Letters to the editor for Thursday, Jan. 8

We must stop population growth

While passing a downtown alley, a nice little old lady said "PSSST! Sonny, come here!" I did. Turns out, it was Ol' Mother Nature. She wanted me to pass along something she'd forgotten to tell Tom Holz the other day. That is, "You humans have got to stop the growth of your population. If you don't, you'll lose it all."

I didn't try to tell her otherwise. After all, she is mighty tired of arguing with pro-life enforcers, economists, anti-birth-control churches, cheap-labor-mongers, Chambers of Commerce, pro-immigration multiculturists, science-can-solve-it-all idealists, just-conserve environmentalists and suspicious minorities.

"What's the problem?" I asked.

"Hee hee, well sonny, like more and more people jumping on a merry-go-round, the earth will rotate more and more slowly — until it stops! With the U.S. on the night side, facing away from the sun."

"What?"

Well, hee hee, not really. But seriously — if you want to see how everybody will live some day if you don't stop growth, just look at Haiti. With population growth, no matter what else happens, you will all get there. Most folks sooner, the rest of us later.

And then she was gone.

But she was right. Although growth has contributed to prosperity in the past, it ultimately will create unstoppable sustainable poverty and suffering in the future. If we stop population growth, all other problems become solvable. If we don't, all other problems will get worse. No joke.

David H. Milne, Shelton

Triway is ignoring 4,000 petition signers

I find it interesting that Triway is willing to concede to neighbors' concerns by withdrawing a bid for 90-foot rezone on the west side. But his argument for building tall buildings on the isthmus is a tribute to the community.

So he sees tall buildings as an asset where 4,000 petitioners don't, but withdraws a rezone request on the west side because of a few neighbors protesting.

Don't you wonder about a City Council that doesn't see this repeated rezone request as harmful?

When Triway buys a property and submits rezone requests, he puts every other builder on hold until the rezone is decided. If it is decided in his favor, the rest of the building community sees the zoning as changeable and the council as ready to make it. Downtown housing has not been aided by the rezone of the isthmus.

Zena Hartung, Olympia

United Nations must end bloodshed

All civilized nations should condemn both Israeli and Palestinian Hamas leaders for allowing their dispute to explode into a bloody war.

There is never any justification for deliberately causing civilian deaths as is being done by Israel with their far superior weapons.

Hamas leaders should have known that Israel would over-react, and Israel certainly knew that bombing Gaza would result in hundreds of innocent men, women and children killed and wounded.

Laser-guided 1,000-pound bombs have been dropped on densely populated sections of Gaza and have hit hospitals and other nonmilitary targets.

Israel has the most sophisticated high tech weapons, some made in the United States, or purchased with U.S. aid funds. Hamas rockets are primitive by comparison and rarely hit what is aimed at.

President George W. Bush has never taken seriously his potential role as a peacemaker, always favors Israel and thus has no credibility among world leaders. We can only hope that President-elect Barack Obama will provide more even-handed leadership in a search for peace in the Middle East.

For now the United Nations must act to stop this humanitarian crisis.

Bob Thompson, Lacey