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Cupertino shouldn’t use
issues for pandering

It is time to approach our problems responsibly without the scapegoating and without the pandering to deep pockets. The issue is not Cupertino’s reputation, but whether we proceed intelligently.

Jobs-to-housing imbalance is not an artificial problem. When traffic is highly congested, those areas where there are too many jobs and too few housing units are precisely the areas where we all have traffic problems. Additionally, we have to fix our transit equation in order for us to stand any chance of fixing issues with housing availability because we cannot afford to pile issues with congestion upon incomplete transportation infrastructure.

Housing and other very serious issues should not be treated as continued opportunities to smear a community so that certain politicians and organizations can collect large developer contributions. If we are serious about solving the housing crisis, then stop pandering and stop scapegoating communities that are working for real solutions.

Darcy Paul
Mayor of Cupertino

Cities’ past mistakes
offer chance for change

As a lifelong Bay Area resident, your story on Russell City, with its extensive photographs, brought back floods of memories. (“Reconciling the destruction of a cultural haven,” Page A1, Nov. 28)

Around the same time, San Francisco’s Redevelopment Agency changed life in the Fillmore and Bayview districts, also through forced relocation. Prior to it, large, low-income families of all ethnicities — Mexican, Black and caucasian, like those pictured in Russell City — lived together peacefully.

Hayward officials apologized for the decision that demolished its community back then. And city employees are now being trained in racial equity, and determining appropriate restitution for their harmful policies that they say were racist.

That’s too little, too late. People that directly suffered have died. The best thing current cities can do is never to repeat that mistake and encourage the culture that fostered the camaraderie and healthy environment that we see in those photos, before the city ruined it.

Ronna Devincenzi
Palo Alto

Regulate Facebook
to stop misinformation

In the article “Facebook froze as anti-vaccine talk swarmed its users”, (Page A4, Oct. 27)it describes Facebook not reacting “fast enough” to misinformation spread throughout the platform.

Facebook is spreading misinformation similar to the 2016 presidential elections. By prioritizing profits over its users’ safety, Facebook is doing little to nothing to moderate, further encouraging the spread of fake news. Facebook should not be allowed to spread wrong information without fact-checking first. This causes further harm from vaccine hesitancy to myths about “stolen elections.” Facebook has 2.89 billion active users.

Imposing tougher restrictions on Facebook and having them enforced by the government would allow for a safer space for the community. The company as a whole will become more reputable and grow. As a huge social media platform, it should be Facebook’s priority to monitor what information is being distributed.

Fabiola Gomez Torres
San Jose

Cable news disinformation
is perverting free speech

As a longtime subscriber of the Mercury News, I value truth in journalism and am constantly amazed and disappointed by the level of disinformation by a certain popular cable news network. David Kutzmann’s Dec.  8 oped, “Commentators spin journalistic fraud into ratings gold,” (Page A6) was a frightening insight into present-day commentators where ratings trump the truth.

When one of the most popular cable news networks basically screams “Fire!” in a crowded theater every day it redefines the concept of free speech into something un-American and ugly. The First Amendment is truly under fire when truth is optional. We cannot afford another Jan. 6.

Rick Varley
Campbell

Balance high court, pass
federal abortion law

At the Supreme Court of the United States’ arguments on abortion, Justice Amy Coney Barrett suggested that a woman did not need an abortion; that she could give the baby up for adoption. This reduces the status of a pregnant woman to that of a brood sow.

This demonstrates the result of the Republican’s half-century campaign against abortion. This political reshaping (packing) of the United States Supreme Court must be corrected. Also, the woman’s right to abortion should be guaranteed in federal law, to protect against the changing opinion of the Supreme Court justices.

Robert Lindley
San Jose

Source: www.mercurynews.com