MARCH 9, 2018, KEIZERTIMES, PAGE A5
KeizerOpinion
KEIZERTIMES.COM
Keeping Keizer great takes
vigilance on all levels
Most people who make Keizer
their home made a conscientious de-
cision to live here. They are raising
their families or living the retirement
lifestyle. There is much to recommend
Keizer as a place to call home.
Some may lament what Keizer
does not have but the
goods far outweigh the
bads. Our city is led and
operated by a dedicated
group of people both
on the electoral and staff
levels; there really is not
much a resident requires
other than what is of-
fered currently.
It is an easy task to rebuff those
who say there is nothing to do in
Keizer. One need only point to our
19 parks, all the sports organizations
plus a professional baseball team. Arts?
Keizer has it. A lot of it. The Keizer
Art Association’s Enid Joy Mount
Gallery stages a new exhibition every
month. During the academic year ev-
ery school presents a wide variety of
concerts and plays.
In short Keizer is a wonderful place
to live. But, Keizer is not an island. We
cannot shut the gate at our borders
and tell the rest of the world to go
away. We may be Keizerites but we are
also patriotic Americans supporting
the U.S. Constitution and the Bill of
Rights. We look to our governments
to defend us and keep us safe—if it did
nothing else, we would be satisfi ed.
The American people of every
ideological stripe, of every econom-
ic level should be shocked that our
Commander in Chief remarked that
the United States might get a shot at
having a leader for life someday. Was it
a joke? If doesn’t matter. The leader of
a free country who is elected by the
people and limited to two terms has
no business musing about a leader for
life either in public or private. Such a
thought shouldn’t even exist.
Our president has expressed ad-
miration for China’s Xi Jingping and
other authorian leaders. China’s two-
term limit was eliminated, allowing
Jinping to serve as president for China
as long as he can.
We live in a country of laws and
our leaders swear to an oath that they
will defend and protect the Constitu-
tion of the United States, that includes
leaders at our local level.
Some may say that the Constituion
is a living document and was designed
to be amended and changed
(we’re up to 27 amendments
now including the fi rst ten
which comprise the Bill of
Rights). We hope that life in
America never gets so com-
plex and complicated that
the citizens completely turn
over their right to choose
their leader to a small cabal.
Though only half of eligible voters
cast a ballot in presidential elections, it
is still an election. Voting turnout rates
on the local level are even smaller.
When the people take their eye
off the governmental ball there will
always be some that will take up the
slack. When statesman, writers and
historians say that mankind’s greatest
experiment is America and its democ-
racy, too many tune that out.
The documents that give people
the right to keep and bear arms, to
marry someone of another faith or
race, to read and say what they like
and to travel anywhere is the same
document that lays out how we elect
our national leader and how long that
leader can remain in offi ce.
Is this a Keizer issue? Absolutely.
It’s an issue that is important in every
nook and cranny of this nation. Some
American citizens may never vote in
any election, they may not even care
about government politics. It doesn’t
matter, they are still citizens of the
United States and have the same pro-
tections and rights as everyone. One’s
citizen status does not rely on one’s
voting history.
One of the problems of not voting,
especially for president, is that every-
one who does vote in those elections
has an outsized infl uence. To the vic-
tor go the spoils, we, as a people, have
to assure the victor never views them-
self as indispensable and therefore de-
serving of serving for life.
—LAZ
Students
studying states
We will be having our
States Fair at the end of the
school year to display all of
our information.
I look forward to re-
ceiving information about
Oregon. It can be mailed
to:
Mr. Van Winkle’s
5th-6th Grade Class
Faith Christian School
PO Box 3048
Kearney, NE 68848
Attn: Keira
Kip Van Winkle
Kearney, NE
our
opinion
To the Editor:
My name is Keira and
I am a 6th grader at Faith
Christian School in Kear-
ney, Neb. My class is study-
ing the 50 states and I have
chosen Oregon as my state.
