Have you heard the latest?

Ellenville is about to be blasted!

First, 46 acres here gained approval for mining operations. Not much left there but big pits where the mountain was gorged and stripped of all semblance of its original greenery. Now it seems that the same mining operation has hit a snafu; 800,000 tons of stone and bedrock removed only by drilling and blasting with explosives. If this is allowed to go through it will be a first for Ellenville. Either put us on the map or take us off.

Elizabeth Gordon
Ellenville

Pastor and theologian Walter Wink, who died in 2012, was present in Selma, Ala., in 1965, shortly after civil rights activists who crossed the Edmund Pettus Bridge were attacked by law enforcement officers with clubs, tear gas, and attack dogs. One of those attacked — a Boston pastor named James Reeb — was beaten and died from his wounds.

A day or two after that attack on peaceful demonstrators, and after peaceful demonstrators who were gathering around Ebenezer Baptist Church were also attacked and beaten by mounted police, Pastor Wink and other civil rights activists who had just received mandatory training in nonviolent disobedience were in a church in Selma, and they learned about the attacks and beatings at Ebenezer Baptist Church. Near the church, Alabama state troopers and local police forces commanded by Sheriff Jim Clark were stationed, and they were "itching for a fight," as Pastor Wink wrote in the book "Just Jesus: My Struggle To Become Human." Led by a local black pastor, people in the church sang a song which included the question, "Do you love Martin King?" The crowd response was "Certainly, certainly Lord!" They sang that several times. Then the black pastor sang, "Do you love Jim Clark, the sheriff?" The crowd's response was "Cer-certainly, certainly, Lord!" Then that black pastor, The Rev. James Bevel, spoke to the crowd and reminded them they were not fighting for their civil rights only, but for the good of the whole society. Then he said, "It's not enough to defeat Jim Clark – do you hear me, Jim? We want you converted! We cannot win by hating our oppressors. We have to love them into changing."

Commenting on that event, Pastor Wink wrote that we've come a long way since 1965, but have we, really? Our nation remains torn, subdivided by racial prejudice, by hatred.

Events in Ferguson, MO and other tragic shootings and beatings of unarmed black men in recent times make it all too real that Selma and Ferguson are related, although years apart. It's 2014, and we still need to learn what The Rev. James Bevel, that young black pastor, told a crowd of angry people in Selma in a church in 1965.

The Rev. Edward R. Schreiber
Atonement Lutheran Church
Saugerties

In the 1950s, President Eisenhower suggested the U.S. become more energy independent by going solar. We could have avoided many wars and invested more in education, disease prevention and a better quality of life for all Americans. Global warming and unusual weather disasters might have been averted.

Germany produced 50.6 percent of its energy this June with solar (sciencealert.com.au, 6/24/14). The UK is pushing for increased solar output (Smithsonian magazine) and by 2020 expects 40 percent of its electricity to be solar powered on sunny days (theguardian.com, 1/29/14).

US solar production is a mere 0.2 percent of our electric supply. There is no acceptable reason to further delay our country's transition to increased energy independence with solar and other renewable energy sources.

Solar is renewable and requires no drilling, digging, blasting or refining. It eliminates dangerous fires, cave-ins and toxic spills on land and water. It does not pollute air, water, soil or food, nor contribute to myriad health problems.

The $4 billion in taxpayer money granted to the fossil fuel industries to augment enormous profits could be better spent to get our country up and running toward increased energy independence now.

I installed solar panels one year ago and produced more energy than I consumed. It was exhilarating!

Rose Marie Williams
New Paltz

When the government cares more about its citizens than the citizens care about themselves, the Constitution becomes an obstacle to be overcome by the government. The way around this is to make the electorate dependent on the government. The caveat is that every handout given is taken from someone else, infringing on their freedoms and diminishing their ability to succeed, effectively dragging everyone down, to the unabashed delight of the communist.

The U.S. Constitution is a simple document. It essentially puts the vast power of the government in a cage, limiting its ability to restrict the rights and freedoms of the governed. Yet, time and time again, we see an elected official diligently sawing away at the bars of the cage, smiling and telling us how good government can really be if we just permit them to let it out of the cage.

Ironically, these same officials swore an oath to uphold the Constitution from which they derive their power and authority. The only thing they are concerned about is amassing more power and control over us — taxpaying, law-biding citizens.

So, the next time you see a smiling Ulster County Executive Michael Hein informing us that "we come at government from a different perspective," bear in mind that "perspective" is not kind, caring, compassionate or constitutional. It's a threat to the prosperity and well-being of us all.

Mike Dovich
Marlborough

Thank you for your lead article in the September 4, 2014 Shawangunk Journal, "Will the Jewish Alps Ever Revive?" Having grown up in Ellenville, beginning in 1952, when our little single-parent family of 3 plus my maternal grandmother emigrated from Berlin, Germany, my brother and I were enveloped by the caring, small town loving atmosphere where almost all family friends became our surrogate "mothers and fathers." I was graduated from Ellenville High School and I still consider members of the Class of 1960 my brothers and sisters. The environment of a village nestled in the valley of the Gunks and the Catskills had a deep impact on my psyche and the annual influx of summer visitors to the Borscht Belt provided us with jobs, entertainment and excitement that will never fade from memory. Of course, at the time we were totally unaware of the historical significance our location of the "sleepy, unimposing village" and its role in the world of stage and screen would have.

