Theresa Leonard
English 101: Creative Writing
Dr. Jim Hepworth
March 26th, 2009
President Obama,
With our economy slowly moving forward, we still need to be aware of all the waste we are putting into our environment, which in my opinion could be fixed by renovation, wilderness preservation, and creating new jobs. Things take time, and right now our priority needs to be about getting people back to work, but we cannot forget about the damage we are doing in the process. When we finally see light at the end of the tunnel with our economy crisis, how is Mother Nature going to look then? Putting off the environment is careless and very dangerous. We do not have the time to just keep it on the backburner. With your political strengths I believe this could be easily achieved.
Recently, I have read The Wilderness Letter by William Stegner.
Stegner States, “Something will have gone out of us as a people if we ever let the remaining wilderness be destroyed; if we permit the last virgin forests to be turned into comic books and plastic cigarette cases; if we drive the few remaining members of the wild species into zoos or to extinction; if we pollute the last clear air and dirty the last clean streams and push our paved roads through the last of the silence, so that never again will Americans be free in their own country from the noise, the exhausts, the stinks of human and automotive waste.” (Stegner 2)
This statement couldn’t be any truer. Few Americans know the true beauty of wilderness. I am one of those lucky few that know what a wilderness is. Most Americans just simply not care. Big businesses come in and build new buildings over the last few acres of beautiful land. Instead of renovating old buildings or adding on, many buildings are being abandoned, and new ones are coming up. In the city of Lewiston, Idaho, where I reside, Main Street is filled with older buildings that are just sitting there with nothing going on with them. They are old, but perfectly good buildings. With a little renovation, they could look just like new. And if they are falling down, why can they not demolish an old building and build a brand-new building in its place. Lewiston is a growing town with much to offer our valley. When a city grows, it naturally opens its doors to new businesses. If they could look at their options with older buildings before deciding to build, that could make a huge difference.
Also in Stegner’s letter, he says, “I should like to urge some arguments for wilderness preservation that involve recreation, as it is ordinarily conceived, hardly at all. Hunting, fishing, hiking, mountain climbing, camping, photography, and the enjoyment of natural scenery will all, surely, figure in your report.” (Stegner 3)Thankfully I live in one of the most beautiful states in America. Idaho has the most breath-taking acres you could ever see. The Wilderness of No Return is one of the many. Many more of these should be preserved. If we don’t do more about it, we are going to see more and more wild animals roaming through big cities. We are taking their territory away from them and they have no place to go but ours.
With our economy not doing as well, we need to create “green collar” jobs. This is the perfect opportunity to introduce new jobs. It’s obvious, going green is our future. I hope to see one day everyone driving a fuel-cell fueling up on water. What an amazing advance. We are a long way from that day, but why not get it going faster by making jobs to find the solution we are looking for. This could help out our economy and improve our environment at the same time. The word of solar panels needs to get out to the people. A lot of people just don’t know what they are about. This would help our economy by reducing the electricity cost down to nearly nothing while helping our environment.
While I know the economy is the United States number one concern, we still cannot put the environment off. This needs to go public since so many people still have no idea what is even happening to our world. It starts with one person doing the right thing. In the near future, we are going to start seeing more and more affects. In my opinion, you’re the right person for this job since you already show so much compassion for our country.
In my opinion you are probably the best President the United States could ever have. Since you were in office, you have accomplished more things in two months than Former President George Bush did in 8 years! You wanting to direct 40 percent of tax breaks to businesses and the middle-class workers is huge. If you keep doing things like this, I don’t doubt you taking our country out of this economic disaster. The biggest thing that put me in tears was when I heard that you froze the White House’s senior staff’s salaries. To me that must mean you care more about our country than any president has.
“Families are tightening their belts, so should Washington.” I recall you saying. (Obama 1) You believe in so many things that mean the world to a lot of people. With more recycling, more preservation, and more research in making our world green, we can help our economy by creating jobs while making sure we are going to be here to see a day where either of these are our concerns. This could be huge by setting an example to the rest of the world. I have full trust in you to bring our economy back and to make our environment clean.
“Families are tightening their belts, so should Washington.” I recall you saying. (Obama 1) You believe in so many things that mean the world to a lot of people. With more recycling, more preservation, and more research in making our world green, we can help our economy by creating jobs while making sure we are going to be here to see a day where either of these are our concerns. This could be huge by setting an example to the rest of the world. I have full trust in you to bring our economy back and to make our environment clean.
Sincerely,
Theresa Leonard
Theresa Leonard
