Garbage changes needed, but be reasonable

Editor: I would like to comment on the plan to replace all small trash containers with larger receptacles, which is illogical if the goal is to reduce pollution and is also unfair to those of us who use the smaller containers.

Any good that is accomplished by changing the way trash is collected will be offset by the necessity of more plastic bins needing to be manufactured, not to mention the cost of these new containers. And what is to happen to the smaller containers if they are phased out? Will they be put in a landfill to languish for centuries--or for millennia--and further degrade the planet? Our planet is overwhelmed by plastic waste, which makes if difficult to think of any reason to manufactures or try to dispose of even more plastic.

As for the impact on individual customers, the proposal is unfair and discriminatory. One of the justifications given by the city is that some people are overfilling their containers so everyone needs bigger containers, which is ridiculous.

There is no guarantee that those who overfill their containers won’t continue to do so even when they have a larger receptacle. And what logic makes it acceptable for those of us with smaller containers to have to pay more for a larger bin which we don’t need or want?

I completely support the changes being made to how we dispose of our trash but the issue of the bins needs to be rethought, both from an ecological standpoint and from the standpoint of equity and fairness to all consumers. GAIL MICHALEK Lodi

End the wokeness

Editor: As our borders disappear we have a government that sends $140 billion and counting to a European nation in which we have no national security interests. No European nation even comes close to our contributions.

Are we not obligated to help a nation being invaded? Help, yes, but not to the point where our own economy suffers while the nations affected give little or no help. So while we have this bright object of helping probably the most corrupt nation in Europe in which Zelinsky has closed down all opposition politically and in the press plus, outlawing Christian churches, our own government’s actions are destroying us in the name of identity politics where you get rewarded or punished by what color your skin is and not by merit.

Schools and government were meant to be a melting pot of many different peoples to promote solidarity and a sense of common identity of being an American. Now they take the opposite mission of separating us in creating unbridgeable differences, dividing us into many different identities that are destined to be at war with each other.

This ideology is everything Dr. Martin Luther King preached against. And yet we have academics and government officials pushing this division. It’s Marxist and it’s un-American. It’s been proven in every socialist/Marxist movement that cost the lives of millions; socialism doesn’t just destroy its enemies it also ends up destroying the very people who advocate this cancer upon humanity. It has no honor or respect for life.

For our own salvation as a nation we must turn back to God. Jefferson wrote, “God who gave us life gave us liberty. Can the liberties of a nation be secure when we have removed a conviction that these liberties are the gift of God?”

We see the lack of respect for others in the violence and rising crime. It’s said that where there is no respect for God can there be much for man? We must end this “wokeness” and heed the warning of Isaiah, “Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil.” RON PORTAL Lodi