Wild and crazy thoughts to save the world

by Jean Stimmell Today, we navigate through our lives, autonomous contestants in a national gameshow called free-market capitalism, where winners live in mansions and losers on the street. Community, ethics, and our non-human neighbors don’t matter much. How do we break out of this amusement park before it is too late? Let’s try by thinking outside the box. What if our thoughts and imagination don’t arise in us as individuals. What if thoughts are socially constructed. Rather than our thoughts arising out of our brain, what if we are receiving them from outside: From the web of all our acquaintances, books we have read, and …

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Hungarian Goulash

To the Editor: Tucker Carlson and the folks at Fox News have taken up cooking and the current dish du jour appears to be Hungarian goulash. Guess we shouldn’t be surprised because, in a world where the U.S. is threatened by authoritarian regimes such as China, Russia, and North Korea, it only makes sense to fight fire with fire. Really, we should not underestimate the appeal of a strong-man leader who possess the alacrity to leapfrog Congress, the electorate, and the courts in a single bound. These guys are decisive, agile, and able to get things done. It’s good to get things done long as …

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Look Behind the Curtain

To the Editor: It’s no wonder that out-of-state corporate control of the New Hampshire legislature spawned a state budget that not only undermines public education, human services, adequate wages and progress toward addressing the climate crisis, but also includes language that perpetuates systemic racism and removes the right of women to make decisions about their bodies. Over the years the populace has not remained vigilant about evolving legislation and how it affects the quality of human lives and the living world. This neglect has allowed our path to democracy to falter. We have stepped aside and surrendered our power to the corporate elite. But as …

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Gerrymandering is Election Fraud

To the Editor: Gerrymandering is election fraud. Its effect is to intentionally defraud. Yet, in 2019, the U.S. Supreme Court’s “conservative” majority, in an anti-gerrymandering lawsuit brought by Common Cause, failed to recognize government was established For the People, not political parties, when it ruled that prohibiting partisan gerrymandering was beyond its reach. The ruling is expected to produce an avalanche of manipulated maps benefiting parties, using highly sophisticated software, and powerful analytics about voters. In 2012, the Republican-majority legislature created Executive Council District #2, a packed, blue, gerrymandered district. Gov. Sununu refers to the salamander shape of the district as “weird,” inferring a harmless …

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Get Serious, Governor

Dear Sir: Last week there was a front page headline in the Portsmouth Herald that read, “Sununu’s COVID plea: ‘You gotta get the vaccine.’” In the body of the article the Governor stated, “We know our fall surge in October, November could be worse than anything we’ve seen. We want to make sure we prepare for that.” I agree totally. Not only do we need to prepare for what the Governor admits is coming, more importantly, we need to do whatever is necessary now to prevent it from happening, or at least minimize the consequences as much as possible. So how is the Governor and …

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It’s Biden’s Fault For Doing the Right Thing

To the Editor: President Biden’s incompetent withdrawal from Afghanistan demonstrates a shocking disregard for the lives of others. Withdrawing troops without first withdrawing the 5,000 to 40,000 American civilians and our allies’ civilians working on behalf of our government’s goals is shameful, unpardonable, and displays Biden’s moral bankruptcy. Biden’s incompetence was not surprising, former Secretary Gates said that Biden has been wrong on every foreign policy issue for the last 40 years. But what explains the total incompetence of the rest of his administration, the State Department, or the Military whose motto is “Leave no man behind!”? Apparently winning wars and protecting Americans is a …

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