I am on the Peyton for Governor team and I would like to respond to Vidda Crochetta’s letter dated Aug. 8, “Getting realistic about petroleum.” The petrochemical products Crochetta mentions can all be replaced and often bettered by hemp, but the more pressing issue is that we must not continue burning oil.

The world’s oil reserves took billions of years to accumulate their carbon content, and burning off emissions into the atmosphere for only two short centuries is nothing less than willful suicide.

The debate on global warming has been surrounded by smoke and mirrors, deliberately bleated by deniers who are protecting their economic interests. But all of this will do us no good while our water supplies dry out and our soils turn into dust.

It’s time to get wise and begin moving away from the precipice before it’s too late for us to have any control at all. We have a little window now and we are determined to start healing the damage we’ve foolishly allowed to happen to our life source.

The Legislature is the representation of the people and we believe everyone must be educated about what the hemp plant can do to enable restorations.

America is the biggest importer of hemp and while we prohibit growing it, we deny ourselves the Most Favored Nation Status which is against NAFTA. No one can know how quickly we can get off oil, because we haven’t tried it yet.

We may have time to get off it sensibly and gradually but the effort we have put out so far equates to nothing less than pathetic, leaving us ever more vulnerable to having to change on a dime.

In this era of sound bites, Emily’s campaign slogan is “Food, Farms, Hemp and Weed” because this signifies what we need to get out of our predicament.

DENISE WARD

Emily Peyton for Governor 2012

Putney, Vt.