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About The nugget. (Sisters, Or.) 1994-current | View Entire Issue (Sept. 23, 2020)
6 Wednesday, September 23, 2020 The Nugget Newspaper, Sisters, Oregon Easing fires not as simple as climate change vs. forest work By Andrew Selsky & Adam Beam Associated Press SALEM (AP) 4 Deadly West Coast wildfires are dividing President Donald Trump and the states9 Democratic leaders over how to prevent blazes from becoming more frequent and destructive, but scientists and others on the front lines say it9s not as simple as blaming either climate change or the way land is managed. The governors of California, Oregon and Washington have all said global warming is priming forests for wildfires as they become hotter and drier. But during a visit Monday to California, Trump pointed to how states manage forests and said, <It will start getting cooler, just you watch.= Scientists say wildfires are all but inevitable, and the main drivers are plants and trees drying out due to cli- mate change and more peo- ple living closer to areas that burn. And while forest thin- ning and controlled burns are solutions, they have proven challenging to implement on the scale needed to combat those threats. As crews battled wildfires that have killed at least 36 people, destroyed neighbor- hoods and enveloped the West Coast in smoke, Trump contended that the states are to blame for failing to rake leaves and clear dead timber from forest floors. However, many of the California blazes have roared through coastal chaparral and grasslands, not forest, and some of the larg- est are burning on federal land. In Oregon, it was the for- ests that burned at unprec- edented levels this past week. Almost the same number of <megafires= 4 defined as having scorched 100,000 acres or more 4 were burning last week as have occurred during the entire last century, said Jim Gersbach, spokesman for the Oregon Department of Forestry. Oregon Gov. Kate Brown on Monday requested a Presidential Disaster Declaration, saying it would bring much needed resources to Oregon9s response and recovery efforts. Experts, environmental- ists and loggers largely agree that thinning trees and brush See FIRES on page 11 Scottie Wisdom&Faith Jean Russell Nave Scottie truth One of the many won- derful things about Scottie dogs is their honesty. They express truth. If they are barking, there is something out there. Even if I can9t see it, I know there is something or someone outside. Just yesterday the Scotties started barking. I couldn9t see a thing any- where in the backyard. But sure enough, as I looked through another window, there was a person raking pine needles off our neigh- bor9s roof. Truth. We are told time and again in the Bible that truth is an essential ideal. There was a time when truth was held so firmly in our society that people did business with a handshake. Today you need a lawyer in your back pocket if you go into business. Every major transaction with a client now has to be put in writ- ing. This in itself is a good example of how <bound- up= we9ve become because we have treated truth so cheaply. Our children may be told to tell the truth, but the actions of our society con- stantly shout otherwise. We know that commercials mis- lead. Politicians misinform and sometimes outright lie. Television programs use lying as a punchline for cheap laughs. Our children watch all of this getting a much clearer message from our actions than from our warnings. What is truth? Historically, philoso- phers explored that ques- tion back as far as the ancient Egyptians. One9s heart would be weighed at death against the <Feather of Truth.= If the heart was too heavy with deceit, one was headed for dark places. Truth has been a rela- tive thing. In the Middle Ages truth was a flat earth, even though the library in Alexandria had held maps showing a round earth cen- turies earlier. The Church decided the earth was flat and that was that. Today science tries to prove what is true through scientific investigation. Yet, that investigation results in many ideas that become held like dogma, forbidding newer research from chang- ing the paradigm. One such thing that I9ve followed for years is the dating of when humans came to the Americas. As recent as the early 20th century, scien- tists would not believe there were people in America before five thousand years ago. In 1929 when fluted spear points were found in mastodon bones dating to Stop by our showroom in the heart of more than 10,000 BC in Clovis, New Mexico, the head of the Smithsonian Institution would not believe they were real because it challenged his idea of truth. This helps us understand that truth in the material world is open to subjective interpretation. As followers of Christ, the truth we want to explore is spiritual truth. Jesus said: <If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.= What did he mean then and what does it mean to us today? Jesus shared His understanding of His Father9s house with His fol- lowers. He wanted people to understand that God our Father is love and we are His children. Meaning that we 4 all humans, regard- less of race, creed, color or sexual orientation 4 are divine spirit. When we live with love, compassionate, non-judgmental and filled with forgiveness, we are living in truth. That is how we live in God9s real world. The real world is not this mixed-up mess we call life in this dimension, which is filled with anger and hate. We can spiritually rise above all that and live free of the hate when we turn to truth 4 God9s love. By living with love we are free and we free others. When we hate, we chain ourselves to that hate and the other person or people we focus the hate upon. Living with love in our hearts means we live with God9s truth, and we are free. Mother Teresa is an excellent example of this put into practice. She lived among people enduring a great deal of death and suf- fering, but her heart was filled with God9s love, which allowed her to ease others9 suffering while she thrived and stayed healthy into her later years. The love she was filled with kept her free. She was free of hate and fear, the major causes of misery and death. It isn9t where you live that makes you free, it9s how you live that makes you free. My rescued Scottie, Chewy, was beaten and starved by people in the past. Yet, his heart is so full of love that he greets every- one with a wagging tale, hoping they will bend down and pet him. Chewy9s truth is love. Make your truth love and watch how you are greeted with smiles too. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free. 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