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Matter

of Survival

To the editor:

Today we added 265,000 babies, we lost 75,000 acres of rainforest, added 46,000 acres of desert, lost 71 million tons of topsoil, added 15 million tons of carbon and lost about 70 species to extinction.

We'll do it all over again tomorrow. If we continue to repeat this process much longer, we will not survive.

In order to survive we must change and in order to change we must first survive.

The U.S. population is only five percent of the world, and yet we consume 50 percent of the earth's natural resources.

Humans aren't the only species on this planet, we just act like we are. The earth does not belong to us. We belong to the earth; we are all leaves on the same tree. It is imperative that we stop biting the land that feeds us.

Ansel Adams said, "It is horrifying that we have to fight our own government to save our environment."

An economy based on the consumption of fixed resources will consume itself and that is exactly what we are doing. Insatiable is not sustainable.

In order to reduce the pollution we create in this country alone, we must alter our thinking process. Drastic changes are in order. We can and must end our dependency on foreign oil and cut way back on our need for fossil fuels altogether.

Alternative resources are and have been available to us for a long time now. They are renewable and sustainable options that must be considered and applied. One solution comes up every morning and another is blowing in the wind. Renewable energy is not only a family value, it is America's best answer to homeland security.

God is nature and the Holy Land is everywhere. The future belongs to those who give the next generation hope, and our generation can leave the gift of hope as our legacy.

Instead of endless wars for foreign oil, we can turn a negative into a positive, lead by example, so to speak. If people insist on living as if there is no tomorrow, there really won't be one.

T. Montgomery Foley

Warren

Children pawn in hunting scheme

To the editor:

Pennsylvania is the latest state to adopt special hunting seasons designed to lure children into the violent and dangerous world of sport hunting.

Hunters often use doctored statistics to "prove" that hunting is safe, but how safe can a sport be when the object is to kill your opponent? In a random sampling of 190 hunting accidents that took place during calendar year 2006, more than 18 percent victimized children aged 18 and younger. These statistics are rarely cited by hunting organizations but the dangers are real.

Hunting agencies use children as pawns in their scheme to increase participation in hunting. Because the division is funded through the fees collected from hunting licenses and the excise tax on weapons and ammunition, it must lure children into its violent world if it is to remain financially solvent and continue to exploit wildlife well into the future.

Rather than destroying their natural affinity to animals, children should be encouraged to engage in outdoor activities that respect nature, such as camping, hiking, and wildlife watching.

Much to the chagrin of the weapons and hunting industries which profit from the slaughter of wildlife, wildlife watching is the dominant form of wildlife-related outdoor recreation in the country.

According to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, only 756,000 people aged 16 and older hunted in 2006, while more than three-times as many people (2,826,000) observed, fed, and photographed wildlife in their natural habitat. Hunting is clearly an unpopular hobby that is becoming more unpopular every year.

The future lies in wildlife watching programs which can support an economy that far surpasses the current one dependent on weapons and violence.

Let's repeal the tax on weapons and ammunition and replace it with one on items such as binoculars, backpacks, and other outdoor related equipment used by wildlife watchers. Funds collected from these taxes can be dedicated toward the preservation of wildlife and the areas where they live, making the need to depend on hunting obsolete.

The time has come to change the way wildlife is managed and to prevent our children from becoming pawns of the weapons industry.
Joe Miele, Vice Pres.
Committee to Abolish
Sport Hunting
New Paltz, N.Y.