Issue link: https://www.epageflip.net/i/5833
6A – Daily News – Saturday, January 9, 2010 A MediaNews Group newspaper Greg Stevens, Publisher gstevens@redbluffdailynews.com Chip Thompson, Editor editor@redbluffdailynews.com Editorial policy The Daily News opinion is expressed in the editorial. The opinions expressed in columns, letters and cartoons are those of the authors and artists. Letter policy The Daily News welcomes let- ters from its readers on timely topics of public interest. All let- ters must be signed and pro- vide the writer's home street address and home phone num- ber. Anonymous letters, open letters to others, pen names and petition-style letters will not be allowed. Letters should be typed and cannot exceed two double-spaced pages or 500 words. When several letters address the same issue, a cross section of those submit- ted will be considered for publi- cation. Letters will be edited. Letters are published at the discretion of the editor. 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How to reach us Main office: 527-2151 Classified: 527-2151 Circulation: 527-2151 News tips: 527-2153 Sports: 527-2153 Obituaries: 527-2151 Photo: 527-2153 On the Web www.redbluffdailynews.com Fax Newsroom: 527-9251 Classified: 527-5774 Retail Adv.: 527-5774 Legal Adv.: 527-5774 Business Office: 527-3719 Address 545 Diamond Ave. Red Bluff, CA 96080, or P.O. Box 220 Red Bluff, CA 96080 Opinion Lately, I've been studying the melting of glaciers in the greater Himalayas. Understanding the cascading effects of the slow- motion downsizing of one of the planet's most magnificent land- forms has, to put it politely, left me dispirited. It is impossible to focus on those Himalayan highlands with- out realizing that something that once seemed immutable and eter- nal has become vulnerable, even perishable. Those magnificent glaciers are wasting away on an overheated planet, and no one knows what to do about it. Another tipping point has also been on my mind lately, and it's left me no less melancholy. In this case, the threat is to my own coun- try, the United States. We Ameri- cans too seem to have passed a tipping point. Like the glaciers of the high Himalaya, long-familiar aspects of our nation are begin- ning to seem as if they are, in a sense, melting away. In the last few months, as I've roamed the world from San Fran- cisco to Copenhagen to Beijing to Dubai, I've taken to keeping a double-entry list of what works and what doesn't, country by country. Unfortunately, it's become largely a list of what works elsewhere but doesn't work here. In places such as China, South Korea, Sweden, Holland, Switzerland and (until recently) the United Arab Emirates, you find people hard at work on the challenges of education, trans- portation, energy and the environ- ment. In these places, one feels the kind of hopefulness and can- do optimism that used to abound in the United States. China, a country I've visited more than 100 times since 1975, elicits an especially complicated set of feelings in me. Its Leninist government doesn't always live up to Western ideals on such things as political transparency, the rule of law, human rights and democ- racy. And yet it has managed to conjure an economic miracle. In China today, you feel an unmis- takable sense of energy and opti- mism in the air that, believe me, is bittersweet for an American pon- dering why the regenerative pow- ers of his own country have gone missing. As I've traveled from China's gleaming, efficient airports to our often-chaotic and broken-down versions of the same, or ridden on Europe's high-speed trains that so sharply contrast with our clunky, slowly vanishing passenger rail system, I keep expanding my list of what works here at home and what doesn't. Over time, the list's entries have fallen into three categories. There are things that are robust and growing, replete with promise, the envy of the world. Then there are those things that are still alive and kicking but are precariously balanced between growth and decline. Finally, there are those things that are irre- deemably broken. Here is the score card as I see it. ASPECTS OF U.S. LIFE THAT ARE STILL VIGOROUS AND FILLED WITH POTEN- TIAL: • Biotechnology, which is delivering much of the world's most innovative research and ideas. • Silicon Valley, which has enormous inventiveness, energy and capital at its disposal. • Civil society, which, despite the collapse of the economy, seems to be luring the best and brightest young people, and superbly performs the crucial function of goading government and other institutions. • American philanthropy, which is the most evolved, well funded and innovative in the world. • The U.S. military, the best- led, -trained and -equipped on the planet, despite being repeatedly thrust into hopeless wars by stupid politicians. • The spirit and cohesiveness of smalltown American life. • The arts, including our film industry, which remains the globe's sole superpower of entertain- ment, along with the requisite networks of orchestras, ballet com- panies, theaters, pop music groups and world-class museums. ASPECTS OF U.S. LIFE THAT STILL FUNCTION BUT NEED HELP: • Higher and secondary school education, in which America boasts some of the globe's preem- inent institutions. Increasingly, though, many of the best institu- tions are private, and jewel-in-the- crown public systems such as Cal- ifornia's continue to be hit with devastating budget cuts. • Environmental protection, which compares favorably with that in other countries despite being underfunded. • The national energy system, which still