Hopefully your article will engender imagination and creative ideas about securing a "physical home" for the rich trove of memorabilia of the Borscht Belt decades that literally put Ellenville on the world map. I, for one, feel very privileged to have "begun my life in the USA" in the safe enclosures of Borscht Belt Ellenville.

Dagmar Mielisch Yaddow
Rhinebeck

Just when you are getting over the shock of opening your school tax bill, you still have the town fiscal budget to look forward to. Government agencies are mandated to keep yearly budget increases to a maximum of 2 percent. At this past Gardiner town board meeting, Democrat highway superintendent Brian Sticia reviewed his preliminary highway department budget for fiscal 2015. The department purchased three new big trucks last year adding massively to the towns growing debt. Brian's wish list this year includes replacing a 2002 truck with a newer, bigger one plus plow for $35,000. He also mentioned replacing the truck he is currently driving, as it is not shiny and new. He also mentioned the need for some piece of new equipment that could be used to clean off the sidewalks....

OOPS! He didn't mean to say that, it just slipped out. And Supervisor Czar Zatz deftly and swiftly pointed out that Brian didn't really mean "clean" the sidewalks, as that's not the responsibility of the highway department.

Just the items he included on paper came to an increase of about 28 percent in the highway budget. It did not include an estimated $400,000 that must be spent to replace the little used Clove Road bridge.

A bit later in the meeting, there was a discussion on how to reduce the budget (cue laugh track) while keeping the increase limited to 2 percent. Yes, correct that this conversation doesn't seem to jive with the highway budget, but I guess Brian Sticia didn't get the memo. Actually, I'm sure it's already been explored among the four Democrat-supported town board members that they could simply form a super-majority 4-1, and override the 2 percent limit mandate anyway. They can basically make the increase whatever they want. So, when you hear these four (Zatz, Wiegand, Reynolds and Dukler) speaking about keeping to the 2 percent limit, understand that is simply happy talk on their part, as they have no intention of actually keeping spending low.

Pamela O'Dell
Gardiner

Tens of thousands of Arabs protested around the world against Israel, with the help of the liberal enablers like the local Middle East Crisis Response (MECR of Woodstock), while they have been silent when 191,000 were murdered in Syria, or Kurds that have been slaughtered in Turkey and Iraq. The UN Human Rights Council only condemns and investigates Israel because the worst human rights offenders, Arabs countries dictatorships, sit on it as members in charge. Western entities like the media, academia, human rights groups, EU and local groups like MECR have become the useful idiots of the Hamas and Arab propaganda. These organizations chose to ignore, excuse and enable 14 years of rockets fired on Israeli civilians by Hamas. If the media covered 14 years of Israeli children growing under rockets attacks, and the UN and EU would have demanded a stop to it, and if the international community held Hamas accountable for wasting millions in foreign aid on weapons and tunnels instead of building schools and hospitals, there would be no dead people in Gaza now! Not only Hamas has Gaza kids' blood on its hands, as it purposely hides weapons and fire rockets from civilian areas to amplify the propaganda, but also the international community that ignored and excused Hamas actions, is directly responsible for the current death toll. I recently returned from Israel and experienced the daily sirens, explosions, and the need to run for cover, something that millions of Israeli civilians have experienced over two months and some for 14 years. Yet none of that is being reported by the journalists, the good soldiers of the Hamas propaganda.

To people like MECR supporters, and the Hub of Hate in Ulster Country that thrives on Israel hate, I suggest that you boycott ALL products developed in Israel including cell phones (Motorola Israel), texting, Kincket, your computer (most of Windows NT operating system made by Microsoft- Israel), AOL Instant messenger to just name a handful. And please make sure that you drive your car using dirty Arab oil despite the widespread honor killings and mutilations of young girls and women in the Arab world, persecution of gays and massacre of Christians. And please buy Made In China products despite their dismal human rights records. Lastly, you must use Made In Turkey products, the country that still would not admit to the genocide of over a million Armenians, a country that continues to occupy part of Cyprus, and a country that continues to kill thousands of Kurds.

T. Peleg
Pine Bush

A vote for Sean Eldridge for Congress is a vote for more accessible health care, a livable minimum wage, women's reproductive freedom, an end to tax cuts for the very wealthy, an end to the possibility of fracking and a sane approach to both gun ownership and undocumented immigrants. It is also a vote to repeal Citizens United.

The incumbent, Chris Gibson, makes clear from his voting record that he does not support these issues.

Be sure to vote.

Doris Chorny
Gardiner

The BKAA strongly urges members and friends to back Mamakating's proposed anti-fracking law (town board endorsed) by writing to supervisor Bill Herrmann and board at mamakating.org or attending/speaking at the public hearing at town hall, 2948 Rte. 209, Wurtsboro, at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, September 16.

Kudos to Mamakating officials for considering this pending legislation, which also forbids town use, storage, treatment, or processing of fracking wastes, and may regulate the latter's passage on town roads. Access the anti-fracking statute's full text via www.mamakating.org.

We likewise gratefully acknowledge Phillipsport Community Center's role in facilitating town action and that of the Natural Resources Defense Council in crafting the town's ordinance.

So, at this juncture, thank Mamakating's representatives for protecting their resident's and natural resources from fracking, and environmental scourge.

Any questions or comments contact [email protected] or me directly at 754-0743.

Paula Medley, President
Basha Kill Area Association