THE DAILY ASTORIAN • FRIDAY, JUNE 17, 2016
FRIDAY EXCHANGE
Some extremists ire guns;
other extremists promote guns
Food is like art
A
fter reading the Mouth of
the Columbia’s review,
“Life in the Slow Lane”
(Coast Weekend, June 2), I
feel compelled to share my
point of view.
Food is like art, different
people like different things.
Who are they to say the way
it should be, what they didn’t
like, and what they could
have done better? I have been
occasionally reading these
reviews for years, now, and
am appalled at their seem-
ingly mean and holier than
thou tone. Tastes differ, and if
yo feel the need to employ a
food critic, why can’t they be
subjective, and helpful in their
reviews, instead of mean and
hurtful?
I made a point to stop by
and introduce myself after
reading the review. The owner
stated to me that she was up
all night crying because of
it. They have obviously put
their heart and soul into a
place that they thought peo-
ple would enjoy. Let people
decide whether they like it or
not — and God forbid, if they
don’t, then they can go to Yelp
and TripAdvisor and play
food critic. They don’t have
to come back. Let the people
decide on their own.
To include three other
businesses as better alterna-
tives in one review is simply
unfair. With quotes like “attire
that’s oddly aristocratic for
the carnival fare,” and “food
is an afterthought,” are nega-
tive things to say about a new
business trying to make it.
Why doesn’t this person say it
wasn’t to my liking?
Lastly, why does The Daily
Astorian still feel the need
to hire someone who slams
new or old local businesses
in these antiquated reviews,
unless, of course, The Mouth
likes them? Shouldn’t The
Daily Astorian want to help
promote and support local
businesses, especially the new
ones?
ERIC JENKINS
Astoria
It’s not too late
A
s I saw all the pictures
and celebrations of the
young people in our area
graduating and moving on
with their lives, I thought to
myself: How many times I’ve
said to myself (and perhaps
you have, too), boy, I wish I
knew then what I know now
when I, like these graduates,
was just getting started in life.
What a difference it might
have made.
Of course we can’t go
back, but we can realize why
it’s so incumbent of those of
us who have accumulated
wisdom in our many years
of facing the ups and downs
of our lives, to mentor the
younger generation.
Retired, bored, bound up
with your own problems?
Why not ind a way to get
involved with the younger
generation? Volunteer, teach,
share your trials and triumphs
with them.
Someone has said, “What
I kept I lost, but what I gave
I have.” How many of us go
to our graves with a message
in our hearts that we’ve never
shared with family or friends
that would have been a lift,
a blessing to them? It’s not
too late. Write a letter, make
a call, make a visit. As you
bless, you’ll surely be blessed.
JIM BERNARD
Warrenton
Ban neonicotinoids
I
appreciated the article,
“Beekeepers struggle to
keep ag buzzing” (The Daily
Astorian, June 10). Bees are
critical to our food system,
helping to pollinate nearly one
in every three bites of food
that we eat, and their high
rates of decline are alarming.
As the article states,
numerous factors contrib-
ute to hive losses. However,
neonicotinoids, which are
6,000 times more toxic than
DDT, should be recognized as
a key contributor. In addition,
more than any other factor,
neonicotinoid use is some-
thing we can control — we
have the ability to make sure
these toxic pesticides stay off
the market.
Admirably, Oregon has
been at the forefront of
acknowledging this, with
Eugene becoming the irst city
in the nation to ban neonicoti-
5A
By NICHOLAS KRISTOF
New York Times News
Service
O
ver the past two
decades, Canada has
had eight mass shootings.
Just so far this month, the
United States has already had
20.
noids, and Portland following
suit in 2015. Of course, this
should be celebrated and rep-
licated, but with hive losses as
high as 45 percent, we sim-
ply don’t have time to wait for
individual cities to ban neon-
icotinoids on their own. What
we really need is a ban at the
federal level.
To make this happen, we
must call on the Environmen-
tal Protection Agency to move
forward with their research
and take action to ban neon-
icotinoids. Failure to ban
these bee-killing pesticides
will have disastrous effects
— after all, no bees means no
food.
CASHEN CONROY
Environment Oregon
Portland
Big questions
W
hy in their “right”
minds did Columbia
Memorial Hospital consider
building a wing on the adja-
cent ill area for their expan-
sion in the 21st century? Eight
years before, geological stud-
ies put forth a case of lique-
faction during an earthquake
for Scow Bay, illed in during
the early 1900s, where the
hospital and football ield
were built. The medical facil-
ity traded a stadium built near
the dump for the football ield
next to them, possibly because
the people in charge didn’t see
the big picture.
