LET TERS
now has my vote. Smith will do his “right
thing” and I’ll do mine. And I’ll have a lot
of company.
A final point: In the absence of fraud
and electoral “irregularities,” when a can-
didate loses, the voters are not to blame.
The blame lies with the losing candidate
for failing to convince enough voters to
vote for him — or her.
Barbara Shapiro
Eugene
PARK COMPLAINTS
We live near the entrance to the Owen
Rose Garden. I-105 is across the street.
Someone has cut the fence and pitched a
tent on highway property. The tent is par-
tially obscured by rose bushes. There are
bicycle parts and trash strewn on the em-
bankment. A worker at the rose garden has
complained to me about time spent clean-
ing up feces.
There is also a steady flow of people
walking through the bushes and the hole
in the fence. The other day two police of-
ficers who patrol the area on bicycles were
coming down the street and I stopped them
to complain. They said they were aware. I
said I thought drugs were being sold and
that the bicycle parts were questionable.
One of the officers acknowledged that
there is drug activity but said it was on
highway department property. He said he
has asked his sergeant to contact the Or-
egon Department of Transportation about
the problem. I expressed shock that this
blatant activity takes place with no conse-
quences.
This is not the first time. This has hap-
pened repeatedly over the years until a few
neighbors and I complain loudly enough.
Then a hazmat team comes to clean up
the mess at taxpayer expense, and we can
breathe easy for a few months. I assume
the problem gets pushed to another neigh-
borhood. I have complained to the mayor,
the city manager, the chief of police and
my city councilor. I have sent pictures.
We like living here and pay $3,800 a
year in property taxes for the privilege. We
shouldn’t have to put up with this. If the
city is going to wink at heroin sales, then
they should set up a clinic and provide it
themselves.
Robert W. James
Eugene
QUESTION TRUMP
No one has questioned the mindset
of Donald Trump. He is one of the most
wealthy Americans and has an unusual
mind that allows him to say the most bi-
zarre and outlandish remarks about all
types of people.
Trump’s bid for the presidency is only
one public arena! His vast real estate em-
pire and large money-making schemes are
another arena. His outlandish decrees seem
to bolster his appeal!
What has he got to lose?
Stace Webb
Eugene
NEW OLD THEORIES
I can actually help Frank Skipton [Let-
ters, 8/11] adjust to the alleged new age
science he feels lost to because of being
born in 1939.
Most of that stuff isn’t being used to
anywhere near its potential, nor what it
was made for. There are still areas here in
Oregon where the new young are growing
up just as he did or, to put it in practical
terms, they are of no use so they are left
alone — pre-labeled as military fodder.
Most of the people around here don’t
even know that their “new” com gear is
wired with brand-new fabricated gold.
The stuff they just bought is already “old”
stuff someone thought they could safely let
them use as long as limiting subprograms
are in place and the tattletale functions are
running.
The real new stuff is “magic” and easy
to use, just as all those light switches that
he has taken for granted all the years he has
been alive, but still is limited by the basic
rule he has always used in his life: What
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are you going to use it for?
You use the light switch to get light.
The rest of y’all know that “transgen-
der” is old stuff now, right? It’s becoming
trans-species for the new age of now. It’s
what cosplay is all about.
Ever pretend to be a horse?
The book Headcrash by Bruce Bethke:
Read it, view it, be told it, access it. It’s
where “cyber punk” comes from.
Aloha, dudes.
Dan Moore
Springfield
WAR ON DRUGS
The war on drugs has not failed to af-
fect my personal experience as a drug user
in America [response to EW 7/21, “Opiate
Overdose”]. It is a common but erroneous
claim that drugs like opiates and cocaine
are all too readily obtainable in any city in
the United States.
My experience proves different. When
16 years ago I did my first shot of heroin,
not too much after my first shot of coke,
I found a class of compounds that would
help me in my emotional rollercoaster and
trauma-filled life.
Heroin, which was the first opiate I en-
countered, and cocaine, a stimulant, eased
my pain and discomfort from an illness
diagnosed as schizo-affective disorder, a
type of bipolar schizophrenia. The delu-
sional thinking that prevailed in my every-
day thought process was ameliorated with
these drugs into insignificance. I was still
a manic-depressive psychotic, but the ups
and downs and all-arounds failed to bother
me in any meaningful way. This was the
blessing of illegal narcotics (opiates) as
well as stimulants like cocaine.
The danger drugs pose to users will be
diminished upon their legalization. Stan-
dardized doses will be available. Also, the
antidote to opiate overdose, which is now
only available to first emergency respond-
ers, will be on a necklace on every junky
who values his/her own life.
In this way “hard drugs” will play the
role nature intended. Not everybody will
benefit from them, but as adults we should
be given the choice of didactic use rather
than retributive justice by police.
David Ivan Piccioni
Eugene
JOBS BILLS
“I am going to bring the best of minds
together and there will be a decent jobs
bill.”
We heard Hillary tell that to a crowd
I suppose that was in Michigan, and the
crowd cheers. Well, Mrs. Clinton, the
president you want to replace has done
that several times. Where are all the jobs?
Now Clinton wants to do the same. Was it
not Barack Obama who told us in 2008 “to
keep doing the same thing expecting a dif-
ferent outcome is insanity”?
Here is a clue from history. A reduc-
tion in taxes will bring untold wealth to the
treasury. A higher tax reduces the wealth
to the treasury. The facts are out there.
Compare them. All you have to do is re-
search. I would like to know how she is
looking out for the middle class when she
wants to raise taxes on the middle class.
How does “I got your back” work? How
about increasing your income tax sound?
Oh yes, she wants more of your income.
She wants it, and should she get it, she
will take 28 percent of your itemized de-
ductions. A hike in corporate tax, a hike in
inheritance tax, and she wants to institute
a tax on stock trade. That is a tax on the
trading of stock, and the increase of capital
gains tax. Sounds to me like “I got your
back” is the same way the slave masters
had the backs of their slaves. Trump wants
to reduce them.
Jim Selby
Florence
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