Portland observer. (Portland, Or.) 1970-current, December 26, 2012, Page 6, Image 6

Below is the OCR text representation for this newspapers page. It is also available as plain text as well as XML.

    December 26, 2012
New Prices
Effective
May 1,2010
«
Martin
Cleaning
Service
"life Wo W MW
B^ SUoeKSP
BY How §7RiA
Carpet & Upholstery
Cleaning
Residential &
Commercial Services
l W we ' re
\ (Boor CoNffW
IIS’ OWN
GhlUPREN
Minimum Service CHG.
$45.00
A sm a ll d is ta n c e /tr a v e l c h a rg e
m a y b e a p p lie d
CARPET CLEANING
2 Cleaning Areas or
more $30.00 Each Area
Pre-Spray Traffic Areas
(Includes: 1 sm all H allway)
1 Cleaning Area (only)
$40.00
AT CoHHEcViCC'
Includes Pre-Spray Traffic Area
(Hallway Extra)
Stairs (12-16 stairs - With
O ther Services): $25.00
Area/Oriental Rugs:
$25.00 Minimum
$40.00 Minimum
Sharing Blame for a Climate of Violence
Heavily Soiled Area:
Responsibility and the tragedy in Newtown, Conn.
Area/Oriental Rugs < Wool):
Additional $10.00 each area
(Requiring Extensive Pre-Spraying)
UPHOLSTERY
CLEANING
Sofa: $69.00
Loveseat: $49.00
Sectional: $ 109 - $ 139
Chair or Recliner:
$25 - $49
Throw Pillows (With
Other Services): $5.00
ADDITIONAL
SERVICES
• Area & Oriental Rug
Cleaning
• Auto/Boat/RV Cleaning
• Deodorizing & Pet
Odor Treatment
• Spot & Stain
Removal Service
• Scotchguard Protection
• Minor Water Damage
Services
SEE CURRENT FLYER
FOR ADDITIONAL
PRICES & SERVICES
Call for Appointment
(503) 281-3949
W inslow M yers
One of the Dalai
L am a’s first p rin ­
ciples is something he
calls “universal re­
sponsibility.” How­
ever quick we are to
place His Holiness on a saintly
pedestal, it is only because the
threshold of our own responsi­
bility sometimes seems so very
low, especially at this moment of
reflection upon the massacre of
the innocents in Newtown, Conn.
From a tearful President on
down through the powerful talk
radio demagogues to ordinary
citizens, we all bear a share of
responsibility for the climate of
violence that is the context for
the tragedy in Newton.
I’m as responsible as anyone
because I haven’t yet written
my representative concerning
my strong feelings about gun
control. Great Britain endured
58 firearm murders in 2011, while
America had 8,775. Great Brit­
ain banned modem handguns al­
together in 1997 and studies show
a slow but steady decrease in
by
crimes involving handguns
in the UK ever since.
The weapons industry and
the anti-control lobbyists led
by the NRA certainly ought
to step up to their share.
They managed to chill the
speech of both presidential can­
didates, even though the previ­
ous mass murder in Aurora, Colo,
took place at the height of the
campaign.
Talk radio and television, with
its sneering contempt for oppos­
ing views and simplistic polar­
ization of issues upon which
people of good will may differ,
clouds the atmosphere of our
culture with potential violence.
Don’t say words alone can’t be
violent, and incite to violence. It
happens all the time. The ob­
scenity is to get paid millions to
pander to our most primitive fears
and impulses.
It is a cliche to say that our
e n te rta in m e n t ru n s on the
adrenalin of violence. But there
are unconscious assum ptions
operating that make that vio­
lence even more pernicious.
Defense, choked up with tears
of pride when he left office and
was awarded the Medal of Free­
dom. Years later he was brought
to the realization that the cam ­
paign he helped to lead against
Vietnam was a mistake of crimi­
nal proportions. And so at last he
shed more universal tears, tears
that included his sadness about
the waste of war and the deaths
of too many innocent Vietnam­
ese.
It is possible to imagine that, in
private, Mr. Obama sheds some
tears for the broken innocents of
Afghanistan and Pakistan that
are the “collateral damage” of
his drones.
For the time being, our politi­
cal culture continues to operate
in a state of radical dissociation.
W hen our leaders shed tears
equally for the deaths of children
anywhere in the world, I shall, as
Michelle Obama said when her
husband was first running for
president, for the first time I’m
truly proud to be an American.
The movie “Argo,” a well-
crafted thriller made by a liberal­
leaning director about getting
seven Americans out of harm ’s
way in Iran, still managed to
reduce all the Iranians in the film
to crude swarthy stereotypes.
“Zero Dark Thirty” rationalizes
our government’s use of torture
to find Osama bin Laden.
Our President lives and works
at the center of a storm of hyper­
violence. Mr. Obama has been
the subject of more violent threats
to his own life than any Presi­
dent in history. And surely the
threats to Obama’s person would
only increase if he took our inter­
national policies in a more dovish
direction.
No worries there. It is the
commander-in-chief s daily duty
to rain down a hell of violence
that, while intended to eliminate
terrorists, often kills innocent
children as randomly as the an­
gel of death that just descended
upon a peaceful town in Con­
Winslow Myers, syndicated
necticut.
by PeaceVoice, is the author
Robert McNamara, President o f Living Beyond War: A
Kennedy’s steely Secretary of Citizen’s Guide.