Electric bikes have become a familiar sight on Long Island streets, offering an affordable way to get to school, work, the store or the train station. But as their popularity has grown, so have concerns about dangerous riding, illegal vehicles and serious injuries. Nassau County needs to turn its attention to e-bike safety and create a comprehensive plan to protect riders, motorists and pedestrians.
Unfortunately, with the war now stalemated on the battlefield and Russia’s economy shattered, President Trump has reversed American policy and leaned toward isolationism and enabling Putin by reducing military aid to Ukraine, lifting Russian sanctions, blaming Zelensky for causing the war and calling for his removal as president. All this while Russia continues rocket and missile attacks on innocent civilians in Ukraine, which has accepted the American peace proposals that Putin has rejected.
While there are a lot of people upset with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and his anti-vaccine philosophy, the leading candidate for impeachment or other procedural torture is the so-called secretary of war, Pete Hegseth. Our country has had lots of secretaries of defense, but none has created such a negative aura as Hegseth. Calling generals “fatties” and other demeaning names, he has undermined the country’s respect for an agency that makes life-or-death decisions about our national survival.
Handling water scarcity is critical, because we need clean water for drinking, food production and our overall survival. This summer, Nassau and Suffolk counties have seen state drought warnings due to below-normal precipitation. Last month, the Suffolk County Water Authority asked residents to stop watering their lawns, warning that its infrastructure was reaching maximum capacity under the current combination of drought and heat. According to the U.S. Geological Survey, Long Islanders use an average of 140 gallons of water a day per person, about 55 percent more than the national average.
Before becoming a photo of a scowling politician, paper has a complicated history. Somewhere there were trees — or recycled fibers that began as trees. There was harvesting, transportation, pulping, washing, processing and papermaking. There was lots of water. There was energy. There were chemicals involved in processing, bleaching and coating. There were huge vats of ink. There was printing and cutting and bundling.