Don’t take away this smoking alternative
I began smoking Marlboro Lights when I was 17 as a dumb rebellious kid who thought it was cool, and then became a pack-a-day smoker after I went to college. This led to an irritating cough, getting winded more easily, the smelly and yellow clothes/teeth.
After about 15 years of smoking, I gave vaping a try as an alternative to smoking cigarettes. Smoking has always been my one vice, and I just like it. I was able to quit smoking cigarettes by vaping. I started out with some of the fruitier flavors and now use a butterscotch/vanilla combo that reminds me of a sweeter cigar flavor.
I strongly oppose Loveland’s proposed flavor ban. A total flavor ban is one of the silliest ideas I’ve heard to deter underage smokers. Most of the people I know that now vape, like me, started out with regular old nasty tasting cigarettes. Why not ban flavored alcohols to stop underage drinking? And honestly, if there’s no flavor thus no smell, it’s going to be so much easier to hide vaping from parents.
This ordinance will only hurt law-abiding vape shops and vapers who have always followed the rules and regulations. There are bad players in the vape industry who knowingly sell to underage users. They will continue to break the rules, and they will certainly not discontinue selling flavored vape. The flavor ban will accomplish nothing other than push vape users, like me, back to cigarettes.
Instead, the Loveland City Council should restrict the sale of all tobacco and vape products to age-restricted locations and fine businesses that refuse to comply with such a law. This is an important issue to me and to many other people that I know, and I would never vote for a councilor that took away my right to a healthy smoking alternative.
Krystal Stanford
Loveland
Take time to engage seniors when you can
The mantra “children should be seen but not heard” seems to have grown to include our senior population in America. It is more like, seniors should not be seen or heard.
I attended a lecture at CSU titled “Why I (Still) Hope to Die at 75” by Ezekiel Emanuel. His belief is that after 75 our likelihood of making a contribution to society would be rare because our brains and bodies are deteriorating. This seems to me to be blatant ageism. The word contribution didn’t seem to include multigenerational knowledge, wisdom and interdependence of society.
Working for a decade as an end of life CNA has shown me something quite different. Our seniors are facing isolation and not getting the respect once valued in America. I have learned so much from my elderly patients, some exceeding 100. Caring for another human brings meaning to life for me. My daughter assisted in caring for her grandfather, an experience that enriched both of their lives.
Retirement is terrifying when you lose your sense of value and contribution. We need as a community to find ways for our seniors to feel valued. Many parents move closer to their children, leaving their long time home, friends and networks of relationships. The result can sometimes be isolating. I recently ran into a couple in their 80s I had known for years at the Fort Collins Club. It was a gift to me to engage and listen to the changes in their lives. Taking time to have a meaningful conversation was the highlight of the day for all of us; they felt seen and heard. Listening to someone’s story is meaningful to the listener and shows respect to the senior.
Millions of seniors have contributed for decades watching grandchildren and sharing a wealth of experience and knowledge. Intergenerational work enhances all of our lives. The pandemic has been especially hard on our seniors. I urge all readers to take time to engage seniors every opportunity that arises.
Angela Joseph
Fort Collins
Legislators should not remain silent about gun problem
A new product was introduced about a year ago, and in that year 39,000 adults and children have died using the product. Should it be recalled and modified to improve its safety? If the manufacturer refuses to issue a recall, should our legislators open investigations searching for solutions? Please answer yes or no before you read on.
Well, we have such a product. It’s called a gun. As I stated in my letter of March 28, it kills about 39,000 people every year. Since my letter, there have been 35 mass shootings, 45 people killed and 135 wounded. That is 180 people in 19 days, or 7.1 people every day getting hit by a bullet in a mass shooting. Another way to look at this: From April 13 to 16, a total of four days, 116 killed, and 200 wounded by a guns, including mass shootings. I could go on stating numbers, but the fact is clear, we have a health problem in the U.S, one where our legislators remain silent.
