A4 Wednesday, March 18, 2020
HOOD RIVER NEWS | Hood River, Ore.
hoodrivernews.com
OPINION
Our Readers Write
‘Crime in
Hood River’
Dear Hood River News,
This is Caden Tubbs and I am
writing to you about a concern
about our crime safety.
There has been a lot of sto-
len items recently and people
should do something about it.
Let me tell you of some recent
crimes:
1. My friend’s dad’s bike was
stolen off of his porch and re-
placed with another stolen bike
because it was “better.”
2. On the 10th of February,
someone stole from a storage
building, and multiple items
were taken.
3. On the first of March, there
was a man arrested for drunk
driving.
These are only a small per-
centage of the crime going on
right now. We need to take bet-
ter care of our stuff and follow
the laws.
Sincerely,
Caden Tubbs
Hood River Middle School
Bike safety
I love bicyclists. I’d scrape the
dust off my old bike if it weren’t
for old hip and knee injuries.
So, it was incredibly discon-
certing to see some incredibly
irresponsible bike riding March
12 approximately 3:15 p.m. at
the intersection of 6th and State
streets. You barreled south-
bound down the Sixth Street hill
and made an illegal right turn
onto eastbound State without
stopping, at full speed, into a line
of cars. Then without looking
behind you at all, you cut right
in front of the car in front of me
before turning southbound onto
Second.
Fortunately, all of us must
have read about the innocent
people getting hit by cars in
the library crosswalk, as we
were all going below the speed
limit (which you were exceed-
ing). And fortunately, you didn’t
cause an accident, because as
a witness I would have testified
(truthfully) in a court of law
exactly what I stated in this
Letter to the Editor. So, to all the
responsibly bicyclists out there
(and that is most of you), I’ll love
you even more if you call out
irresponsible bicyclists for their
dangerous behaviors.
Jeff Zipfel
The Dalles
Thanks,
Thomsen
My thanks go to Chuck Thom-
sen, along with other Repub-
licans, for the moral courage
to block the severely harmful
Cap and Trade bill that would
seriously impact business’ very
survival. It also would aversely
affect people on limited income.
This issue, which impacts so
many people, should be decid-
ed by voters in Oregon … not by
Kate Brown, not a small number
of people in Salem. And the bill
would not benefit the climate!
Donald Rose
Hood River
Harmful
inaction
During the past several
weeks, I have attended meet-
ings where difficult decisions
had to be made. Even though
there were strong feelings on
both sides of each issue, partici-
pants listened respectfully, used
informed and reasoned argu-
ments to defend their position,
and eventually came to either
consensus or compromise. This
is democracy in action, and it
has the power to bridge gaps,
promote mutual respect, and
allow meaningful action to take
place for the good of the group.
It’s the cornerstone of democ-
racy, and it’s what we should
expect from elected officials.
During the past several
weeks, difficult decisions had
to be made in the Oregon Leg-
islature. Republican senators
chose to walk away when things
were not going their way. They
chose departure and dereliction
of duty over deliberation and
discussion. This is democracy
inaction, and it widens gaps,
fuels partisanship, and prevents
any action whatsoever from
moving forward. It’s behavior
unbecoming to elected officials
who, by accepting public office,
must represent all constituents
regardless of party affiliation or
personal bias.
Anne Gehrig
Hood River
‘Trump/CDC
2020’
In January of 2017 President
Trump stated, “We have by far
the highest IQ of any cabinet
ever assembled.” I have no idea
how many of these geniuses
have been fired or quit. I do care
about what has NOT happened
over Trump’s three-plus years
in office.
We are constantly reminded
by President Trump how much
he accomplished in his first 100
days in office. Somehow over
three years, the topic of disease
testing and management got
lost in all the deregulation, tax
cuts, bloviating, and tweets. This
is a huge surprise to me since
just last week, Trump bragged
about his “natural ability” to
understand diseases. He even
questioned whether he should
have gone into that field instead
of becoming president.
Conspiracy theories now
blame Europe, Obama, and
basically every Democrat for
the coronavirus pandemic. If
Trump were an ordinary man, I
would be grateful he is running
out of people to blame. Then
I remember how many times
Sen. McCain was blamed by
our president for events which
occurred even after his death.
Maybe we should give Trump
a shot at running the CDC?...
It cannot get any worse given
the way he represents us as
president.
Steve Kaplan
Hood River
Misinformation
In Hugh McMahan’s letter
on March 11, he suggested that
the recent tornado in Kentucky
was evidence of “increasing fre-
quency and extremes” because
of climate change. That is mis-
information of the highest order.
There is absolutely no scientific
evidence that the tornado in
Kentucky or any other tornado
occurred or was made worse be-
cause humans are burning fossil
fuels. Your statement is nothing
more than speculation and fear
mongering. The letter goes on
to claim that peer reviewed sci-
ence “finds CO2 the highly likely
cause.” Since when was science
concerned with “highly likely”
and what does that mean? There
is no climate crisis. Stop the fear
mongering and misinformation.
Also, I support Chuck Thom-
sen and all the other Repub-
licans for walking out. Tax in-
creases are supposed to origi-
nate in the House, and we were
told the short legislative sessions
were not for big policy changes
like Carbon taxes. Democrats
were trying to pull a fast one.
John Spaulding
Mt. Hood-Parkdale
Not standing
with Chuck
I stand with David Hupp, Stu
Watson, Darrell Roberts, Steve
Kaplan, Peyton Helm and Ruth
Tsu; I do not stand with Chuck
Thomsen.
