Readers’ Column for the week of June 13, 2021

You may call the Owego Pennysaver Readers’ Column at (607) 687-2378 24-hours a day, or email comments to readerscolumn@stny.rr.com. We reserve the right to revise or reject any message.

To the person who complained about the rhubarb patch in Spencer needing fertilizer: the patch you are referring to is my father’s. My father offers this FREE rhubarb to the community out of the goodness of his heart. He has for this this patch for decades, makes no money from the patch, and bears all of the costs for maintaining the patch on his own, not to mention the thousands of labor hours he has spent tending to the patch. He uses organic growing methods and he applies compost in the spring, and is well aware which parts of rhubarb are edible. 100% of any donations he collects go directly to the local food bank and to Doctors Without Borders. Instead of writing a critical anonymous post in The Pennysaver about something that is offered for FREE, if you have something you’d like to contribute, go introduce yourself to my father and volunteer to help with the patch. Otherwise, please be more grateful for the rhubarb and the effort that it takes to provide it for your enjoyment. 

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I’m a taxpayer in the OA School District and I’m wondering what happened to the original plans for the capital project that we voted on two years ago. What are the latest plans and how will they be communicated to taxpayers and the community?

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Is it possible and advisable for a person to get a second series of vaccines? It seems that two masks were more protective. I would like to know from someone reliable who is qualified with the answer.    

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Why are the flags still at half-staff at the courthouse in Owego? I think it’s about time they are returned to full staff. From what I can find there is no reason for them to still be at half-staff everyday.

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It was a cold (7 F low) March 13 in 1989 (32 years ago) when a mini–Carrington Event took out Quebec Hydro and all of New York, except the New York City area lost power. A Carrington Event is a geomagnetic storm or coronal mass ejection (CME). The first recorded Carrington Event happened in 1859. Today, a full-on Carrington Event would result in decimation. I have tried to ask NYSEG how their rate hike for improving infrastructure would help protect us from a mini to max Carrington Event. I cannot get an answer. Don’t tell anyone the real purpose of “rebuilding infrastructure” is to support the New York City Green Scam. Our local solar farms produce near 0 watts power in the winter, when power requirements are highest. The list of toxic metals leaching out of the solar panels is too long to list. 

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I’m wondering who is responsible for breaking the light at the underpass again. Cross traffic from West Avenue to Mountain Road once again has to sit for 90 seconds with zero traffic entering or leaving the village in the morning. 

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I would like to know why different ethnic groups despise each other. What caused this animosity towards each other? Under the color of their skin, we are all made the same. Why do some feel they have to make another person feel less than, maim, or kill them? During the course of my 80 plus years, I have lived, seen and read about the destruction we do to one another. It really makes all of us kind of stupid. We all have good and bad traits; hopefully we can make the good ones override the bad ones and live our lives to the fullest – being safe, happy, productive, and free. 

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An unvaccinated person can infect another unvaccinated person because they can be harboring and dispersing the virus for many days before they develop symptoms and know that they have it.

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Please, if you walk your dogs on the sidewalk or blacktop, make sure it’s not too hot for their little pads. If you can’t hold your foot on the blacktop because of the heat, then neither can they. Please look out for our furry friends.

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I am appalled by all the posts I see on various social media sites that espouse denial of rights to people. Legalize discrimination if they aren’t like you? Careful, you may be next.

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Can someone tell me how tall you can let your grass grow in Spencer? My neighbor keeps his short by putting junk cars on top of it. What a place!

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Thank you to the SUEZ worker that returned my grandson’s baseball after it rolled under the fence at their facility at the end of George Street in Owego. It is much appreciated.

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Breaking News. The New York State Education Department just released data on teacher and staff metrics for the school year 2019-2020. For the 61 Southern Tier East School Districts and BOCES, OACSD wins first prize for most wasteful. This puts the OACSD Board of Education well into its two decades of spending more than anyone else and getting less. At OACSD we have the highest paid classroom teachers and program administrators, the second highest paid principals and assistant principals, third highest paid guidance counselors, and fourth highest paid “other” non-teaching staff. These are facts. Wasteful union contracts are BOE policy. Students have received no benefits due to the Board of Effluent Living for District Employees. Ask the BOE why?

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Last week someone commented, “For all those religious people that pray to God, it’s totally ridiculous. The God they pray to is a figment of their imagination.” I believe in and worship God; He is real! An ancient prophet once said, “All things denote there is a God; yea, even the earth, and all things that are upon the face of it, yea, and its motion, yea, and also all the planets which move in their regular form do witness that there is a Supreme Creator.” There once was a Skylab space station; when congress failed to provide funds to maintain it, it eventually was overcome by the gravity of the earth, and fell to the earth. Now consider the moon, how long has it been in orbit around the earth? What power keeps it orbiting the earth?

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Did another area radio station succumb to pressure to eliminate a conservative talk show and now play music? Will we end up with both AM and FM stations being airwaves of music, nothing to stimulate the brain? 