I stated in my last letter, this is a complex problem that will require a multifaceted approach. We need to be looking at how to identify at risk individuals early to get them help, change the reporting process to help identify those people who may need help, and look at changes to how we deal with guns.
Once again here are the ways to contact the two legislators that represent us in Loveland in the state Legislature:
Hugh McKean, House District 51, representative and House minority leader (hugh.mckean.house@state.co.us)
Rob Woodward, Senate District 15, Senator (rob.woodward.senate@state.co.us)
Ask them why they remain silent on this issue that is killing 39,000 people every year in the U.S.
Bob Massaro
Loveland
Power grabs at home; powerlessness abroad
My head is swimming from the last week of Biden thinking. Four more Supreme Court judges — a power grab. Bring in Washington, D.C. as a new state — a power grab. The continuing policy of the open Mexican border bringing in more potential Democratic voters — a power grab. Appointing Kamala Harris to do nothing to control the border mess — a power grab. Propose HR-1 legislation to loosen voting rules — a power grab.
Biden’s foreign policy is searching for answers to issues like Iran’s accelerating efforts to build a nuclear bomb, Russia’s amassing of military forces on the Ukraine border, and increasingly aggressive Chinese behavior in controlling the South China Sea area. He has developed a uniform response to these problems: Hey, let’s do nothing and hope they go away. Unfortunately, hope is not a policy. These types of nonresponses present an image of uncertainty and weakness and opportunity for our enemies to assert more power.
Steve Venzke
Loveland
What will the policing solution be?
The recent national negative news about Loveland cops’ response to a demented old lady is proof yet again that the “good old days” — when a cop with big gonads and a tiny brain was just what society needed — are done and gone. Actually, cops who view themselves as hammers and everybody else as nails have been a problem for probably 100 or more years. The only difference today: Cameras are everywhere, and they capture things that have gone unnoticed for most of history.
Because our politicians and judges are morons, we have made it simple for pretty much everybody to get a firearm. But the old verities still hold true: When you make something easy for law-abiding citizens, you make it super-easy for the scumbags, lowlifes, knuckle draggers, and mouth breathers. And that makes a challenging job super-dangerous for our police officers. So, of course, cops today understandably must approach every situation — even old ladies — as a potential life-and-death proposition. And that leads to the kind of bone-headed, heavy-handed over-reactions we are seeing on the news almost every day.
Today, if you hate the guy next door, just call the cops and tell them he’s standing in front of his house, waving a gun and screaming threats at the world. Heck, you can raise hell just by reporting “a suspicious person” walking past your house.
I wonder what the solution might be.
Glenn Troester
Loveland
It’s time to pay attention, talk and listen
When I see a police officer shouting at an African-American, what I see is distrust, contempt, and fear — from both sides — left over from our history, and rooted in slavery.
Imagine a white plantation owner reading the Emancipation Proclamation (1862) and shouting, “How am I supposed to run this plantation without slaves? I can’t pick all of that cotton by myself. Besides which, freed slaves may turn on us.”
Well, those Southern white folks worked it out, thanks to the Ku Klux Klan and Jim Crow. Keep the Blacks “in their place.” Make sure the cost of their labor remains low. Spread stories about laziness, rape and mayhem. Hire police to protect “us” from “them.” If they get “uppity,” they get hurt.
This worked for whites as long as whites were comfortably in the majority. There was concern, however, that the growth of all minorities would one day change that. Advances in civil rights and voting rights nudged that day along, causing many whites to side with minorities seeking more and better opportunities.
Thus the scales were tipped earlier than expected. Suddenly, Barack Obama was elected president, and showed the world an example of a calm, bright, loving and responsible Black family — not on TV, but in real life. Thereby dashing the left-over image of inferiority. White supremacists rose up in fury.
Police training began to change, becoming more extensive and responsible. At the same time, more responsibilities were dumped on them that they were not equipped to handle. And the mutual fear and distrust remained, like a rot from the inside out.
So, here we are as a people, facing a mixture of hope and fear. We need to pay attention, talk and listen, before the whole thing blows up on us.
Ann Harroun
Lakewood