification experiments, military signal propagation projects. HAARP antennas heat the ionosphere repeatedly for government uses.
How many times do our government and private interests violate the health and safety of the public and the sky before we finally say, “No!?” Fleet Numerical and the Naval Postgraduate School are probably involved with many of these projects.
The sky is not for sale. It is not an experiment. It is our very precious and rare air. Stop geo-engineering now.
Drew Lewis
Santa Cruz
