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About Eugene weekly. (Eugene, Oregon) 1993-current | View Entire Issue (June 28, 2018)
LET TERS WHERE THE BUCK STOPS Attending the University of Oregon Commencement June 18, where my daughter was graduating, I was surprised and pleased to hear President Michael Schill admit, “My generation has royally screwed up.” But I was hugely disappointed in his next line: “It is up to your generation to fix it.” No. His next line should have been: “I am so sorry, and I will be dedicating the rest of my life to fixing it.” This is something we all should have learned in kindergarten: You clean up your own mess. Sure, we could blame our par- ents’ generation for the mess we inherited, but most of us benefited financially from the continuing destruction of our climate and our ecosystems during our adulthood, so it is incumbent upon us to spend that profit on cleaning up our mess, to use the power and influence we have achieved to change the system so that it is no longer making the future worse for our children. The bucks stops here, President Schill. You can start by implementing a compre- hensive aggressive carbon reduction plan at the UO immediately, as the students have been imploring you to do. Sharon Blick Eugene GO GREEN I am a Pacific Green Party voter and ac- tivist, and I encourage others to consider registering and voting Green. 4 June 28, 2018 • eugeneweekly.com I first registered as a Green in 1999, when the party was still officially the Pacific Party of Oregon. It soon affiliated with the national Green Party organization and the name changed to “Pacific Green Party.” My motivation was intellectual and temperamental. The major political parties were committed to policies of exploitation for wealth accumulation by the wealthy at the expense of nature and people. The Greens were an international movement supporting human rights, nonviolence, de- mocracy and ecological wisdom. I was animated by a tendency to chal- lenge authority and root for the under- dog. The initial enthusiasm and successes of the 2000 Ralph Nader presidential cam- paign cemented my loyalty to the party and its ideals. I would not support one of the major parties as a possibly lesser evil, when both are leading on paths of increasing violence, inequity and ecological devastation. Since 2008, I have regularly run for U.S. Congress as the Pacific Green candi- date in the Oregon 4th District. I do not run to punish Peter DeFazio for shortcomings as a Democratic representative. I believe we are fortunate to have a leading progres- sive Democrat as our representative. I run to promulgate a better vision for the future and to give voters the opportu- nity to vote against the system of militaris- tic imperial larceny that the United States has become. Mike Beilstein Corvallis IMMIGRANT TRUTHS A HISTORY OF EVIL People who steal bikes or forge checks rarely face jail time, let alone federal pris- on or the loss of children, because those are misdemeanors. But so is illegal border crossing. So why are immigrant families treated differently, torn apart and impris- oned? It can’t really be about deterrence. The U.S. didn’t warn Mexico first. It’s not about numbers. Since 2000, border arrests have plummeted from 1,600,000 to about 300,000 annually. It’s not about gangs. They’re less than 1 percent of crossings. It’s not about crime. Immigrants are half as likely to offend as those born here. True, drug traffic is up at the border. But Califor- nia Border Patrol says they just need more agents. It’s not about human trafficking. That’s less than 1 percent of border crossings. It’s not about welfare. Undocumented immigrants don’t qualify for benefits, yet they pay $12 billion in annual taxes. It’s not about taking American jobs. Crops are rotting and meat packers closing. It’s not about the law. Nothing requires putting infants in cages. What it’s really about is evil, ugly, raw, dehumanizing racism that treats brown families as political pawns. Trump’s re- prieve is incomplete. Don’t let up. Re- unite the families. Rachel Rich Eugene The current U.S. policy of confinement of brown babies in concentration camps should come as no surprise. Our country has a long history of white exclusiveness (racism) starting with the active government and religious-supported genocide of the Native American popula- tion; the enslavement of millions of blacks for the benefit of white landowners; the family gathering picnic-style lynch par- ties after the Emancipation Proclamation; Jim Crow laws; the illegal imprisonment of Japanese citizens during WWII as the feared “yellow peril” (while white Ger- mans were ok). When Chinese laborers finished build- ing the transcontinental railroad, the pro- moted fears of “yellow hordes” taking over jobs resulted in persecution, lynching and killing of these undesirables. We have a sordid history of dehumaniz- ing other races, usually justified by warped “Christianity” and white supremacy. The separation of brown babies from brown mothers and imprisoning them in “tender age” concentration camps is just another sordid chapter of white racism. Enough of our population (indirectly) elected a known racist, and we got exactly what was promised. The Trump regime is simply evil, and those who support it are knowingly complicit. Daniel Schlender Springfield
