letters
WILL THE VOTERS
GET TO DECIDE?
NO PUBLIC BAILOUT
FOR MLB MILLIONAIRES
I’d like to thank Michelle Holman and
Kai Huschke for their insightful and
powerful Viewpoint on Nov. 30, “Making
Democracy Illegal: The increasing
attacks on citizen initiative power.”
It provokes some questions. What will
happen with the Protect Lane County
Watersheds initiative, currently being
circulated for signature gathering?
Will it be successful in getting to the
ballot? Will it get the votes needed
to make it into law? Will that law be
contested in court? Our water and
community would be well served by the
proposed protections in this initiative.
Let's give it our best, Lane County! See
ProtectLaneCountyWatersheds.org.
Katie Geiser
Eugene
Let me get this straight: Our local
minor league baseball team would like
hefty contributions from local, county,
state and even federal taxpayers to build
a $100 million stadium right next to an
established residential neighborhood.
The story we’re told is that Major
League Baseball (MLB) will not pay for
the stadium; if we want a team here we
need to foot the bill.
Well, here’s what MLB recently
announced they will pay for: a $700
million, 10-year contract for a player
named Shohei Ohtani. This means that,
averaged over the 10 years, this person
gets $70 million a year, $5.8 million a
month, $1.3 million a week, $192,000 a day.
And that’s just one player! Yet they ask us
to pay for a stadium. I fi nd that insulting.
I look forward to voting no on any
ballot measure asking for stadium
funds.
Steve Hering
Eugene
YET ANOTHER LAWLESS
TIMBER GRAB
The Warner Creek road blockade
— declared the “Cascadia Free State”
— in 1995-96 was a coalescing of a
deep ecological resistance movement
brought about by then-President Bill
Clinton’s enactment of the lawless
Logging Rider in 1995 to log and
clearcut million acres of our national
forests. Road blockades and tree sits
against Clinton’s lawless timber grab
proceeded for 10 more years.
Twenty-eight years forward, President
Joe Biden and the U.S. Forest Service
have enacted a new “Lawless Logging
Timber Grab” upon 45 million acres
of national forests across the country
using the Orwellian guise of “wildfi re risk
reduction” and “restoration” to again
log and clearcut our last ancient forests.
The provisions were snuck into the
Infrastructure Act of 2021. If allowed to
proceed, this new timber grab upon our
national forests will release an estimated
4 gigatons of carbon equivalent by
2030, which would completely wipe out
any gains the Biden administration has
enacted against climate upheaval.
Will the people of Cascadia and
beyond defend their homeland and
biosphere by beating back Biden’s
lawless timber grab like citizens did
from 1995 to 2000? Defending and
preserving our last ancient forests
will create real gains in curtailing the
looming ecological and climate collapse.
Shannon Wilson
Glenwood
E U G E N E W E E K LY . C O M
THE U.S. STANDS ALONE IN
OPPOSING A CEASE-FIRE
What keeps me up at night is all the
children buried alive under the rubble
in Gaza. They live right now, trapped in
utter terror and desperation, waiting
for rescue. Right now they cry, hoping
someone will hear them. This is the
fate of dozens, maybe hundreds, of
Palestinians.
Our country stands alone in its vote to
continue the violence. The hypocrisy of
our veto against a global consensus for
cease fi re is plain for all to see. Whatever
tenuous lie we feed ourselves in the
isolation of the American perspective
will bear only poison fruit. Until one day
we may fi nd our own children screaming
in the darkness under the rubble, and
wonder how the world can sleep at night
knowing of such injustice.
I can no longer sleep soundly as
an American. Not because of some
privileged self interest for my own kin
and country, but because nothing could
ever persuade me to set aside empathy
for any child suff ering alone in darkness.
All the world, save our narrow Anglo-
Israeli alliance, acknowledges that same
human empathy. This is the line in the
sand which all of conscience should rush
to fi nd themselves on the right side of. It’s
the right side of history, which opposes
selfi sh and short-sighted political
interests that any free people should
turn their backs on. I turn my back on
this America, and I pray we can look our
own children in the eye if we allow the
totality of this genocide to unfold.
Eric Howanietz
Eugene
THANKS FOR GIVING US AN
OPINION FORUM
As the year comes to a close, I want to
thank Eugene Weekly for the incredible
opinion forum they provide for our letters.
Current opinions include the confl ict in
Gaza, the mayoral campaign, health care,
the need for the astrology column.
Many of us learn from the points of
view of others, on national issues like
renewing the expanded Child Tax Credit,
local issues like elections, global issues
like the End TB Now Act and confl icts
like Gaza. And this is just one aspect of a
very informative and entertaining local
paper. Let’s continue to share our ideas
and speak up in response to others, this
supports the paper and our democracy!
Willie Dickerson
Snohomish, Washington
FOCUS ON KINDNESS
FOR THE HOLIDAYS
With so much fear, chaos, wars and
hateful voices, my sense of sadness
turned to hope as I once again watched
It’s a Wonderful Life, seeing George
Bailey, in his darkest hour, rescued by
his neighbors and singing “We’ll take a
cup of kindness yet for Auld Lang Syne.”
I can choose kindness instead
of complaining or shutting others
out of my life. I have my wonderful
neighborhood, where we come from
diff erent countries and backgrounds
but care for each other through thick
and thin. My UMC faith community has
“Open Hearts, Open Doors.” Health
Care for All Oregon is leading the way
to a simplifi ed health care system with
everybody in and nobody out. I can work
with these folks and groups that are
seeking peace, justice, hope and health
for all, thus not contributing to the
anger, hate and sadness in our country
and world.
As a 94-year-old retired nurse, I
am hopeful that we'll all share cups of
kindness as our gift to family, friends
and even with those we may not agree
with this holiday season.
Shirley Kingsbury
Eugene
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