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I’m calling about Debbie Mills; she’s a Nashville recording artist. She’s going to be doing a concert on the green in Montrose, Pa. on June 13 from 3 to 4 p.m. Go see her and have fun.

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I want to compliment how beautiful the roses are at the CVS on Keystone Avenue in Sayre. I wish somebody would come and prune the bushes. There is so much dead stuff in there and they do so much better if they could get that dead stuff out of there. Again, I would like to thank Darlene for being such a good Owego Pennysaver carrier. She does a good job. 

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I saw on the news where 12 and 14 year old children were shooting at officers and the news announcers said where did we go wrong. I’d be more than happy to tell you guys where you went wrong. You do not discipline your kids when they do bad things. You just try to buy their love. It’s no wonder they’re on drugs, no wonder the world is the way it is. 

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Attention residents, that week I went by one of our newly elected town official’s houses, low and behold, there was our road crew working! It looked like they had the wood chipper and three or four guys there on this little side road off of the main road that I don’t believe warrants the manpower or use of our town equipment and have no idea of what they were doing. Our road crew can’t even seem to pick limbs or fallen trees out of our road ditches, but yet we can work on our newly elected town official’s house? What’s wrong with this picture? Wake up people!

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I saw a comment in this column about how it costs $50,000 a year to house a prisoner in New York State prisons. That’s nothing! Did you know that New York State is also locking up people past their prison sentence and have paid their debt to society? It’s because of a law passed in late 2000’s called article 10. Because of this law, men that have committed no new crimes are being housed indefinitely at the Central New York Psychiatric Center and the St. Lawrence Psychiatric Center in conditions that are more restrictive than some prisons. The cost taxpayers pay to have this done is $150,000 per year per detainee. There are approximately 400 men being held beyond their time, which comes to about $60 million per year. If you count from 2010 to 2021 it’s $660 million taxpayers had to pay for violating these men’s rights. Think about that next time you can’t buy something for your kids. We don’t need a place to put free men who might do something. 

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The Berkshire Cemetery has never looked better than it did this year on Memorial Day. Everyone involved in mowing, trimming, and cleaning up should all be commended for a job well done. It was hard this year because it was raining right up to Memorial Day.

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I live on Cady Avenue in Nichols and we have a beautiful street. We have a couple people that don’t mow their lawns, and at one of them no one lives there anymore. It’s a real detriment to our beautiful street. I’m just wondering why the code officer isn’t doing anything about it.  

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For the reader who called in saying that religious people that pray to a God and that God is a figment of their imagination, how do they know this? How do you know this? Where is your proof? Where is your evidence? Have you read the bible? Think about this.

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To the person that has cans and bottles in the paper, please give me a call. My number is (607) 205-9547.

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I have a newsflash for the person that says there isn’t a God. He’s alive and he’s well! Please read John 3:16.

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If you are looking for something to do on Saturday nights consider going to Thunder Mountain Speedway in Lisle, N.Y. They have the best short track stock car racing in New York State. Everybody is so friendly. I understand that it is a family run racetrack.

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This is to the person that called about trash bags at a house in Nichols. I live in Nichols and I haven’t seen that yet. You need to look around Nichols a little more because there are worse places with trash piling up. Guess what? We need a code enforcement person. I understand that the one that was here quit; maybe that’s a rumor. We need somebody to kick some butt and get things done. 

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I am curious as to why the Town of Owego Highway Department is not getting in on getting all the free millings as they are doing Route 96. You’d think that would be a huge savings for the town taxpayers. Remember that come Election Day this month. They really don’t want to save the taxpayers money by the looks of things. 

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I’m calling about the American flags. As you are crossing the Court Street Bridge in Owego, they are not displayed properly. The blue part with the stars should be on the top left, so all of those flags are displayed backwards. It would be really nice, honorable and respectful of our armed forces especially if they were replaced properly.

 

National Political Viewpoints

Is it just my perception or are the people complaining about a lack of workers also the ones that are screaming “build a wall” to keep potential workers out?

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I had to laugh at the person who wrote about the Putin Pipeline. Check your facts; 90% of the pipeline was constructed during the Trump regime. The sanctions he placed on the construction project were a joke at best. They did absolutely nothing. And if you think Germany and the rest of the European Union are going to pay twice the cost to buy liquefied natural gas shipped on boats from the U.S., then you are an even bigger Moron than I thought! God Bless Joe Biden!