As all these folks say in their
letters (March 11), the behav-
ior exhibited by Chuck Thom-
sen and his cohort was behav-
ior that some of us learned in
kindergarten to be inappropri-
ate and ineffective. You can’t
expect to play wallball if you
take the ball away and leave
the playground. Wait — maybe
they really didn’t want to legis-
late anything?
Pat Evenson-Brady
Hood River
‘Recall Chuck
Thomsen’
On Jan. 14, 2019, Chuck
Thomsen took the following
oath of office as an Oregon state
senator: “I, Chuck Thomsen, do
solemnly swear, or affirm, that
I will support the Constitution
of the United States, and the
Constitution of the State of Or-
egon, and that I will faithfully
discharge the duties of State
Senator according to the best of
my ability.” Last month, Chuck
Thomsen shamefully failed to
discharge his duties as State
Senator by leaving his post at
the capitol in order to deny Or-
egonians a quorum for a vote
on the cap and invest climate
bill. Because of his walkout,
many other bills important to
Oregonians were not addressed,
resulting in a failed legislative
session — at great cost to tax-
payers. Thomsen’s violation of
his oath of office strikes at the
heart of our democracy, which
only functions when elected of-
ficials show up to vote yes or no
on legislation for the common
good. He deserves to be recalled
as Senator from District 26.
John F Christensen
Corbett
Democracy
What is American Democ-
racy? Well, it goes something
like this: The first step of the
American Democratic Process is
that the wealthiest 1 percent of
Americans, who are overwhelm-
ingly male and white, get to use
their money to buy the field
of candidates, who are over-
whelmingly male and white,
that are going to kowtow to their
economic interests, regardless
of party.
The second step of the Amer-
ican Democratic Process is the
one that gets the most lip-ser-
vice: It’s important to vote; it’s
your duty to vote; if you don’t
vote, you don’t get to complain.
You’ve heard all the clichés. So
we go to the polls to choose the
candidate that we want most
to be elected. Maybe. Or per-
haps your polling places will be
closed, or your ID gets rejected,
or you were purged from voter
rolls, or you have to stand in line
for 13 hours, or you live in one
of the United States’ territories
which do not have statehood or
voting rights but are still subject
to the laws of the United States,
or you are in prison.
Then, the third step of the
American Democratic Process is
that once the dust settles on the
election, the super wealthy, who
picked the field of candidates in
the first place, send in an army
of lobbyists to hand the candi-
dates pre-written legislation to
rubberstamp.
Then, if all else fails, the elect-
ed officials will simply walk
off the job and hide in a cabin
somewhere in Idaho, all the
while drawing a salary paid for
by tax dollars.
Combine this with gerryman-
dering, the electoral college, and
the bicameral legislature, and
you have a recipe for, at best,
absolutely nothing getting done,
and at worst, a capitulation to
the wealthiest Americans.
There is, however, a solu-
tion, and that is the progressive
agenda. That is Democratic
Socialism. That is the movement
behind Bernie Sanders. It is
more than the man himself. The
wealthy elites of the DNC can
cheat Bernie again, but they will
never stop progress towards a
better world.
Benjamin Sheppard
Hood River
ANOTHER VOICE
Chuck Thomsen: ‘I left Salem to protect you’
By SEN. CHUCK THOMSEN
Hello neighbors,
I’m a fourth-generation pear
grower who was born and
raised in the Hood River Valley.
I served our local community
for many years as a county
commissioner and volunteer
firefighter. Most importantly,
I’m a husband, father and
grandfather.
Since 2010, you’ve elect-
ed me to serve as your state
senator. I’ve had the pleasure
of meeting many of you at
community events or at your
front door. I’ve had support
from Republicans, Democrats,
non-afiliated voters and Inde-
pendents because I’ve been
able to get things done for the
people of our district, and I’ve
put the interests of working
families first.
Now, special interest groups
are backing a recall election
against me. They don’t like the
fact that I left Salem to pro-
tect your right to vote on the
highly controversial cap and
trade bill. These downtown
Portland groups will likely
spend hundreds of thousands
of dollars over the next few
months to smear my name
and remove me. These special
interest groups stand to profit
if cap and trade passes, so this
is personal to them.
This reckless bill would have
increased energy and fuel costs
for families in Oregon by hun-
dreds of millions of dollars
without any measurable envi-
ronmental benefit.
But that’s not the worst part.
The bill purposely blocked
you from voting to undo the
damage.
Why?
Because Gov. Brown and
too many politicians in Salem
know that average Oregonians
don’t want and can’t afford
their cap and trade bill. In fact,
this was the third time in two
years they’ve tried to ram this
controversial bill through, only
this time they wanted to make
sure you couldn’t do anything
about it and were completely
cut out of the process.
No matter how you feel
about cap and trade, silencing
voters is just wrong.
I left Salem to protect your
right to vote on this bill. I will
do anything to protect that
right for you, even if it means
being recalled. Because the
politicians and special inter-
ests didn’t elect me, you did.
I don’t believe I should be
recalled for fighting to let you
have the final say on the cap
and trade bill. I took a stand
to protect your right to see
what’s in the bill, how it will
affect you, and your right to
vote on it.
Let’s be clear about what this
is. Gov. Brown has an extreme
environmental agenda and she
knows that if voters had a say,
they would reject her plan like
voters did twice in Washington
State.
I had a decision to make:
Do I stay in Salem and let Gov.
Brown and special interest
groups from downtown Port-
land take away your right to
vote, or do I take a stand to
protect your right to vote? That
was an easy decision.
I took a stand for our com-
munity and all Oregonians’
right to vote. I hope you’ll
stand with me.