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Kudos to Oakland
official on tough cuts
Re: “Oakland to lay off or demote nearly 100 city workers in cuts” (Page A1, Feb. 1).
Kudos to Oakland City Administrator Jestin Johnson and the Finance Department regarding the recent budget cuts.
They deserve to be commended for making tough budgetary decisions that should’ve been made by previous and current mayors and City Council members. Those who made the easy choices rather than addressing the reality of budget deficits are more concerned with keeping their jobs than doing them.
Susan Tonus
Oakland
Taxes, tolls must
be spent wisely
Re: “State lawmaker seeks audit of bridge toll spending” (Page A1, Feb. 15).
I was happy to see the article about state Sen. Dave Cortese, a Santa Clara County Democrat, seeking an audit of Bay Area bridge toll spending.
On Sunday, I drove my son to San Francisco Airport from Pleasanton. When driving through the middle lane of the entry to the San Mateo Bridge right after passing the bridge toll we hit a major pothole. We were fortunate not to have been injured; however, my car requires repair at my expense because of the $500 deductible. This is just one incident of one driver dealing with the thousands of potholes around Bay Area roads.
I am all for taxes and tolls and am a proud Democrat and happy to be living in a blue state, but I want to see our money going to good use. Our roads are unacceptable.
Andrea Bloom
Pleasanton
President must preserve
Constitution — all of it
Look, I don’t care.
I don’t care whether someone elected to office was foolish earlier in their lives in a dozen different ways.
I don’t care whether someone elected to office believes in my version of divine beings, singular or plural.
I don’t care whether someone elected to office is convinced of 12 different mutually exclusive conspiracies. I just don’t care about any of that.
I do care if someone elected to office is determined to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States of America, as it is — all of it. No exceptions. Every bit of it, including, most importantly, the parts they don’t like.
When we preserve it, it preserves us, and the country we love.
Michael Steinberg
Berkeley
Press must confront
president on his lies
There are two things about President Trump that are apparent to me: He lies constantly, and he acts like a tough guy always spoiling for a fight.
There’s one lie that always has bothered me because I think it may have had a big effect on the election. It’s that Venezuela (and other countries) are emptying their prisons and asylums and sending the murderers, rapists, gang members and lunatics to America. I mention Venezuela specifically because he said that street crime there was down almost 70%. (I wonder how he knew that.) But deliberately sending thousands of criminals here to cause mayhem seems almost like an act of war
Here’s your chance Mr. President. How are you going to address this? Why not demand Venezuela pay restitution for the crimes that their criminals committed here? Or maybe the press needs to challenge him on his constant, ridiculous lies.
Jim Peterson
Walnut Creek
Demand that Congress
stand up to Trump
It is time for all Americans to stand up to Donald Trump.
He is well on the way to becoming the first autocratic president of the United States. An autocratic government is where one person has absolute power, a dictator. Trump has shown that he does not respect any authority other than his own. He wants to take away the power of the judicial branch, and he reigns supreme over the GOP by threatening Republican politicians with retribution if they go against him.
We cannot let this man continue. Write letters to members of Congress. Demand that they impeach Trump. Demand that they do not let his executive orders stand. Demand that they do not pass the kind of legislation that would give him supreme power. To do otherwise will be the end of the United States as we know it.
David Stearns
Concord
Democrats should let
DOGE do its work
Fraud and waste? The left and other Democrat apologists are doing everything possible to stand in the way of DOGE and its task of finding and reporting fraud and waste, and recommending what can be done about it.
There are billions at stake. How many billions? According to the GAO, we’re talking about fraud losses estimated “between $233 billion and $521 billion, based on data from fiscal years 2018 through 2022.” This information is not new; but no one has done anything about it before DOGE.
Let’s put this into something we can relate to: The Southern California fires are estimated to have caused more than $250 billion in losses. What’s estimated by the GAO could pay for twice the fire damage.
Is there more that can be found? We all know the answer is yes. How about returning some of this to the taxpayers?
Stephan Pinto
Walnut Creek