To the Editor:
After the County built this concrete wall on Guiberson Road, the Sespe comes down and hits this wall then bounces off directly into the west side and damages my neighborhood. The past 20 years it has eaten up along my bank and now my home almost collapsed into the creek. Also, since the levee was built, the county stopped cleaning out debris where the water should be flowing. It is damaging all of us on Grand Avenue. For years we have been asking the County for help nonetheless we have been told too bad we can’t help, there are not enough homes to justify the cost to protect you all. Soon, not only my home will be another floating down the Sespe but many others are in jeopardy. What is mind boggling is that the County maintained the creeks, rivers, watershed in the past and issued building permits to construct homes at the time they were maintaining them. Homes were safe and out of harm’s way
But then they stopped around the 80s-90s. Due to that neglect of maintenance the erosion and evulsion started to occur. The path of the creek has eaten away continuously after each rain, threatening my home to collapse. I never dreamed that our government would turn their backs on us.
Cindy Jackson,
Fillmore, Ca.
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To the Editor:
I don’t wonder that you propose “shifting our debates to fresh issues.” All right. Over the New Year, Trump, “locked and loaded,” threatened to invade Iran to protect the civil rights of its protesting citizens (as he does not do for American protesters at home), again targeted Greenland and, in an act of war for oil interests, invaded and kidnapped Maduro of Venezuela to face trial in NYC, and hinted at having eyes for Cuba or Mexico. With no Congressional input. Worry not about redundancy, Martin, because unfortunately, the issues of 2025 will resurrect and magnify under this administration, despite your ongoing “Trump Plenary Mulligan Award.”
In 2026, I salute your wish that Congress receives all the evidence in the Epstein Files. I don’t know if Trump was personally involved in pedophilia, but he sure is exerting massive deflective energy to protect himself from something. Last summer, the DOJ sought to close the Epstein Case because there was “nothing more” to find. Yet, millions more pieces of potential evidence were discovered over the holidays, after the legal deadline. Trump has indicated willingness to consider a pardon for convicted sex offender Ghislaine Maxwell (“I have a right to do it”) whose incarceration has been upgraded by Trump’s DOJ to a long spa session, room service, and puppy foster care.
Facts, Martin. Alternate reality is for novelists or conmen, and you are neither. Five deaths eventually resulted from the insurrection, and the “official findings” rejecting 2020 election malfeasance came from a deeply conservative SCOTUS.
Explain how the female capitol insurrectionist, with hundreds behind her breaking into the capitol, was “harmless.” Clarify how the guard was “historically negligent” and how that reflected on his attempts to defend the capitol. Vindicate the “trivial damage” of fear and desperate attempts by our legislators to hide when the capitol defense was overcome (Mark Meadows said he’d “never seen Jim Jordan so scared”), the violent threats to the Vice-President and Speaker, makeshift weapons, broken furniture and doors, and human waste found deposited or smeared in offices and hallways. Reality is not going to bend itself to your need for political exoneration, Martin.
You touted that, “The event lasted exactly 4 hours,” 4 hours longer than if Trump had not instigated it. Instead, he eagerly watched it unfold on TV, and had to be begged to intervene.
As far as I know, no one died in “stop the steal,” but they did try to overthrow the People’s national electoral will at Trump’s urging, which is a federal crime. No one died, either, at the hands of Joe Biden or his unfortunate son, Hunter, whose laptop you insist holds “prima facie evidence of massive felonious graft!” After two full years of nonstop investigation by Republicans, what laptop or other evidence was uncovered to support your accusations of presidential graft? How many times was President Biden impeached by the eager 118th Republican Congress? Facts, Martin.
I recommend you review the YouTube video of former Special Counsel Jack Smith’s recent testimony of the investigation into Trump’s actions surrounding the events of January 6, 2021, and illegal retention of documents at Mar-a-Lago. The transcript is at Smith-Depo-Transcript_Redacted-w-Errata.pdf . Thorough, and illuminating. You will see why the Republicans chose New Year’s Eve to release it, when their base would surely be otherwise occupied.
One week into 2026, Martin, let’s recommit to “Facts.” I wish for us all that WWIII does not erupt, but I don’t think you need to fret that we will “be left behind.”
Kelly Scoles,
Fillmore, Ca.