Oregon daily emerald., October 27, 1978, Page 4, Image 4

opinion
How do we spell (tax) relief? M-e-a-s-u-r-e 11
Tax fever is infecting America.
At first glance, it doesn’t look like a
disease most students need to worry
about catching. But their immunity ex
ists only on the surface.
Tax relief — and the effects on state
and local government that obtaining
that relief will create — should concern
students. From their perspective, it’s
important that Ballot Measure 6 not
succeed in the November election.
Relief provided by Measure 6 will go
mostly to wealthy property owners and
businesses at the expense of renters
and the less affluent generally. Meas
ure 6 remains a copy of a measure —
Proposition 13 — designed in Califor
nia, which suits well neither that state
nor our own.
The Oregon alternative, Ballot
Measure 11, also targets the majority
of its relief for persons higher on the
income scale than students. But 11,
shaped in a special session of the legis
lature, doesn’t threaten severe disrupt
ion of government programs — pro
grams from which students benefit
considerably. Measure 6 does.
Especially vulnerable to the impact
of 6 is Oregon’s Homeowner and Rent
er Relief Program (HARRP).
Under that program, relief checks
are sent to homeowners and renters
earning less than $16,000 a year. Ap
proved by the 1973 Legislature,
HARRP gives Oregon one of the most
progressive tax systems in the country.
HARRP ensures that those who earn
more, pay more. But the $170 million
that finance HARRP during the last two
years would probably become one of
the first victims of the budget axe if 6
passes.
Although they contribute —via rental
payments — 17 percent to Oregon’s
total property tax, renters could not ex
pect to find the benefits of Measure 6’s
tax relief passed on to them by land
lords. Measure 11 would not discrimi
nate against renters who comprise 36
percent of Oregon residents, in provid
ing its tax relief.
The Legislative Revenue Office es
timates that passage of 6 would take
more than $850 from local govern
ments during the1979 fiscal biennium.
These taxing units would undoubtably
turn to the state for money needed to
finance schools, law enforcement and
other services.
Measure 11, on the other hand, will
cost an estimated $525 million over the
next two years. It also imposes spend
ing lids on both local and state budgets,
thus striking at the causes of over
spending of which high taxes appear
as symptoms.
Measure 6 remains critically flawed
by its lack of such controls over spend
ing, an omission that reveals the
single-minded and self-serving mo
tives of its prime movers.
But HARRP is just one state pro
gram.
Tuition support, veterans loans and
child-care facilities — all of which ben
efit many students — also depend on
state resources. The $325 million dif
ference between measures 6 and 11
could become crucial in determining
whether these social-aid programs re
ceive sufficient funding.
Students would probably be better
off in the short run if the tax situation
remained as is.
But that’s unlikely.
Polls indicate that one if not both of
these relief measures will pass. Most
citizens are feeling unfairly burdened
by taxes and less able than ever to
affect the public decision-making pro
cess.
The issue of tax relief — and the
accompanying goal of reducing the
size of government — should trans
cend parochial interests.
Measure 11 will serve these, and
students’, interests much betterthan 6.
vours
Open faculty evaluations
As Chairman of the Student University Affairs Board I
would like to bring the matter of course evaluations to the
student’s attention. I wish to do this for two specific
reasons: 1) because course evaluations are a potentially
useful resource to students in choosing classes, and 2) to
stress the importance of SUAB to the students and the
University.
Investigations into the possibility of general university
course evaluations has been going on for some time.
These are not to be confused with the evaluations many
departments now use. The critical side of this issue is
whether or not the information should be released to stu
dents.
As a full-time student myself, and as voting member of
the University Senate, I am completely for the release of the
information compiled from the evaluation forms. This in
formation can be used in a sensible manner to assist stu
dents in the selection of their courses. The ramification of
this use is direct, i.e., getting the best possible education for
the money we are now investing in our futures.
The senate meeting of Wednesday past brings out a
very important aspect of SUAB's existence, the fact that
SUAB is the students direct voice of input into the legisla
tion on this campus. On issues such as course evaluations,
this function becomes magnified.
Your voice in university legislation such as this is a rare
privilege, because very few universities have combined
student-faculty bodies. This privilege must be exercised in
order to make the things you want out of your university a
reality. Students may attend, as observers, the special
session of the Senate this afternoon at 3:30 in Room 229 of
the Law School.
There are currently three SUAB positions for which no
one has filed. They are: #3 and #4 — Business and
Economics; and #11 — Fine and Applied Arts, Art History,
and Art Education. If you’re interested in becoming heard,
come in to EMU, Suite 4 and find out about write-in cam
paigns. If your major is already represented, come in and
find out who your representative is, and where you can
contact him or her, to make your opinions known.
Finally I would like to encourage all students to vote in
the upcoming (Nov. 1 and 2) ASUO elections. The key to a
successful student government is increased participation
on the part of thestudents. The SUAB and the ASUO are
here to serve you; your part is to become involved.
Gary McMahon
SUAB Chairperson
Brotherly blindness
Reverend Ray proclaims his sainthood on top of the
EMU terrace (ODE 10/23), and proclaims ideal justifica
tions on unreal behaviors for people. His proclamations are
theirs
ideals that even himself cannot attain.
The reasons for his continued practice lie in both his
reasoning beyond nature, and his strict adherence to a
dogmatic belief not of nature.
One can peer through their own delusional truths by a
reality test, by asking them some of the hows and whys
about the nature of Christ. I attempted to do this with one of
his devout financial campaigners.
He first off denied a natural father to have been a part
of the conception of Christ, as I showed the deductive
aspects of the nature of all life. In my reasoning to him I
shed light on the truth of the divinity of the Christ concep
tion, involving Joseph and Mary whom I consider to have
been ‘of the Holy Spirit that the Christ was conceived ‘in,'
and showed by deduction the hows and whys of the actual
divine nature of the Christ conception as manifested by the
will of God.
At that point, he did, in pure denial toward the real
substance of life, emit vile accusations in front of my face!
‘You’re gonna bum, you Anti-Christ,’ he blasphemed at me.
My God, what held I done! I was attempting to reason
with him objectively and he began to get irrational! He
proclaimed the Christ not to have been of nature, and
instigated a delusional creed bound dogma belief of the
attitudes of a Holy Ghost conception of Mary!
His proclamations ot the word of God in the Bible met
defeat when I showed him the deducing interpretations and
still he provoked inational tomes! Such a fundamentalist
gone to proclaim a Jesus coming from the clouds.
I proclaimed that his bizzareness was delusional and
that he had better seek help in some mental hospital! In our
final arguments with one another, I disclosed that he would
have to lay down his burdens sometime, and in his fun
damentalist fashion he said he would have to say some
prayers for me.
There is no real truth except natural truth, no love
except natural love, and no conception without actual con
ception! Though the actual natural truths of the divinity of
the Christ nature are diluted by creed-bound fundamen
talists with their attitudes toward their icon God-man they
have made and of their idolary worship of that icon within
themselves. It is truth, beauty and goodness which are the
necessary ingredients for arriving at the divinity of the
natural Christ truth. It is not dogma but letting natural
reasoning prevail in the search for objective truths.
Les Frye
Psychology