PAGE A6, KEIZERTIMES, MAY 10, 2019
Opinion
Why I support
Chuck Lee
pitbulls is a key step
for ending all violence,
which is why it’s im-
portant to resolve the
problem by educating
people.
For clarifi cation, the
term, “pitbull,” actual-
ly classifi es four dog breeds, but the
original breed is the American Pit-
bull Terrier.
To start off, the main cause of pit-
bull abuse is the dog owner. The im-
portant thing to look at is why own-
ers abuse their pitbulls. A main cause
of animal abuse is if the owners are
violent towards people, such as do-
mestic abusers and criminals. People
also abuse their pitbulls because they
want to entertain themselves and
gain money. This happens through
the horrible culture of dog-fi ghting.
It still happens currently, but it’s un-
der the radar.
Another component of the prob-
lem is the history of the dog breeds.
It’s well known that pitbulls have a
bad reputation and are labeled as ag-
gressive. The label built mainly came
from the dog-fi ghting culture, where
people treat them with unimaginable
cruelty in order to make them fi ght
better. This perception affects the
way people look at the dogs.
So, how can we change this? To
help solve pitbull abuse, one solution
would be teaching about the prob-
lem. This includes public visuals, such
as PSAs and speeches. By taking this
action, it’ll raise awareness and inspire
people to assist the dogs for freedom.
To bring this back together, pit-
bull abuse should be resolved by ed-
ucating society about the problem,
revealing that these dogs want to be
loved just like anyone.
Rosemarie Rojas
Keizer
letters
To the Editor:
I am supporting Chuck
Lee
for
Salem/Keizer
School Board Zone 6
I have known Chuck for
over 25 years and have seen his com-
mitment to education fi rst hand.
Over the years, we have worked
on various projects and committees
where I was fortunate to watch and
learn from him. His knowledge and
connections within our district have
made him an asset and keeps stability
on our school board.
Back when Chuck was a Keizer
City Councilor, he encouraged me
to continue my community work
and consider taking a more active
role in city matters. When I was fi eld
director for Keizer Little League and
Chuck was president of Blanchet
Catholic School, he was a helpful re-
source on several fi eld projects. I can
never forget that.
In 2013, Chuck and wife Krina
Lee were honored at the First Cit-
izen Banquet with the “Education
Award” for their years of service to
education in our district.
As founder and president of the
Career and Technical Education
Center, he reached out to me to
participate on the Advisory Board
bringing a diversity of opinions to a
nationally renowned school.
I encourage you to vote for a
person who has a 35-year record of
accomplishments to go with his in-
tegrity.
I encourage you to vote for
Chuck Lee.
Roland Herrera
Keizer
A better way to
board airplanes
To the Editor:
We all know that boarding air-
planes takes way too much time.
The typical system creates a blockage
in the aisle, causing a line in the jet
bridge.
One of the main reasons for this is
people bringing carry-ons. Because
the airlines are charging for checked
bags, more passengers are bringing
carry on bags with them. With this
in mind, it seems obvious. The more
people trying to stow their bags in
the overhead bin, the more time it
would take to completely board the
aircraft.
The effects of the time it takes to
board a plane is turn time between
revenue fl ight. The longer it takes for
airlines to board passengers, the lon-
ger it takes before the plane can take-
off, reach its destination, and repeat
the process.
Airlines continue to use this sys-
tem because of the benefi ts they can
offer. These can include early board-
ing access, frequent fl yer rewards, and
credit cards.
A faster boarding system is one
that was developed by Jason Stef-
fen, an astrophysicist. His method is
boarding the window seats on every
other row for one side, then the oth-
er. Then fi ll in the other sides win-
dow seats and continue to board in a
similar fashion. This is simply a stag-
gered way of boarding outside-in.
Boarding planes takes way too
much time and could be solved. By
changing the order in which passen-
gers board, it will create less distur-
bance during the process and thus
take less time.
