Limited ferry service limits us

We were dismayed to learn that the Guemes ferry schedule has been curtailed to discontinue both Friday and Saturday midnight runs. This is making it difficult, if not impossible, for us to attend any of the wonderful cultural events in the county, as we would either have to leave mid-performance or plan to spend extra money on a motel as we would not be able to be in line in order to use the last (11 p.m.) ferry.

In the past, when we would attend the Seattle Opera, we would be able to pack the car and drive up after the matinee and be able to use the ferry. But now that Sunday-night service ends at 8 p.m., that, too, is not possible. And now that snowbirds have returned, ferry service is at a premium, especially on weekend evenings, and it is thus more difficult for us to gain access to our home on Guemes.

What would happen if the roads were closed at night to access? We’re all part of the county/state transportation system and as such, our taxes are supporting this system.

Pauline Anderson

Anacortes

Question Herald’s fairness

The Skagit County Cattlemen are fully behind saving our agriculture land and remaining farmers in Skagit County. Marv and Bev Macken raise a few cows along Colony Creek. They have taken measures to protect the stream following criteria provided in Critical Areas Ordinance. Original fences were installed by the local conservation agency. Fines issued by Skagit County have been seen as harassment and thus rescinded, because Skagit County made no attempt to confirm the Mackens’ compliance throughout legal proceedings.

The Skagit Valley Herald is grievously incorrect that the Mackens should be “grateful” that Skagit County revoked the fines. Guilty until proven innocent, according to the Skagit Valley Herald. The Macken case has never been a water quality issue; not by DOE or county standards. The case has absolutely nothing to do with fecal coliform, since Skagit County has never tested water to determine if the problem was associated with cows, horses, humans, wildlife or waterfowl.

The county is attempting to use livestock and dairy as scapegoats for all water quality problems. At the onset of this case, water quality samples were taken not by the county, but by the cattlemen. These samples indicated there was no apparent increase in fecal coliform on Colony Creek due to the Mackens’ few cows. In fact, there appeared to be a decrease.

Test numbers show that levels of fecal coliform entering the Mackens’ property have been nearly exceeding state standards, due to sources upstream of the Mackens. We question the Skagit Valley Herald editorial board on fairness and lack of facts contained in an editorial and cartoon published by the Herald that depicts livestock owners as offenders.

It is easy to point fingers where you have no evidence. The Macken case is about a fence allowing cow head only access to drink. It’s time for Skagit County to update its stream-monitoring plan, and provide public works funding and tools to identify sources of pollution in streams.

Randy Good, president

Skagit County Cattlemen

Sedro-Woolley

Fakery lives on

Jay Ambrose’s “stimulus” article is a great analysis of the quicksand on which our economy has been built. The delusional mindset that has brought us to this tenuous position is due to the increasing popularity of fakery in many segments of our society.

In the academic world, coaches who get caught cheating on recruitment rules get fat pensions or promoted to bigger schools. UW and Eastern Washington are classic examples. The student body and athletes are penalized. If that logic is fair, let’s release all bank robbers and incarcerate their spouses and children. Seven years ago, a UW neurosurgeon confessed to fraudulent billing. Result: He was given a multimillion dollar pension. The university claimed taxpayers would not pay the tab. It was to come from billing revenue. Who pays that? Such fakery.

A recent scientific survey by Northwestern University revealed that the northern ice pack has rebuilt back to the 1970s levels and polar bear population is on the increase. Al Gore feared his global warming pork barrel would shrink. He switched the label to climate change. I can testify to having seen climate change four times in each year for the past 80 years. Where’s my Nobel Prize?

Obama claimed he would create new jobs. Unemployment continues to climb, so he’s switched to claiming the employed are the jobs he has saved. His stimulus administration has stimulated a wide array of political pork. It is beginning to appear that he may hold a graduate degree from the Illinois school of corruption. His textbook was written by P.T. Barnum. It took George Bush eight years to acquire the label for failed policies. Obama has done it in six months. Fakery lives.

John M. Hamers

Anacortes

A sham and a smear

June 12’s front-page article, “Holocaust museum shooting signals race turmoil, some say,” implies that opposition to affirmative action or illegal immigration is somehow connected to anti-Semitism. Those issues are not related, and in fact, anti-Semitism today is more a phenomenon of the political left than right.

We need look no further than President Obama’s admitted spiritual mentor, Jeremiah Wright. Recently he told reporters that “Jews” were preventing him from talking to the president. He has a long history of anti-Semitism, including remarks from the pulpit during the time that Obama was a member of his flock. Nation of Islam leader Farrakhan, who said Judaism was a “gutter religion,” was honored by the church during that time also.

Obama himself has repeatedly enhanced the stature of an avowed Holocaust denier, President Ahmadinejad of Iran, by expressing a desire to meet with him. Added to Obama’s recent statements that Iran should be allowed a “peaceful” nuclear program, his approach probably helped Ahmadinejad’s re-election effort, as Iranians saw this as proof that his hardline toward the U.S. was effective. During Obama’s Middle East trip, he made a speech that implied moral equivalence between the Holocaust and Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians. There is so much wrong with that comparison that space limitations preclude analysis, but suffice it to say that it is further ammunition for those, like Iran and Hamas, who want to destroy Israel.

Let me be clear. None of this is to suggest that Obama or Wright are responsible for the attack on the Holocaust museum. But any article that purports to analyze the root causes of anti-Semitism in America yet fails to acknowledge its prevalence within the political left is nothing but a sham and a smear.

Mark Lijek

Anacortes

Government is health-care fix

Private health insurance companies have failed the public in keeping health costs down and compromised the health, welfare and economic viability of Americans. As a consequence, I believe it is time for some sort of carefully planned, carefully administered government-run health insurance plan.

According to the conservative British news magazine “The Economist’s Pocket World in Figures (2008 edition),” most large Western European cities have a higher quality of life than cities of comparable size in the United States, and part of that is due to their government supported health systems. I believe it’s time that we also raise the our quality of life by considering an American government option for health care.

Possible options could be a comprehensive federal health plan in full competition with private plans or, perhaps, a hybrid health system that would provide basic government care, plus a private choice for more complete or comprehensive health care.

When it comes to health care, I believe the president is right: Government is not the enemy; it’s the solution.

William Manatt

Mount Vernon