Poor forest management is not the culprit<\/p>\n
To the Editor:<\/p>\n
Regarding \u201cKey Trump allies from Upstate NY tell Canada its wildfire smoke is \u2018unacceptable\u2019 \u201d<\/a> (Aug. 7, 2025):<\/p>\n Elise Stefanik and Nick Langworthy\u2019s letter to Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney blaming Canada for the air quality impact of their wildfires on New Yorkers is embarrassing. Their accusation that the increased frequency, size and intensity of these forest fires are the result of mismanaged forestry practices is absurd. It\u2019s just more misinformation to distract from a politically inconvenient reality. <\/p>\n Well-researched and peer-reviewed scientific studies have provided conclusive evidence that this phenomenon is largely driven by climate change resulting from human activity. Unless the United States (and Canada, for that matter) acknowledge this truth and take meaningful action to limit carbon and methane emissions, this problem is going to get worse before it gets better. <\/p>\n Lee Gratz<\/p>\n Phoenix<\/p>\n Trashing climate action is what\u2019s unacceptable<\/p>\n To the Editor:<\/p>\n You can\u2019t make this stuff up. A letter <\/a>drafted by Upstate members of the U.S. House of Representatives, and sent to Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, asserts the wildfire smoke that has been blanketing our region over the past several days is \u201cunacceptable.\u201d The letter was penned by Reps. Elise Stefanik and Nick Langworthy. <\/p>\n The bizarre aspect of the letter is, of course, that these representatives are closely allied with a federal administration that is gutting the nation\u2019s efforts to address climate change. The article clearly states:<\/p>\n \u201cScientists agree that a warming climate makes extreme wildfires like those in Canada in recent years more likely. They also agree that human action, such as burning fossil fuels, is the reason the Earth is currently getting hotter.\u201d<\/p>\n Stefanik and Langworthy are surely aware of the climate-wildfire connection, but their politics have become theater: They know their parts and act them out in earnest, regardless of their disconnect from reality. They have an audience of one \u2013 President Donald Trump \u2013 whose personal preference is to ignore the clear and present dangers of climate change.<\/p>\n With less than 5% of the world\u2019s population, the U.S. is nevertheless the second-highest carbon polluting nation on the planet. This is the \u201cunacceptable\u201d aspect of the situation, and the U.S. needs to get its own house in order before placing blame on Canadian forest and fire management practices. <\/p>\n Now that the Big, Beautiful Bill has hamstrung any possibility of government incentives for the technologies necessary to transition away from fossil fuels, our best way to lessen the likelihood of these and other climate disasters is to place a price on carbon pollution. We can make polluters pay, encourage their use of non-polluting fuels, and do all this without increasing the national debt.<\/p>\n Robert Kuehnel<\/p>\n LaFayette<\/p>\n If you purchase a product or register for an account through a link on our site, we may receive compensation. By using this site, you consent to our User Agreement<\/a> and agree that your clicks, interactions, and personal information may be collected, recorded, and\/or stored by us and social media and other third-party partners in accordance with our Privacy Policy.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Poor forest management is not the culprit To the Editor: Regarding \u201cKey Trump allies from Upstate NY tell…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":140058,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[26571,83232,83696,7335,692,34144,83697,37486,29495,12121,83698,83699,83700,83701,25076,18849,746,78573,18850,34161,421,2252,398,83702,6141,4905,66643,2991,83703,904,159,83704,83705,67,132,68,3015,8515,11003,83706],"class_list":{"0":"post-140057","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-environment","8":"tag-battle","9":"tag-bc-wildfire-service","10":"tag-bcpoli","11":"tag-blaze","12":"tag-british-columbia","13":"tag-camera","14":"tag-cameron-lake","15":"tag-canadian","16":"tag-cause","17":"tag-challenging","18":"tag-cppi","19":"tag-cppixbc","20":"tag-cppixbritishcolumbia","21":"tag-cppixvancouver","22":"tag-crew","23":"tag-danger","24":"tag-environment","25":"tag-evacuate","26":"tag-forest","27":"tag-helicopter","28":"tag-homes","29":"tag-life","30":"tag-media","31":"tag-out-of-control","32":"tag-park","33":"tag-photograph","34":"tag-planes","35":"tag-press","36":"tag-qualicum-river-village","37":"tag-regional","38":"tag-science","39":"tag-terrain","40":"tag-timber","41":"tag-united-states","42":"tag-unitedstates","43":"tag-us","44":"tag-vancouver-island","45":"tag-victoria","46":"tag-wildfire","47":"tag-yyj"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":"Validation failed: Text character limit of 500 exceeded"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140057","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=140057"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140057\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/140058"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=140057"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=140057"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=140057"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}