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About Eugene weekly. (Eugene, Oregon) 1993-current | View Entire Issue (April 3, 2003)
TO THE EDITOR UNITED WE STAND A silver lining to this big black cloud called the “Bush administration” is that it has managed — through lying, stealing and murdering — to unify people around the world against it. People who have never marched or protested before are doing so now. I pray this energy doesn’t dry up. Our so- called democracy is at stake now more than ever. We must put down the labels such as Democrat, Green, Republican, Libertarian, con- servative, liberal, anarchist, etc,. and find our common ground. We need to clean up the elec- tion process and get people elected that repre- sent us. We need to get citizens to be active, ed- ucated voters. The power should not be in the hands of the military industrial complex, the oil and auto man- ufacturing industries, or the chemical industry — multi-billion dollar corporations that are getting fat off of toxifying and destroying our homes, our bodies and our earth. If change doesn’t happen soon it will be time for a revolution. Remember the Boston Tea Party? It’s about time for another party! The dream we dream together becomes re- ality. Pamela Driscoll Eugene COST OF WAR War destroys both the past and the present. Not just humans will die if we go to war. The past will also perish along with them, because every time a tank drives across rocky hills it could be destroying known and unknown arche- ological sites. Are we willing to destroy these lives and artifacts in our quest for oil and power in a senseless war? Early humans came from Africa, but then moved into the Middle East. These early hu- mans then settled into the Tigris/Euphrates River valleys. This area, which includes Iraq, became what is now known as the “cradle of civilization.” In Africa, these early humans were hunters, gatherers and scavengers. It was in Iraq where these early humans learned to do- mesticate grains and animals and true civiliza- tion was born. We must balance the loss of present day life against the loss of history. Humans are not in short supply in Iraq, but the archeological record is. Should the past be sacrificed for oil? Should the lives of people in Iraq be sacrificed for oil? I now call upon the people of the world to take action. Take a stand against this war. Don’t let our past be erased to further the needs of our governments. Take a stand. The sacrifice is too great. Molly Simons-Kimbal Jefferson Middle School POWER IN NUMBERS There are roughly 140,000 people in the city of Eugene. I would like to believe that out of this number, there are at least 10 percent who are passionately against this war, against this administration, and all of the lies fed to the peo- ple of this country. The numbers of participants at the latest rallies were so incredibly low, I find it quite sad. If 10 percent of Eugene’s residents feel as I do, then why aren’t we seeing groups of 10,000 to 13,000 protesters? C’mon, people! Let’s unite. Can we stop the war at this point? Probably not. Can we try to stop some of the laws that our government is trying to pass right under our snotty little Willamette Valley noses? HELL YES! Write to your senators, keep protesting. Ask everyone you know to come out to rally. When they tell you they have too much to do, tell them... IT CAN WAIT! What are we afraid of? Let’s take chances and use our voices. We have become way too comfortable and com- placent, let’s open our eyes and look beyond these borders. We need power in numbers. I hope to see a lot more of you out there next time and every time. Democracy is in the balance. Tip the scale. Phaedra Fillé Eugene FREE THE WALLS The concept of a free wall is alluring as it could aid in the training of our young graffiti soldiers. However, it is of utmost importance to continue developing and exercising guerilla tactics of our aerosol assault teams. The acquired knowledge and techniques are crucial and must not be abandoned. The no- tion that a free wall could serve as a sponge to absorb the city’s graffiti problem is laugh- able. The suggestion that we “keep art to structures where the owners condone it” is in- sulting in an age of such unequal ownership opportunity. We must ask ourselves, do we respect “they” who have repeatedly proven their hatred of our beloved Hip Hop? The conflicting agendas of Hip Hop and “they” BY TONY CORCORAN The Veteran and the Rookie Author’s note: This is risky business — I’m writing about two guys with desks next to mine on the Senate floor, John Minnis and Frank Morse. But, at the risk of ruining their reputation with their Republican colleagues, I actually like these guys and respect them. They’ve made a commitment to serve; and they take their jobs seriously, for the most part. THE VETERAN John Minnis and I have our differences: He’s an evangelical Republican cop with tenu- ous relationships to the Right, I’m an agnostic Democratic labor goon with tenuous rela- tionships to the Left. On law enforcement issues we’re not that far apart, to the extent that you can ever see the world through the eyes of this Dick Tracy/Charlton Heston hy- brid. This is a guy who has one of the toughest jobs in the state when we’re not in session; John is a Portland police detective — he formerly worked in homicide — who currently in- vestigates sexual assault crimes. He has a street-tempered attitude toward crime and criminals and I don’t blame him a bit. John is an experienced committee chair, having chaired Ways and Means in the House and Judiciary in the Senate. He is my vice-chair on our Senate General Government Committee, and has been a great help as the committee meanders its way through the PERS discussion and weightier issues like collective bargaining and professional wrestling. Watching him go off the other day in committee on an unfriendly, anti-government, ego- tistical lawyer made my heart swell with pride; we both left the hearing grinning ear to ear. Despite our differences, we have a lot in common — physically tall, lean but muscular, without a gray hair to be seen. (In my case, without any hair to be seen.) We’re both ami- cable, calm, deliberative, consensus-building, transparent, reasonable, forgiving, relatively honorable (did I mention “calm”?), shy wallflowers and statesmen. John does think he’s smarter than me, but we’re both Irish, so I know better. John’s been catching a lot of flack lately for his SB742, which creates a crime of terror- ism and then makes every protest and every concerted activity, even legal actions such as 4 APRIL 3, 2003 a union strike, punishable by a life sentence. I could see myself after some future protest, during the sentencing phase, begging: “No, no, John, I didn’t mean the part about your mother wearing combat boots, only the part about the buckteeth! Let me plea bargain down to 30 years in prison.” John claims everyone is overeacting to some bad editing by our drafters in Legislative Counsel; he really intended it to be an “anti-tourism” bill aimed at imprisoning unsuspecting city councilors who tried to pass a local lodging tax that could be punishable by capital punishment, i.e., if it’s not pre-empted by the state. THE ROOKIE Frank Morse is a good guy — an earnest, smart, successful businessman with a faint sense of humor buried under an OSU degree in engineering. His previous company, Morse Bros. of Corvallis, one of the largest aggregate and road building companies in Oregon, was deeply respected in environmental circles for its mitigation work on habitat. After he retired from there, Frank took up making a better piece of artillery for the U.S. Navy. He partnered up with Remington and produced weaponry using a heavy birdshsot he devel- oped. He serves on the board of Northwest Christian College, he’s on a hospital board, and he showed up in support of an AIDS/HIV group that visited the capitol; he’s so normal and seemingly liberal that the Democratic Party once recruited him to run for the legislature. Unfortunately, he’s an R! Fascinating guy, but, alas, still a rookie. He recently sponsored a Senate Joint Resolution to the federal government asking the feds to forego their requirement that Oregon provide matching state funds in exchange for federal dollars. Hello! Frank doesn’t want the state to pay its share of mental health, public health, food stamp, and Medicaid costs. But he wants the feds to continue to send the matching funds as if we were actually supporting these services. Hmmm? We can’t raise sufficient funds for Oregon’s mental health programs — which have al- ready seen human casualties — so the solution is a Senate Joint Resolution? Next thing you know, he’ll bring in one of those “turnaround” experts from the private sector, and then the very next thing you know the welfare department will start makin’ a profit! Gollee! Sen. Tony Corcoran of Cottage Grove represents portions of Lane and Douglas counties in Senate District 4, which includes the UO area. He can be reached at sen.tonycorcoran@state.or.us