delivers but is overde- pendent on oil and coal, and depends on a grid badly in need of upgrading. ASPECTS OF U.S. LIFE IN NEED OF DRASTIC INTER- VENTION: • Public elementary education, which in most states is desperate- ly underfunded and fails to deliver on its promise to provide all chil- dren with high-quality schooling. • The federal government, which is essentially paralyzed by partisanship and incapable of delivering solutions to the coun- try's most pressing problems. • State governments, which are largely dysfunctional and nearly insolvent. • American infrastructure, including highways, docks, bridges and tunnels, dikes, water- works and other essential systems we aren't maintaining and upgrading as we should. Airlines and the airports they service, which are almost Third World in equipment and service standards. • Passenger rail, which has not one mile of truly high-speed rail. • The financial sys- tem, whose overpaid executives and under- regulated practices ran us off an economic cliff in 2008 and com- promised the whole system in the eyes of the world. • The electronic media, which, except for public broadcasting and a vital and growing Internet, are an overly commercialized, broken-down mess that have let down the country in terms of keeping us informed. • Print media, which from newspaper publishing to book publishing are in crisis. • Basic manufacturing, which has fallen so far behind it seems headed for oblivion. I started keeping these lists because I was searching for things that would banish that dispiriting sense that America is in decline. And yet the can-do list remains unbearably short and the can't-do one grows each time I travel. American prowess and promise, once seemingly as much a permanent part of the global landscape as glaciers, mountains and oceans, seems to be melting away by the day, just like the great Himalayan ice fields. Orville Schell is the director of the Asia Society's Center on U.S.-China Relations. He is the former dean of the Graduate School of Journalism at UC Berkeley and the author of many books on China. America's can't-do list Commentary N EWS D AILY RED BLUFF TEHAMA COUNTY T H E V O I C E O F T E H A M A C O U N T Y S I N C E 1 8 8 5 Guest View Orville Schell STATE ASSEMBLYMAN — Jim Nielsen (R), State Capitol Bldg., Room 4164 P.O. Box 942849, Sacramento 94249; (916) 319-2002; Fax (916) 319- 2102 STATE SENATOR — Sam Aanestad (R), State Capitol Bldg., Room 2054, Sacramen- to, CA 95814. (916) 651-4004; Fax (916) 445-7750 GOVERNOR — Arnold Schwarzenegger (R), State Capitol Bldg., Sacramento, CA 95814; (916) 445-2841; Fax (916) 558-3160; E-mail: gover- nor@governor.ca.gov. U.S. REPRESENTATIVE — Wally Herger (R), 2635 Forest Ave. Ste. 100, Chico, CA 95928; 893-8363. U.S. SENATORS — Dianne Feinstein (D), One Post Street, Suite 2450, San Francisco, CA 94104; (415) 393-0707. Fax (415) 393-0710. Barbara Boxer (D), 1700 Montgomery St., Suite 240, San Francisco, CA 94111; (415) 403-0100. Fax (202) 224- 0454. Your officials Rebuttal to claims that marijuana is harmful Editor: First of all I agree that smoking anything is harmful for your lungs. Now to set a few things straight about mari- juana. Marijuana is not addictive. People who have an addictive personality may have more of a problem with this and the addiction is more psychologi- cally than physical. You can not over dose on marijuana. There is a chemical in the mar- ijuana that keeps you from over dosing or becoming phys- ically addicted to it. How many people have you heard of getting into a wreck from smoking or eating some- thing with marijuana in it. Though you hear of so many people driving drunk and killing someone else other than themselves. Marijuana does not make you lose you inhibi- tions like alcohol does. If you decide to stop smok- ing you can stop without any withdrawals. I have talked to so many people that smoke marijuana and none have had hallucinations from smoking it. Marijuana is not a gateway drug. I know lots of people that smoke marijuana and have never touched another drug in their life. So that blows that theory out of the water. Also did you all know that the word canvas comes from the word cannabis? Look in the dictionary for yourselves. The stalks can be made into lots of things, including clothing, can- vas, rope, shoes and many more things. Also did you know that the oil they used in the wagons that came out West used cannabis oil, which you get from crushing the seeds. People have been led to believe that lard, pig fat, was used to oil the wheels. If they used lard it would dry out, start to stink and after a few days the wheel would be so dry it wouldn't be able to spin on the axle. So they used the oil from hemp seeds. There are so many uses that can be done with the hemp plant. Also we are told in the bible that if man's laws conflict with God's laws we are to follow God's. There are several places where it shows that the people of God smoked cannabis. As the bible says knowledge and understanding sets us free. Also if we'd quit spending millions on trying to erradicate and legalized it, sold it like cigarettes and tax it, we'd have a surplus in our gov- ernment general fund. Saving all that money and getting taxes from the sales. I don't smoke it, but I believe in our basic rights, which we are los- ing everyday. Please America don't let that happen. Keep the constitu- tion alive and our freedoms. Never give an inch when it comes to our rights and the constitution and the declara- tion of independence. The gov- ernment is for the people, by the people and of the people. Russell White, Corning Your Turn