And so it goes with the
continual promise of the
Bond Street Reconstruction.
For three years I’ve been ask-
ing the Astoria City Coun-
cil, the mayor and my council
representatives in community
sessions: When will Bond
Street’s slide be ixed so we
have a two-lane street for a
trafic outlet?
My concern: Marine
Drive is the only other major
exit from the city on the
west. Bond Street has a traf-
ic light, for low, to regulate
additional vehicles to Marine
Drive. How long will it be
until it’s repaired? I’ve con-
tacted the Oregon Depart-
ment of Geology and Mineral
Industries (DOGAMI), Asto-
ria Public Works (Ken Cook)
and Council Representative
Cindy Price. I’m hoping for
progress.
P. MATTSON
McDONALD
Astoria
Water wise
I
am writing this letter as a
shout out to all homeown-
ers who live in the Youngs
River Lewis & Clark Water
District. The YRLC Water
Board made a decision — not
on independent engineered
data, but on their need for
some fast cash. The decisions
the YRLC board makes today
will affect us all 20 to 30 years
down the road, and there will
be no going back.
The board is 100 per-
cent behind a zoning change
that would allow for the con-
struction of 168 apartments at
Miles Crossing. I believe that
the district’s irst allegiance
should be to ensure that there
will be adequate water sup-
ply to current users, and to
those property owners who
may wish to build a home in
the future. There are people
in our district who have been
paying taxes on buildable lots
for many years. Will there
be water for them when they
want to build, or will we have
another long moratorium?
According to an article in
The Daily Astorian, “Paciic
County rivers at record lows”
(June 9), Paciic County is
experiencing its lowest stream
lows on record in the Willapa
and Naselle rivers. They have
been keeping records for 86
years, and the rivers are run-
ning at 26 percent of aver-
age low. This is scary. I want
to know that my family will
have water now, and in the
many years to come.
The water board refuses to
budge on their position, but
you can let your county com-
missioners know how you
feel about this. It is not too
late now, but it will be soon.
ELENA MILLER
Astoria
Thanks for paper
A
ll I wanted to write to you
is to say thank you —
you, and everyone else who
works at The Daily Astorian,
does a wonderful job, and I
enjoy reading a few articles
every once in awhile.
You guys do a great job
with selecting topics and
bringing out news that I would
not have heard from any-
where else. I am always able
to ind at least one topic in the
newspaper that I can enjoy at
any given time throughout my
day. I hope to keep seeing new
stories that can kill some time
when I have nothing to do
during the day.
CHRISTOPHER
MONTANO
Astoria
Time for Hillary
I
t’s time to throw in the
towel, boys. Bernie, take
your inger-wagging, apo-
plectic, righteous indigna-
tion schtick back to Washing-
ton and do what senators are
elected to do — shovel that
pork back to Vermont.
And, D.T., it was great
entertainment while it lasted,
in the great tradition of Amer-
ican political buffoonery,
much loved by the likes of
Will Rogers, H.L. Mencken,
Mark Twain and Groucho
Marx. “Crazy Bernie” and
“Pocahontas” Warren was
brilliant, and upstaging Hil-
lary’s trip to the ladies’ room
was genius, to say nothing of
your front page photo-op with
the Pope.
As show business people
are wont to put it, “There is
no such thing as bad public-
ity.” And, from beginning to
end, you knew how to garner
it. But, the party’s over and its
time for you to get a gig with
Saturday Night Live — per-
haps doing parodies of Don-
ald Trump.
It has been dinned into our
ears for decades now that men
in power have been screwing
up the world for millennia,
and it is time for the nurtur-
ing, caring, supportive, con-
ciliatory hand of a woman to
lead us into a halcyon future.
In November, we will have
that opportunity. Let’s just do
it.
LOUIS SARGENT
Gearhart
Canada has a much smaller
population, of course, and the
criteria that researchers used
for each country are slightly
different, but that still says
something important about
public safety.
Could it be, as Donald
Trump suggests, that the peril
comes from admitting Mus-
lims? On the contrary, Cana-
dians are safe despite having
been far more hospitable to
Muslim refugees: Canada has
admitted more than 27,000
Syrian refugees since Novem-
ber, some 10 times the number
the United States has.