Ian Baseler
Keizer
By nature pitbulls
are not a danger
To the Editor:
Ending abusive behavior towards
Ocean pollution
To the Editor:
Ocean pollution has rapidly in-
creased in the past years, National
Oceanic and Atmospheric Associa-
tion states, “The majority of pollut-
ants going into the ocean come from
activities on land. Natural processes
and human activities along the coast-
lines and far inland affect the health
of our ocean. One of the biggest
sources is called non-point source
pollution, which occurs as a result of
runoff. Non-point source pollution
includes many small sources, like sep-
tic tanks, cars, trucks, and boats, plus
larger sources, such as farms, livestock
ranches and timber harvest areas.
Pollution that comes from a single
source, like an oil or chemical spill, is
known as point source pollution. Of-
ten these events have large impacts,
but fortunately, they occur less often.
Discharge from faulty or damaged
factories or water treatment systems
is also considered point source pol-
lution. There are damages: sea crea-
tures dying, loss of habitat, islands
in the ocean getting polluted, lastly,
unhealthy water. Based off of my life
when living on the islands, I’ve al-
ready seen and felt the major effects
ocean pollution has caused.
One obstacle that will stand in
the way of starting is trying to per-
suade people to helping clean. Sec-
ond, there will be the need of having
money to buy ships for hauling trash.
It’s better to start now before it’s too
big to handle, according to research,
the garbage in the pacifi c is twice the
size of Texas. The world needs to see
what’s happening to the ocean/how
everyone can help make a change.
Aron Jessy
Salem
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The $2 trillion infrastructure trap
By DEBRA J. SAUNDERS
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi
and Senate Minority Leader Chuck
Schumer emerged from the White
House after meeting with President
Donald Trump. They announced that
Trump and congressional Democrats
had agreed to spend $2 trillion on a
big infrastructure package.
It’s amazing how
chummy partisans can
be when they doubt they
will actually have to get
anything
done—oth-
er than set a trap for the
other side.
Schumer
confessed
Democrats were ready
to come in with a lower
number, but Trump was
gung-ho on $2 tril.
And why not? The chances are
next to nil they will pass actual legis-
lation before the 2020 election. In the
meantime, as they prepare to blame
the other side for a failure to fi x crum-
bling roads and bridges, they can leave
the impression in the public mind that
a trillion here and a trillion there is
just loose change.
Adie Tomer of the Brookings Insti-
tution was taken aback by Washington
biggies throwing out such a huge sum
as if it’s not a complete sea change. He
noted, “What they unwittingly an-
nounced today is another New Deal,
like FDR’s New Deal. That’s how big
this would be.”
While they’re talking about a 10-
year spending plan, that’s a huge
chunk of change. And if Washington
solons don’t come up with a way to
pay for it—standard operating proce-
dure in this town—the notion could
add to the $22 trillion national debt.
As it is, according to the Commit-
tee for a Responsible Federal Budget,
“A child born in the United States
today will immediately
inherit almost $50,000”
in IOUs.
Schumer also told
reporters that in three
weeks, Trump would de-
tail how he plans to fund
the package. Given the
president’s reluctance to
make the public pay for
his high-rise schemes,
that sure sounds like a setup for failure.
Democrats want Trump to shave
back the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act
to pay for big projects. The likeli-
hood of Trump taking back some of
his own tax cuts is only slightly more
likely than Trump admitting he’s ever
been wrong about something. Senate
Majority Leader Mitch McConnell
has called a peel-back of the tax cut
a “nonstarter.” But even if he hadn’t,
the GOP Senate is not going to raise
taxes.
A hike in the gas tax could help pay
for the package, but it can’t fund the
many things that Democrats defi ne as
“infrastructure”—broadband in ev-
ery American home, more money for
housing, more spending on renewable
other
voices
energy and fi ghting climate change.
No wonder White House counselor
Kellyanne Conway warned Demo-
crats not to push through a version of
the Green New Deal under the guise
of infrastructure.
But Democrats declared that re-
newable energy projects that address
climate change must be part of the
infrastructure package. Sen. Brian
Schatz, D-Hawaii, told VICE News,
“Without a clean-energy emphasis,
it’s a nonstarter.”
They undercut their purpose by
putting the need to spend on water
infrastructure in the same bucket as
paying for broadband. If everything is
a priority, nothing is priority.
Also, it would be nice to see Wash-
ington spend on maintaining deteri-
orating buildings and bridges rather
than building high-ticket edifi ces and
railways.
