A new sewage treatment system may be installed at a public restroom at the edge of Herrick Park in East Hampton Village using money from the community preservation fund, which should give both environmentalists and good government observers pause.

Why the United States has remained in a state of war in Afghanistan for 18 years is not clear. It is not clear to the American people. Nor is the purpose clear to U.S. military and Foreign Service leadership, much less Congress. We were lied to.

As the House Judiciary Committee takes over the process of impeachment looming over the Trump presidency, one central figure with strong East End ties will almost surely not appear at any hearing, though his actions are close to the core of the allegations. This is a person whom many on the South Fork social scene have sat next to at a benefit or lifted a glass with at an informal dinner. Unlike Paul Manafort, who has family here and had owned a Water Mill house that helped him launder millions in illegal foreign payments, Rudolph Giuliani, a part-time Bridgehampton resident, could be considered a regular on the circuit. How he went from an apparently mild-mannered former New York City mayor and Hamptons summer hobnobber to someone making a mockery of both the legal profession and democracy itself is a matter of speculation.

East Hampton Town's citizens advisory committees seem to have forgotten that their roles are as advisers, not decision makers.

An early snow remained yesterday morning, thinly painting the Mulford Farmhouse roof and Village Green in white. Highway Department workers have been wiring the temporary firs on Main Street and Newtown Lane. The guy with the holiday light show in the back of his pickup truck has been out once again, new and improved with blinking LEDs making patterns as he rolls through town at dusk. Just like that, a Christmas feeling comes to East Hampton. How quickly the year turns.

Food grown on the East End of Long Island will fill many tables here this week. Traditional Thanksgiving dinners include many of the staples long grown here, and increasingly, a dazzling variety of meat, vegetables, and beer and wine from these parts will be served as well. Though it may be less than a passing thought as we tuck into the first courses, there is a remarkable struggle behind each of the local foodstuffs.

An extraordinary lineup of women running things gathered earlier this month to share the message with high school girls that they, too, can make a difference.

Sympathy for a Cooper Lane couple whose house may soon be over-loomed by an extra-tall utility pole should lead to action by PSEG-Long Island to find another location.

In the House of Representatives impeachment hearings so far, a valuable lesson has stood out: the dignity of the members of the United States Foreign Service who have appeared as witnesses. Starting with George Kent, the senior State Department member in charge of Ukrainian relations, and William Taylor, the acting ambassador to Ukraine, American television viewers, as well as those listening on radio or live stream, were reminded of the professionalism and dedication that is the hallmark of public service at its best.

Members of the East Hampton Village Zoning Board of Appeals had had enough. Late last month, they vetoed a request from the owner of a Georgica Pond-front house to legalize a number of changes that had taken place without the board’s okay.

Now that Election Day has passed, perhaps East Hampton Town can return to the question of a new, centralized shellfish hatchery on a site off Gann Road at Three Mile Harbor in a less politicized atmosphere.

Far be it for a newspaper to encourage its readers often to turn on the television, but this is an extraordinary time in the history of the United States.