Folks, you really need to hear this: Things are not good. The restaurant industry is in shambles, severely understaffed and doing a fraction of its typical sales. That’s why the federal government’s Restaurant Relief Fund needs to be refunded – and go to more than 30 percent of eligible businesses.

With all the human suffering in the world and the clearcutting of old-growth forests in the Amazon and Indonesia, why waste tears on a trio of old trees?

Concerned community members in Cambridge have organized buying high-quality KF94 masks in bulk for public school students. It’s laudable, but why do individuals need to raise funds to provide personal safety equipment to students at all?

Residents were right to be upset by police reporting that two teens were arrested last month in The Port with illegal weapons, apparently about to turn an argument violent. But a handful of gun enthusiasts were upset by something else: a reference to weaponry as being “heavy-duty.”

Household names have increasingly included social justice in their branding. It’s sometimes difficult to know whether these brands believe in their socially conscious messaging or whether their mission is drumming up engagement with performative activism.

The City Council’s respect for free speech has long been a bit dodgy, easily sacrificed for what members think constitutes a well-run meeting – and a well-run city where you can be part of the dialogue if you say what people want to hear.

If we understand the science, we should be willing to pause and adjust construction projects at the Tobin School, Jefferson Park and the Volpe site to save mature trees, protecting environmental health and keeping Cambridge’s urban forest from collapsing.

What can be done about recent youth violence in Cambridge? It is important that we discuss specific responses that can immediately begin to address the economic disenfranchisement and the social disconnect of many 17- to 30-year-olds.

This tree debate has been framed in the false binary terms that so many political debates are these days, pitting the public benefits of a modern new school and park complex against the environmental benefits of preserving healthy, mature trees.

We are a world-class city with access to world-class and innovative ideas, but ideas are not action and we do not leverage success for our most vulnerable citizens.