North Salinas runner

I am absolutely livid at the horrible decision by the California Interscholastic Federation officials for having disqualified Clara Adams from the 200-meter event during the state championships at Buchanan High in Clovis on Saturday. Even more egregious was the decision by the same incompetent Federation to strip her of the race she had just won in the 400 meters.

Clara is an amazing young sophomore and an up-and-coming record-breaking track star from North Salinas High. She was not in any way disrespectful, and was looking forward to the 200 meters, a rare feat to run both races. The reason for disqualifying her was simply that she was overzealous in celebrating her 400-meter victory. In a celebratory moment between Adams and her father, she stepped away from the track and she took a fire extinguisher from her dad and sprayed her shoes as if to say: “I was on fire” (and indeed she was having run such a fast race).

It is a sad commentary when the very officials representing her sport render such a half-witted and inappropriate decision to tarnish the reputation of a young athlete, and to undermine all her preparation and hard work, as well as her joy.

— Bob Steinberg, Carmel Valley

Sports officials are taught that when the game is over your duties are over. Hit the locker room and go home. After Clara Adams finished her race with the best time, the contest is over. Everybody go home.

But that’s not what happened. Race officials continued to officiate after the race was over. What Clara did after the race had nothing to do with her time. If the sports powers believe she needs to be disciplined for her post-race actions, then discipline her for that. Do not take away her win.

Since she was so fast, maybe her shoes were really on fire!

— Dan Presser, Carmel

June gloom

Every spring the weather reports and the county robocall centers are awash with heat warnings. But what about cold warnings? These past two months have been cold and windy without temperatures going up above 70 very much at all. Perhaps the weather service should warn us and instead of cooling centers, provide warming centers in libraries and other buildings for the elderly and poorly exercised who live by themselves to visit so hypothermia will not set in.

Seriously, when I was a kid, I’d walk home from school in the Central Valley late in May and could feel my shoes nearly burning on the sidewalk. No weather warnings were issued then, it was just accepted as a change of season. Could global warming be causing it? Then let the kids walk home again and get rid of those cars crowding around our schools.

— Bill Graham, Salinas

Antisemitic attacks

It is hard to believe that, in our modern era, we are still stuck in the 1930s and 1940s, where Jews are harassed, attacked and killed. The horrific Boulder, Colorado, Molotov cocktail assault on a peaceful gathering of pro-Israelis is impossible to understand. One of the victims was even a Holocaust survivor.

Earlier, a young couple was fatally shot execution-style outside the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C.

Why are so many still determined to harm or wipe Jews from the face of the earth? Violence against others based on their religion is not only an act of terrorism, but also an affront to every principle held by Americans.

Have we learned nothing from history?

— Lawrence Samuels, Carmel

Intelligence briefings

Incredible as it sounds, because President Trump doesn’t like to read, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard is considering a video game makeover to Trump’s briefings to make them resemble a Fox News broadcast. Of course, this is the same network that recently settled a defamation lawsuit by paying almost a billion dollars because they knowingly and repeatedly broadcast false news, so how trustworthy are they? Perhaps Gabbard can just draw the intelligence briefings in crayon so he can look at a picture instead of those confusing images called “words?”

— Glenn Nolte, Carmel Valley