Our assisgnment is to fi nd out as
much about our states as we can and
I would like your readers to help me
out. I hope they will send me informa-
tion about Oregon: maps, brochures,
souvenirs or anything else that would
be helpful.
letters
School bond is big, but important
By CHUCK LEE
We have overcrowding issues
throughout
the
Salem-Keizer
School District that will
only worsen if we don’t
act quickly and effectively.
Our student population
is growing at the same
moment our facilities are
aging and overtaxed.
You need to go no fur-
ther to see the seriousness
of our space issues than
to visit Keizer Elemen-
tary School during any lunch pe-
riod. There you will see our kids
bunched up in a packed corridor,
waiting to have a quick moment
at the salad bar or to be served a
hot lunch from a line that brings
to mind a freight train with no ca-
boose in sight.
Despite sincere efforts to accom-
modate the lunchtime surge, there
are simply too many hungry kids in
too small of an area.
For lack of cafeteria space, many
students carry their trays through
the school and wind back to their
schoolroom desks to eat. Even
though the students try hard to
avoid messes, mishaps are inevitable,
kids being kids.
Keizer students deserve better,
and a solution is just three months
away.
The 2018 school bond measure,
to be decided in May, addresses the
need for not just more cafeterias
but more classrooms, more science
labs, more gyms and fi tness areas,
more commons areas, and more
vocational-technical career spaces.
The bond will pro-
vide a direct response
to some of the more
vexing societal prob-
lems we face here in
Keizer and across the
country: the need for
more STEM (science,
technology, engineer-
ing and math) courses,
the shocking rise of
childhood obesity, and the need for
a well-trained workforce to fi ll jobs
in construction, digital design, au-
tomotive body repair, cosmetology
and more.
In my work as president of our
Career Technical Education Center
(CTEC), I’ve seen what can happen
when high school kids are provided
with state-of-the-art facilities and
instruction. Graduation rates soar.
The school bond will provide a
major boost to technical and voca-
tional education across the district,
placing us in a position of leader-
ship in Oregon.
But there’s more.
Some $99 million will go toward
keeping our kids safe, strengthening
spaces that are of high risk of col-
lapse in an earthquake, upgrading
badge access and intercom systems,
and relocating or renovating front
offi ces at 34 schools.
We are at a moment in history
when traumatic events are forcing
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(Chuck Lee represents Keizer on
the Salem-Keizer Schools Board.)
Is democracy losing ground in the US?
In America we may now have
come to a crossroads as to how we
want our government to be orga-
nized and run, if, among some of us,
we want any government at all. Our
history lessons, from the nation’s
founding, report that those former
colonists able to vote, narrowly vot-
ed in favor of the U.S. Constitution
and Bill of Rights, while heated de-
bate has preceded and
followed the adoption
of every amendment
since.
A reading of our
history discloses many
a subsequent develop-
ment that was gener-
ally unacceptable in that
fateful year, 1776. A
short list of those issues would have
to include an end to slavery, suffrage
for women, and full citizenship sta-
tus for African-Americans. Further,
our democracy goes on with debate
after debate on every new major is-
sue, most recently exampled by gun
controls and health insurance for
every American.
One debated issue in more re-
cent years has been labeled, “creep-
ing socialism.” The debate mainly
originates from the establishment
of Social Security and other federal
work and aid programs that came
into existence during the Depres-
sion. It continues to this day and has
been nationally heightened during
the fi rst year of the Donald Trump
administration as the president, his
cabinet and “Trump Party” mem-
bers proceed with the wish to move
Social Security to private owner-
ship and sharply defund—if not
terminate—other federal programs
such as Medicare, Medicaid and the
Affordable Care Act.
