Dear Editor,

Re: The “Solar farm” slated for Luning

These boondoggles only exist because the taxpayers are forced to subsidize them. Absent subsidies, there would be none. Absent strategic campaign contributions, there would be no forces subsidies.

These projects are inefficient, non-competitive and cannot survive without the coercive hand (fist) of bureaucrats. Look at the project in Tonopah. One hundred and seventy million dollars in taxpayer guarantees, and the wholesale price of that power will be higher than the retail price we are paying now per kilowatt-hour.

The project at Ivanpah, Ca/Nv, is losing money, and they want 52 million tax dollars, to bail out their investors. This project also sucks over 30 million gallons of water per year from the desert (required for constant cleaning of the heliostats).

The solar panels to be used in Luning also require constant cleaning. Does the dust blow in the Soda Spring valley? Where will the water come from? How much will be required? In our fourth year of drought, these questions must not be ignored.

Exactly how many tax dollars are taken from us to make this while elephant possible?

Any project that demands forced, extorted funding by the taxpayers, to serve some illusionary, greater good, should be rejected. If the technology isn’t competitive, go back to the r&d lab and work on it. The head of the Ivanpah fiasco, John Bryson, former CEO of Cal. Edison, screwed 85,000 shareholders out of one billion dollars, in collusion with Gray Davis, the governor who was thrown out of office before his term ended. Now he wants 52 million taxpayer dollars.

Can you run a business with a non-competitive product, without forcing someone else to subsidize you? You will need a lot of campaign cash to do it.

Mineral County could use more job opportunities, beyond question, but let’s not go back to the WPA, or other neo-socialist traps, for the favored few.

Free-market solutions are the only self-sustaining solutions.

Tom Bergeron, Sr.

Mina

Dear editor

As the candidate most likely to have been effected by the lack of a full vote count, I would like to express my thoughts. First and foremost we must have faith in the election process and the judicial system. The system works if we allow the time necessary for the departments of authority to do their job. We must reserve judgment and opinions until all the facts are revealed. Laws are written with an intent or “spirit of law”. The laws concerning elections are in the spirit of honoring the vote of the people. In a case like this, where the written law differs from the intent or “spirit” of the law, the Nevada Supreme Court can “set aside” the law and honor the true intent of the law, which is the vote of the people. After all is said and done my hope is the voters of Mineral County will have more confidence in the election process and the judicial system.

I would also like to state that I have worked with Cherrie George and the staff at the Treasurer office for many years and I do not believe any of those people would have knowingly or willfully tampered with the election in any way. I have known them to be honest people with good work ethics. We all make mistakes or forget to do things because none of us are perfect. We hope, when we do make a mistake, the consequences are minor.

Kevin B. Chisum

Hawthorne

Dear Editor,

Water has been in the news a bit lately. On Jan. 15 the front page story about lake restoration contained one glaring error. The first sentence in the second paragraph says, “Walker Lake has been receding over the last century . . .” WRONG! Walker Lake has been receding for over 300 centuries. Walker Lake and Pyramid Lake are the last remnants of Lake Lahontan.

So what are we trying to restore? To the 1990 level when fish were still plentiful? How about to the days of the Navy Beach? Or better still, why not to the time Jack McCloskey first reported on the new road north of Walker Lake community? Sure, it would be nice to turn the clock back. There is but one power that can restore Walker Lake and that power is not of this earth. You can pray to God, give sacrifices to Pachu Mama, dance with rattlesnakes, or practice Voodoo. In the end the natural process that has claimed almost all of ancient Lake Lahontan will also claim it’s last two puddles.

Which leads to my second thought. Ms. Sampson, I don’t know why you are getting your knickers in a twist over the term puddle. Honestly speaking that is exactly the situation. Whether we like it or not 100 years from now Walker Lake will be a small pond below the cliffs. The only power that can change that does not reside in Washington DC. We may be able to slow down the decline for a decade or two, but we humans won’t stop it. All that aside, we have far too many human issues that need our time, attention and resources.

God Bless America.

Charlie Morris,

Walker Lake