More broadly, Canada’s
population is 3.2 percent Mus-
lim, while the United States is
about 1 percent Muslim — yet
Canada doesn’t have massa-
cres like the one we just expe-
rienced at a gay nightclub in
Orlando, Florida, or the one in
December in San Bernardino,
California. So perhaps the
problem isn’t so much Mus-
lims out of control but guns out
of control.
Look, I grew up on a farm
with guns. One morning when
I was 10, we awoke at dawn to
hear our chickens squawking
frantically and saw a fox trot-
ting away with one of our hens
in its mouth. My dad grabbed
his .308 rile, opened the win-
dow and ired twice. The
fox was unhurt but dropped
its breakfast and led. The
hen picked herself up, shook
her feathers indignantly and
walked back to the barn. So
in the right context, guns have
their uses.
The problem is that we
make no serious effort to keep
irearms out of the hands of
violent people. A few data
points:
• More Ameri-
But it’s not too
cans have died from
dangerous to allow
guns, including sui-
the sale of an assault
cides, since just
rile without even a
1970 than died in
background check?
all the wars in U.S.
If we’re try-
history going back
ing to prevent car-
to the American
nage like that of
Revolution.
Orlando, we need
• The Civil War
to be vigilant not
marks by far the
only about iniltra-
Nicholas
most savage period
tion
by the Islamic
Kristof
of warfare in U.S.
State, and not only
history. But more Americans about U.S. citizens poisoned
are now killed from guns annu- into committing acts of terror-
ally, again including suicides, ism. We also need to be vigi-
than were killed by guns on lant about National Rile Asso-
average each year during the ciation-type extremism that
Civil War (when many of the allows guns to be sold without
deaths were from disease, not background checks.
guns).
It’s staggering that Con-
• In the United States, more gress doesn’t see a problem
preschoolers up through age 4 with allowing people on ter-
are shot dead each year than ror watch lists to buy guns: In
police oficers are.
each of the past three years,
Canada has put in place more than 200 people on the
measures that make it more dif- terror watch list have been
icult for a dangerous person to allowed to purchase guns. We
acquire a gun, with a focus not empower the Islamic State
so much on banning weapons when we permit acolytes like
entirely (the AR-15 is available the Orlando killer, investi-
after undergoing safety train- gated repeatedly as a terror-
ing and a screening) as on lim- ist threat, to buy a Sig Sauer
iting who can obtain one. In MCX and a Glock 17 hand-
the United States, we lack even gun on consecutive days.
universal background checks,
A great majority of Mus-
and new Harvard research to lims are peaceful, and it’s
be published soon found that unfair to blame Islam for ter-
40 percent of gun transfers rorist attacks like the one in
didn’t even involve a back- Orlando. But it is important to
ground check.
hold accountable Gulf states
We can’t prevent every gun like Saudi Arabia that are well-
death any more than we can springs of religious zealotry,
prevent every car accident, and intolerance and fanaticism. We
the challenge is particularly should also hold accountable
acute with homegrown terror- our own political igures who
ists like the one in Orlando. But exploit tragic events to sow
experts estimate that a serious bigotry. And, yes, that means
effort to reduce gun violence Donald Trump.
might reduce the toll by one-
When Trump scapegoats
third, which would be more Muslims, that also damages
than 10,000 lives saved a year. our own security by bolstering
The Orlando killer would the us-versus-them narrative of
have been legally barred from the Islamic State. The lesson
buying lawn darts, because of history is that extremists on
they were banned as unsafe. one side invariably empower
He would have been unable extremists on the other.
to drive a car that didn’t pass
So by all means, Muslims
a safety inspection or that around the world should stand
lacked insurance. He couldn’t up to their fanatics sowing
have purchased a black water hatred and intolerance — and
gun without an orange tip — we Americans should stand up
because that would have been to our own extremists doing
too dangerous.
just the same.
Shut the Mouth
P
lease shut the Mouth of
the Columbia. To what
end is the anonymous restau-
rant review continued? To ill
space? To possibly sell ads? To
possibly sell ads for rebuttals?
To enhance one business over
another?
In previous generations,
our small town newspaper
writers were usually aware of
the local residents, knew them,
their history, and relationships.
However, today’s generation,
through the ubiquitous use of
the social media, with no con-
straints, can anonymously
bully, hate, and deride any-
one. At least the modern ven-
ues such as Yelp or TripAdvi-
sor generate various opinions
and votes; a single published
review does not.
Further observation seems
to indicate that a trend of urban
replants to a small town brings
with it a would-be elitist atti-
tude allowing mockery of the
provincials therein.
PAUL VAN DER VELDT
Astoria
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