Page 2. THE GAZETTE-TIMES, Heppner, Ore., Thursday, Mar. 20, 1975
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9 Deliver me from reformed cigarette smokers, reformed
drunks and reformed whores. They are the most intolerant
people on earth, aside from being the most monumental
bores. Once the "light" and the "truth" has been revealed to
them, they will move heaven and earth to insure that every
person, voluntarily or by force, foreswears the three alleged
evils. The reformers are round-the-clock crusaders for laws
to enforce their tardy and fanatical judgement, apparently
on the premise that if none of these popular vices are to be
enjoyed by them, they are not going to be enjoyed by
anybody. Sen. Keith Burbidge of Salem, an alcoholic, is an
example of the reformer. He has introduced HB 2145, a bill
that would double the taxes on beer and wine. The money
(naturally) would go toward rehabilitating drunks. If Sen.
Burbidge had quit smoking instead of drinking, he would
probably have introduced a bill doubling taxes on
tobacco with proceeds going toward the expense of
reforming smokers. Had he been a prostitute he would most
likely have introduced a bill to make practice of the oldest
profession a capital crime or proposed a tax on prostitutes
to train them all to sing in the choir.
9 Back to the beer and wine fields of Sen. Burbidge. The
easy-going American people are over-tolerant of such lealots
in the vineyard. They accept without complaint the massive
taxation of a cnief source of enjoyment, the hours and days
they may enjoy same, and a hundred regulations imposed to
restrict the exercise of their chosen vises. But Americans can
be pushed loo far. as they were in the Prohibition era. Sine
people learn nothing from history, it will do no good whatever
to point out that over-taxing or outright prohibition of
alcoholic beverages leads to the public's decision to
manufacture its own beer, wine and liquor which it can do,
has done, and will do again when its patience with the
reformer's rabidity becomes exhausted. Once it becomes
more profitable to make alcoholic beverages at home, it will
he 1 have made it myself w hen the stuff w as over-taxed, and
I will do so again. During prohibition I patronized
bootleggers, as did most Americans. The reformers don't
believe this, in spite of the fact that it has happened before.
They think "a law" automatically resolves the question in
their favor.
0 If we get taxed so highly that we switch to bootleg alcohol
it will be interesting to see what w ill happen to the reformers'
pet social programs that are now being supported by high
taxes on sin the half-way houses, clinics for tobacco and
alcohol addicts, and dozens of "rehabilitation" programs
such as the one Sen. Burbidge proposes. On the other hand,
w ho cares? "Swearing off" is an individual matter. A smoker
who wants to stop. does. A drunk who decides to become
permanently dry. will. Prostitutes abandon their careers
every day to enter more socially approved professions by
making the decision themselves. The overweight person who
becomes disgusted with his flab will push himself away from
the table. If reformation is. in the final analysis, an exercise
of an individual's will power, where is the need for these
proliferating rehabilitation centers supported by taxes on our
chosen vices? What Sen. Burbidge needs is a stiff drink.
For a man who serves his community for peanut pay,
Mayor Jerry Sweeney at least deserves some
appreciation which he seldom gets. What he usually gets
are letters like this one he received last week. It reads: "Just
why do we elect a mayor if he can't take time to sit in with the
couni ilnien to discuss city affairs and especially the bills at
these inflated times. We commend Mr. Plocharsky for
speaking up on this matter. Thanking you, we remain
interested in city affairs." It was unsigned, except for
Proxrty Owners." The postscript is a real grabber: "If we
signed our names on this letter you wouldn't like us."
Sweeney, of course, knows who wrote the letter and at
whose direction. So do I. Neither of us are going to poison the
writer s dog. The mayor's decision to slop spending an hour
pawing through routine bills is one way to speed up council
sessions. It isn't that bills get no attention. They do. Recorder
Marshall Lovgren gives them a thorough scrutiny. Bills are
available to individual councilmen at any time. They can
peruse them at their leisure, but not on the council's time.
Fitly years ago there wasn't much business for a council to
transact, so it fiddled around with reading routine bills and
exchanging gossip. It's different now. City business is big
business Sessions must be streamlined and run on a
business-like basis. Which is what Sweeney is doing, even if
oxer the heads of the community nit-pickers. I appreciate the
mayor, and sympathize with him. Everybody, it would seems
knows better how to be mayor than does the mayor. Just like
even Ixxiy knows how to run this newspaper better than I do.
But mine of them run (or the office of mayor and none of them
go into the newspaper business themselves. Which is
probably a blessing!
Remember a while back when Sen. Mark Hatfield was
calling upon Americans to eat one less hamburger a week so
the grain-fed beef saved would mean more grain we could
give away to the ' starving nations"? The March 10 issue of
Foreign Agriculture" has a story about farmers in India
who are feeding wheat to their poultry and livestock-while
shipping more expensive feed grains (corn and sorghum) to
other countries at $160 to $200 a ton. Maybe the senator hasn't
dune his home work.
Last week I got carried away in a news story about the
opening of the new Bank of Eastern Oregon and wrote that it
is i he only full-servite bank in Morrow County. What I
intended to write was that the Bank of Eastern Oregon is the
only independent bank in Morrow County. It didn't take
genial Ken Belcher, manager of the First National Bank long
to find the GT's telephone number and challenge the
statement. Rightly so. The First National is also a
lull-service bank. Fortunately. Ken did not enter upon the
Gazette-Times premises to horsewhip the editor. But he did
extort Id drinks at the Elks Club Happy Hour as balm for his
injured feelings paid for by the errant editor, who had it
coming.