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The word “citizenship” has lost much of the noble luster that it once had. “Civics” has become demoted to a “user’s guide” on the workings of government. Eliot Cohen of Johns Hopkins University has aptly expressed it, “Without history, there is no civic education, and without civic education there are no citizens. Without citizens, there is no free republic. The stakes, in other words, could not be higher.” The most damaging part to our children in the last 30 years is that schools do not incorporate a strong civics curriculum that grows with them from the time they start school until they graduate. Those that are now teaching are not themselves educated and knowledgeable of so much of our U. S. history and haven’t a clue as to what even compromises a civics program. Yet school districts are being swayed too quickly to start incorporating Critical Race Training syllabus based solely on Project 1619 without ever teaching the concept of our founding and the times of those who helped pave the road; our history, ever changing and ever growing. Re-wording our history and not to incorporate these growing pains does not make for a better history but is setting the stage for separation of the hard road traveled to bring us to where we are. If we do not cherish it, we will go the way of so many other countries in the annals of history. Then just like that, 250 years are gone and we’ll be back where we began, looking for a new country to honor the tattered Constitution and Bill of Rights.

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To the person who commented last week that they would never vote for another Republican – thanks to both Republicans and Democrats, you certainly have that right. However, consider before you paint all Republicans with the same brush, accusing them of not having the good of the nation or its people at heart – seriously? When there were DOZENS of incidents of destruction of private and public property in Democrat led cities and states last year? Blocks of Seattle were taken over and taxpayer funded buildings, etc., were destroyed or vandalized. Hard earned businesses, from the small store run by an immigrant to vandals ripping plywood off Macy”s windows and breaking in to smash everything in sight. Accosting people in their own backyard? Allowing unvaccinated, at the least, hardened criminals and terrorists at the worst to flow unchecked into our country? Releasing criminals convicted by “a jury of their peers” because they might get COVID, yet sending COVID positive elderly back to their nursing homes to infect others, fatally? Defunding the police who are the only people standing between you and somebody walking into your house, kicking you out, and enjoying your big boy recliner and 100 inch TV? If you think that is supporting hard working Americans, you are to be pitied.

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If we lose our democracy, all of our veterans died for nothing.

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No voting rights, no democracy.

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I see where Donald jobless Trump has a blog, and it only lasted 29 days. That just shows you the popularity is dwindling. Do you people still back him? You better go see a shrink.

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Newsflash! Fauci still says he trusts the Wuhan Virology Lab scientists. Since a Chinese general oversees and runs the Wuhan lab I think Fauci is very naïve and should retire. The Wuhan virus mortality rate is about one percent, however there are other viruses being investigated in Wuhan and in the United States with mortality rates of 15%. Just think of what that would do to the world population. 

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I believe what happened on Jan. 6, the insurrection, was an elective democratic plot to ruin Trump. I also think that they influenced the Electoral College so it looked like Biden would get more votes. Ever since Biden has come into office it’s been one disaster after another. First the situation at the border and then the problem with the gas and now we’re having problems with a meat shortage. He is a disaster!

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I relate the Republican Party to a cult because they don’t believe in facts and they don’t state facts. They state fantasies and lies and wild conspiracy theories. It’s like Jonestown all over again. They’re crazy! The lies they believe and the stories they start are just unbelievable! 

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I understand Biden and Harris are buying people now. I have gotten my COVID shot, and I’m waiting to get my check. I understand they are giving them out now so I’m looking forward to getting my check from you.

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When I saw Trump on television again it was like reliving a nightmare. It has been so nice, so heavenly and peaceful without all of his lies and buffoonery. He also said he will be president in August. He really said that! Some people do believe that nonsense and I guess people will believe anything.

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When you enforce the law, criminals go to jail and crime goes down. Marxist democrats, like slow Joe, defund the police, send criminals and illegal aliens free, and crime goes up. Get it? This is a fact; the dimwit democrats squeal to not reveal. They are the real traitors to the U.S. Republic.

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I’d like to make a comment on the clown who keeps telling us about wearing the mask. Let us know where you go eat so I can burp and sneeze while I watch you eat through your mask. You are a foot soldier for slow Joe and Dr. Fauci. 

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Newsflash! The Biden comedy show continues. Vice President Harris says to the Guatemalans, “Do not come.” Sleepy Joe has many times said, “welcome immigrants” and showers them with a ton of freebie incentives. This Biden administration is the most colossal joke in history! Compared to Trump, Biden is a Neanderthal. Maybe Jeff Bezos can take slow Joe and Kamala in his spaceship next month and leave them in earth orbit.

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Is it too much to ask to have common sense and courage leading us from the White House? I believe it is at this time, as long as we have Biden and Harris. She giggles when she is asked about the border. She makes a joke of it; they don’t really care. Come on 2022, get these republicans back in office. 

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I realize drug cartels and human traffickers are controlling our borders. I heard on the news yesterday that we are now looking at more deaths in America because of the drugs coming over that southern border. But why are we not hearing about that? We are going to have more deaths than COVID. But no, everybody is still afraid of COVID so wear your masks and don’t worry about the drugs coming over. This country is so backwards and upside down. We need good leadership, which we are not going to have for a while.

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I must admit it’s a sad day in America when the American people trust Dr. Pepper more than they trust Dr. Fauci.