In America, there are a consider-
able number of citizens alarmed and
anxious over what may be viewed
as “creeping totalitarianism.” There
are examples throughout the world
of well-established totalitarian states
found in most of Africa, Asia and
Eastern Europe. Their number is
so large as to discourage their list-
ing here in limited space. As long
as the Constitution with the Bill of
Rights, our government of checks
and balances and our governmental
institutions and agencies remain in
place, then our democracy is safe.
Unfortunately, these long-standing
safeguards against corrup-
tions in U.S. government
are under attack and there-
by threatened.
Three novelists, a Ca-
nadian, a Brit and an
American, have written
fi ctional trips that take the
reader into dystopian plac-
es through novels such as
Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s
Tale, George Orwell’s 1984 and Ray
Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451. Dysto-
pian stories are usually stories about
survival where the main theme is
oppression and rebellion. Dysto-
pian stories take place in nations
devastated by pollution while war,
revolutions, overpopulation and
other disasters abound. Only three
of these dystopian stories are men-
tioned here; however, there are
many others in this genre an inter-
net search can fi nd.
The institution of the family is
eradicated in some of these stories
where children are reproduced ar-
tifi cially and romantic love is for-
bidden. The stories emphasize the
powerlessness of the individual in
the face of demeaning oppression
and brutal government policies
controlled by totalitarian dictators.
Paranoia is ubiquitous among the
citizens of dystopian societies who
live in fear and are totally manipu-
lated. For example, in The Hand-
maid’s Tale, women have no rights,
in 1984 love is forbidden so when
the main character fi nds it he is ulti-
mately brainwashed to feel affection
only for Big Brother, and Fahrenheit
451 is set in a place where all books
gene
h.
mcintyre
Keizertimes
communities to re-evaluate risks.
The bond measure will defray the
costs of school security at a time
when it is a daily dinner table con-
versation topic.
Finally, this much-needed mea-
sure meets a long-held goal of mine.
As a Keizer resident and school
board member representing our
community’s interests, I’ve pressed
for expansion at McNary High,
rather than see the construction of
a new area high school to replace it.
This expansion will keep Keiz-
er high school students in Keizer,
and the bond will allow for suffi -
cient onsite parking on the campus,
which will eliminate the practice of
students parking in nearby neigh-
borhoods. Please remember that
when your ballots arrive in the mail.
When the bond passes, as I be-
lieve it will, McNary will benefi t
signifi cantly, as will our middle and
elementary schools.
Yes, the bond measure is big:
$619.2 million. But I ask that you
take the time before Election Day
to familiarize yourself with the
scope of the measure and how a
wave of critically important im-
provements will roll across the dis-
trict. If we fail to act, the problems
won’t disappear. And projections al-
most guarantee our student popula-
tion will expand.
We have the capability to meet
the challenges head on.Vote yes.
are burned.
Our nation has made great
strides over the years in an ongo-
ing effort for Americans to embrace
the American Dream; yet, it remains
out of reach for millions. Condi-
tions suchas racism, inequality, infe-
rior educational opportunities, di-
minished upward mobility and the
concentration of wealth and power
has found its way into the hands of
a tiny minority that works against
new membership.
What’s “creeping” at high veloc-
ity is the ubiquitous corruption by
government offi cials who swore an
oath upon assuming offi ce to pro-
tect and preserve the United States
of America. Par and parcel of what’s
happening promises to further di-
vide our nation and is enhanced by
the constant din from the country’s
leader and his devoted followers
who claim fake news and witch-
craft through use of prevarications.
Hence, corruption is public service,
lies are truth, and dead ends are op-
portunity.
So, we’ve reached a very serious
place. Will the values and traditions
brought by the U.S. Constitution
and our “better angels” suffi ciently
rally us to save ourselves or will the
greatest idea ever proposed, the one
penned by our founders to establish
and maintain ‘liberty and justice for
all,’ be sustained or join the dustbin
of history. The 11th hour has ar-
rived while delayed action could
bring America to a place, having
caused so that’s irreversible, there
can be no reversal.
(Gene H. McIntyre lives in Keizer.)
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