Then there’s the far-left rump of
House Democrats that wants to fo-
cus on impeaching Trump rather than
working with him in any way.
Pelosi told reporters, “We cannot
ignore the needs of the American
people.” She shouldn’t sell short the
far-left members of her caucus who
hate Trump so much they are prepared
to oppose big government spending.
In short, both parties are likely to
sabotage any deal, then blame the oth-
er guy for not working hard for the
hardworking taxpayer.
(Creators Syndicate)
Can Americans ever be united against foes?
A daily question returns to this
writer’s mind: What would it take to
unite the American people as we ap-
proach the third decade of the 21st
century? Most Americans were united
in a common effort to defeat the Japan
and Nazi Germany after the attack on
Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941. Yet, even
a day before that ‘day of infamy,’ there
were prominent leaders in the U.S.,
including Henry Ford and Charles
Lindberg, who favored working with
Hitler.
Nowadays and into
the foreseeable future, the
Russian Federation ap-
pears as the biggest threat.
One would think it wiser
for the Russians to work
with the U.S. as we out-
perform the Russians in
every possible compar-
ison and stand stronger by military
might. Nevertheless, relations with
Russia have always been tenuous and
diffi cult from the 1917 founding of the
USSR as a “Godless communist state”
down through the tumultuous allied
relationship to defeat Nazi Germany
and Russian “help” to bring down the
Empire of Japan after it was all but de-
feated.
Almost immediately after WWII,
the Cold War got underway and per-
sisted through to the late 1980s. Ul-
timately the USSR lost the Cold War
and was dissolved. Afterward there
was a hint of promise that the U.S. and
the newly-named Russian Federation
might work for the common good
of both nations. It was soon clear that
such cooperation was not to be.
A rebellious crowd of Russians led
by Vladimir Putin, a former KGB se-
cret police enforcer and that nation’s
wealthy oligarchs who, like jihadists,
hate America and all the West and
view the North Atlantic Treaty Or-
ganization as a threat to their security
and, of greatest importance to them, a
check against their world domination
and subjugation. Hence, the movers
and shakers in Russia have now ded-
icated themselves to subverting and
destroying all democracies with a plan,
implemented daily, under Putin’s dic-
tatorial direction.
Now we have President Donald
Trump and family members, led at
times by son-in-law and special ad-
visor, Jared Kushner (he who’s been
denied an FBI clearance) has delivered
another big lie among the thousands
delivered by President Trump, Don
Jr., Ivanka and Eric over the past two
years. In his remarks at a
Time magazine function,
Kushner downplayed the
signifi cance of Russian
interference in the 2016
election, remarking, “I
think the (Mueller-led)
investigations and all of
the speculation has had a
much harsher impact on
our democracy than a couple of (Rus-
sian) Facebook ads.”
Even though heavily redacted and
misrepresented by Attorney General
William Barr, we are now well aware
that a wide-ranging Russian opera-
tion included, but was not limited to,
hacking Hillary Clinton, U.S. Senators
Marco Rubio and Lindsey Graham,
the Democratic National Committee
and the Democratic Congressional
gene h.
mcintyre
Campaign Committee, the Repub-
lican National Committee, probing
state voter databases for weaknesses
and stealing hundreds of voters’ per-
sonal information. Also, Putin is be-
hind spreading propaganda aimed at
enhancing division and depressing the
vote through fake accounts on social
media, staging rallies in Florida, Penn-
sylvania, and New York, and setting
up multiple meetings with members
of the Trump campaign in a criminal-
ly-underhanded effort to elect Donald
Trump.
We Americans accept or ignore the
shenanigans of Jared Kushner and the
Trump family at our greatest peril.
They have unabashedly proven they
work to acquire personal wealth and
power at America’s expense. Having
witnessed and enjoyed the enhanced
unity that developed and was sustained
during the Kennedy and Reagan ad-
ministrations, we now witness the
sowing of discord, strife and disunity
by the Trump administration. Mean-
while, the Trumps have shown us that,
instead of unifying us, they apparently
labor hardest at building a mega-prof-
iting hotel in Putin’s Moscow with a
penthouse for the autocrat.
(Gene H. McIntyre shares his opin-
ion regularly in the Keizertimes.)