Spring is here | Miami Herald

Driving past my and everyone else’s pile of debris and into the Everglades National Park, it was easy to feel discouraged — so much stuff.

But looking carefully in the park and at home, I saw our tropical paradise is not wasting any time in putting out new buds and leaves.

Tropical spring is here, greening everything — fast. I’ve got my work cut out for me, as does everyone, but I only hope that folks aren’t too quick to cut every tree down in frustration.

Our hothouse Eden takes work, but it is what make South Florida special — Plant!

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Trump Antoinette

The video of Trump tossing paper towels to a crowd gathered before him in devastated and starving Puerto Rico surely triggered in the mind of many high school world history students the image in the mind’s eye of Marie Antoinette standing on her balcony, viewing starving Parisians begging for bread, and the queen responding: Let them eat cake!

That ended with her subjects cheering her shackled in a cart en route to the guillotine.

NRA afraid

When thousands of Americans die annually due to gun violence, it is a public health issue.

What triggers human gun violence? When looking at potential policy changes that might impact such gun violence, one would expect that the public health community would put a major focus on research to obtain scientific understanding of the problem and offer data that could lead to optimal recommendations for policy change.

However, in 1996, Congress, after lobbying by the NRA, modified the federal omnibus spending bill with an amendment that effectively shut down federal funding that would allow meaningful research into gun violence.

Why would the NRA lobby to inhibit such research? The NRA is afraid. The NRA is afraid that all the claims it has made over the years pointing away from gun ownership as part of the problem will be shown to be false.

And those in Congress who have refused to this day to remove that amendment are anti-science pawns for an organization afraid of what the science might show. Interestingly, no one can say what those research results might show.

However, those in Congress need to come together in a bipartisan manner and provide common sense changes until such research has been accomplished.

Bad sewage solution

The new $2.1 billion dollar “solution” proposed by Miami-Dade for our sewage problem reminds me of the quote referencing the repetitive nature of insanity.

You know, the one about continually doing the same thing over and over, yet somehow anticipating a different result.

Instead of the Atlantic Ocean, the sewage will be pumped “deep into the ground.” What that means is that millions of gallons of sewage will be added to the already excessive amounts of chemically treated sewage sent deep into the ground.

This project pushes the boundaries of safety as it infringes on the western edge of Miami-Dade.

The Everglades, an already delicate part of Florida’s landscape, is also a prime region for fracking — another process that involves injecting waste into the ground.

We need innovative solutions, not new dumping grounds. We need to protect the land beneath our feet.

Our sewage is already being dumped. Florida Senator Anitere Flores and Representative Carlos Trujillo need to protect us from more reckless dumping by supporting the ban on fracking this next legislative session.

Trump in PR

Well, now I’ve seen it all!

The president visits a hurricane-destroyed American territory and spends most of the time patting himself on the back for help that never got there, blames the citizens for “throwing his budget out of whack,” tells them that they were lucky to not be living through a “real disaster” and throws paper towels to all who have no water, food or power.

He could have easily called for a USAF C-5 to load up with relief supplies and follow AF-1 to Puerto Rico.

But as usual, it’s all about him. With each statement, tweet or action that he makes, I’m more convinced that he is an embarrassment to the presidency.

Abortion and guns

Our nation is shocked and rightfully saddened by the senseless killing of 59 people in Las Vegas.

Most of us don’t realize that every day in the U.S. 3,000 unborn girls and boys are also killed at Planned Parenthood and other U.S. abortion centers. Not many mourn for them.

Saint Mother Teresa said, “How can a nation that allows parents to kill their unborn children tell citizens not to commit other crimes?”

Abortion contributes to people thinking they can solve problems violently.

Second Amendment

When the Second Amendment was signed on parchment with a quill pen in 1791, and promulgated through the young states via coach and horse rider, the signers could never have imagined cell phones and WhatsApp, beneficial technology beyond comprehension.

But neither could they have imagined the hideous and incomprehensible technology of a hand-held weapon having the lethality equal to that of a squadron of soldiers of those times.

Technology has far outpaced the intent and imaginations of the signers of the Second Amendment; there is no longer any justification for its continued application, and innumerable reasons — each with a name — for it to be repealed.

Las Vegas tragedy

The tragedy in Las Vegas brings two important thoughts to mind: Most hotels require housekeeping to clean and remake rooms every day. If the shooter occupied that room for several days, why didn’t housekeeping do its usual job? If housekeeping was prevented from doing its job, why didn’t the hotel check into the reason?

Secondly, from now on, no event should be scheduled in a state that does not prohibit automatic firearms to be sold. This will lessen the NRA’s stranglehold on America.

Ask Scalise

I know he was on “60 Minutes,” but here’s a suggestion to the media: Why not send a reporter to interview House Majority Whip Steve Scalise about the constitutionality of allowing violent nuts to purchase weapons of mass destruction?