4 A
❘
WEDNESDAY EDITION
❘ NOVEMBER 25, 2015
Siuslaw News
P.O. Box 10
Florence, OR 97439
RYAN CRONK , EDITOR
Opinion
❘ 541-902-3520 ❘
EDITOR @ THESIUSLAWNEWS . COM
DEAR READERS:
Office closed
T
he Siuslaw News office is closed
Thursday in observance of the holiday.
Have a safe and happy Thanksgiving. —Editor
LETTERS
Political theater
I recently watched part of the Benghazi hear-
ings. What was it — the eighth, 10th or 15th
hearing? Apparently there have been more hear-
ings on Benghazi than there were after Pearl
Harbor, 9/11 or after the financial collapse of
2007-2008.
I’m not arguing that what happened in 2012
at the U.S. Embassy in Benghazi wasn’t tragic.
However, remind me how many congressional
hearings were held after Columbine, the shoot-
ing at Sandy Hook Elementary School or the
recent domestic terrorist attack at Umpqua
Community College?
Many political observers believe — and this
belief is confirmed by House member Kevin
McCarthy (R-CA) — that these endless hear-
ings have been largely political theater; and like
the parallel “email scandal,” motivated by
Republican attempts to “hobble” and/or reduce
the poll numbers and popularity of the
Democrat frontrunner Hillary Clinton.
So let me posit this: If Clinton should be held
accountable for the five Americans killed in
Libya, then we should also hold FDR account-
able for the thousands of U.S. service men and
women killed at Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941,
and as Donald Trump recently intimated,
George Bush should be held accountable for
“not keeping us safe” on Sept. 11, 2001.
How so? Although I don’t know if the con-
spiracy theorists are correct regarding FDR’s
motives in seemingly provoking the Japanese
and leaving Pearl Harbor relatively “undefend-
ed,” I’ve read that Bush never read Richard
Clarke’s (the Anti-terrorism Czar) memo out-
lining the plans of jihadist to use hijack com-
mercial airplanes as flying bombs to inflict
maximum civilian casualties.
Similarly, Bush’s Vice President Dick
Cheney, who often misrepresented the “facts in
evidence,” should be held accountable for the
5,500 U.S. deaths, 40,000 causalities and added
$4 trillion deficit that resulted from the United
State’s disastrous 2003 Iraq invasion.
I’m all for congressional hearings, particular-
ly as it regards attacks on our nation, acts of
domestic terrorism or our justifications for our
attacks on others, especially when dozens to
thousands of lives are lost. But let’s agree that
another vote to repeal the Affordable Care Act
(56 and counting) or another Benghazi hearing
simply represent the “Political Theater of the
Absurd” and represent another reason why
Americans are so disaffected by their represen-
tative democracy.
Jeffrey M. Shear
Florence
Common sense approach
to gun control
I’ve done a little research on the Australian
firearm program and I have a few comments. I
don’t believe their type of gun control would work
in the United States to prevent mass shootings.
The first reason: The current population of
Australia is approximately 23 million.
Considering the quantity of firearms confiscat-
ed, reported after 1997, was between 100,000 to
1,000,000, it means much less than 5 percent of
the Australian population were affected by the
then new program.
Compare that number to the current U.S pop-
ulation of 321 million. Here, the reported 315
million legal firearms are anywhere from 32 to
47 percent of the population. That works out to
roughly 100 to 150 million firearm owners.
And, that doesn’t count the black market. A lot
of Americans that would have their second and
fourth amendments curtailed.
This brings up my second point: In Australia,
there is no bill of rights. Australian owners of
permitted and approved firearms are subject to
police search procedures. This means they can
enter your premises or vehicle at any time of
day or night to search without a warrant, in per-
petuity.
If the Australian mandatory confiscation pro-
gram were to come here, our fourth amendment
right to unreasonable search and seizure would
go out the door. It would be reasonable to say
that the same program of limiting type of
firearm, size of caliber, size of magazine, etc.,
that you could own, would also go out the door,
thereby affecting the second amendment. The
sheer numbers involved and loss of rights for so
many Americans, by comparison, just won’t
work. Not unless the Bill of Rights is substan-
tially changed.
My third comment: Prior to 1997, the
Australian firearm owners also didn’t have an
effective spokes organization. Considering the
tiny population of firearm owners affected, it’s
no wonder their legislature found it easy to take
away any perceived rights.
During my search of the Australian firearm
program of 1997 documents, I could not find a
solid mental health component in their assess-
ments in determining their new regulations.
In the United States, we have several firearm
organizations that speak on behalf of firearm
owners. The one that is the most prolific is, dare
I say their name, the NRA. I am not a
spokesperson for them nor am I a member. But,
I agree with them on some form of a bill that has
a mental health component/database to add to
the National Instant Background Check System.
To me, this would be a common sense
approach to identifying and flagging a potential
person of threat rather than taking away the
rights of millions of Americans. But, this is just
my opinion.
Michael Davis
Florence
Columbus Day
Are you kidding me? Someone wants to
change Columbus Day to Indigenous Peoples
Day? I can hardly pronounce it.
I’m referring to an article written in the Nov.
10 issue (“City Considers Columbus Day Name
Change,” page A1). Is this what our elected city
council members are up to when they meet?
Columbus Day isn’t about a race, it’s about
America, a country. There is a movement to
remove everything about what makes this country
what it is, and I’m surprised to see it leaking into
our town, which is solidly made up of a commu-
nity of people who value this country’s roots.
The majority of us probably have Native
American blood running through our veins,
which I am one of also, but this name change
for this holiday is crazy. Let’s keep the race
issue out of this one. I don’t believe the
Florence City Council has the right to make this
kind of decision for all of us.
Donna Dobson
Florence
Cure cancer
I am 75 years old and, although I still drink
and smoke, I am in fairly good health for some-
one my age. In the past 10 years, I have lost a
number of friends, both young and old, who had
no vices, ate healthy and exercised, and cancer
still took them from me.
Instead of spending billions/trillions on a trip
to Mars or engaging in more unwarranted con-
flicts, why not infuse those monies into research
to cure cancer and other cures for Alzheimer’s
and paralysis using stem cells? Seems like our
government is more concerned about going into
space and to war than fighting diseases and the
health of humans.
Win Jolley
Florence
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