I don't find it hard to believe in the Hereafter. It's the
Here and Now 1 find hard to believe!
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THE GAZETTE-TIMES
MOHKOW COUNTY'S NEWSPAPER
Box 337. Heppner, Ore. 97836
Subscript ion rate: $6 per year in
Oregon, $7 elsewhere
Ernest V. Joiner, Publisher
Published every Thursday and entered as a
second-class matter at the post office at
llcnnner. Oregon, under the act of March 3, 1879.
Second-class postage paid at Heppner, Oregon.
"Look On The Bright Side.
Think Of The Trouble You'd Be In If
You'd Been Elected President."
School ...
(Continued from Page 1)
Dohcrty told the board mm
the tax ' off-set established
when the county's schools
were consolidated into a
county-wide district, will end
July I, 1975. As a result,
residents of lone, Boardman
and Irrigon will see a slight
Increase in school taxes and
Heppner residents will exper
ience a slight decrease.
A student from Lexington,
representing Lexington youth,
requested Ihnt the gymnasium
nl the Lexington school again
be opened for use evenings by
the young people so they could
play basketball. The student
also requested that burned out
lights and basketball nets be
replaced. The gym has been
closed the past month because
a project was being construct
ed in the building. The board
voted to grant the request.
Students and parents are to
meet w ith the superintendent
on the matter.
Martha Doherly was hired
to instruct girls' tennis at
lone. Jim Kdmundson. prin
cipal at lone, has been
instructing both boys' and
girls' tennis in the past. Due to
the increase In student inter
est additional help was need
ed. There will he 16 girls and
It) boys participating in tennis
at lone this spring.
The hoard adopted a set of
ixilicies concerning the keep
ing of students" records. The
new policies comply with new
federal law concerning the
riiihl of privacy.
The next board meeting will
boat A. C. Houghton School in
Irrigon on Monday, April 21.
beginning nl S p.m.
The mail pouch
EDITOR:
House Bill 2872 sponsored by State Representative Bill
Ferguson. MD. has been introduced in the Oregon House of
Representatives. It's purpose is to restrict the ability of
people without adequate finances to file lawsuits.
This bill if adopted would permit the courts to intrude in the
lawyer-client relationship when this relationship is on a
contingency basis.
In a contingency case an attorney agrees to handle a
lawsuit on a percentage basis, which he only receives if his
efforts are successful. If he loses he is out any time, money
and effort he has invested on behalf of his client. The line of
attack used by opponents of this is the contention that the
lawyer will receive too much of his client's settlement if he is
successful.
The fact is that those opposing this arrangement object
because poor people are getting half-way as much protection
within the law as the more affluent, when opponents believe
poor people should have none.
JOHN D. LUKER.
Hillsboro.
i KI). NOTE-I am not acquainted with the provisions of
IIK 2K72. but there is abundant evidence that something must
lie dune to slop the high general and punitive damage awards
handed down so lavishly by juries and judges. It is not
unusual for plaintiffs to receive million-dollar awards for
everything from hurt feelings to injuries clearly the fault of
the complainant. These heavy award costs are passed on to
the public in higher costs for medical, legal and other
services. Perhaps a ban on punitive and general damages
would correct the injustice of high awards, still permitting a
low-income person to have legal representation but with
court awards restricted only to actual, proven damages. An
injured party's actual damages should be compensated, but
getting rich just" to punish a defendant beyond actual
damages is. in my opinion, legalized larceny.)
EDITOR:
I would like to take this opportunity to share with the
people of lone news that a former employee of the Morrow
County Schools is presently under contract with a
neighboring school and has substituted there almost the
entire year.
To refresh your memory, during the 1973-74 school year
remarks were made that the contract was not going to be
renewed or specifically placed on permanent tenure and that
9 years of previous experience was to be given no
consideration. Many people rallied to her defense but the
effort proved futile.
Because of a chosen few of the community and lack of
school support, she, was forced to resign. Probably the
greatest advantage of being dismissed from a Morrow
County leaching position is that it carries with it the best
possible recommendation.
The moral of this unhappy experience is to quote an old
clinche. "It's not what you know but who you know."
JERRY L.MARTIN,
lone.
EDITOR:
My name is Herman Glasco. I am a 32-year-old inmate
presently incarcerated at the London, Ohio Correctional
Institution, which is somewhat an honor prison.
I am without family or friends who are concerned with my
health and welfare, or to whom I can write. I am writing this
letter to you as an agent of appeal for correspondence and
friendship. I am hoping you will be kind enough to publish it
in your paper. In a desperate effort to emerge from the
internal prison of lost hopes, I have written you this letter in
an attempt to reacquaint myself with the outside world . . .
My interests are sports, music, education, etc. My sign if
Gemini. I will answer all letters promptly if anyone cares to
write. Please address me: Mr. Herman Glasco, No. 132 296,
P.O. Box 69. London. Ohio 43140.
HERMAN GLASCO,
New London, O.
(ED. NOTE Mr. Glasco appears to be a man trying to
rehabilitate himself rather than throw that responsibility
upon society. I hope individuals and groups will see the
wisdom and Christianity in corresponding with this lonely
man.)
EDITOR:
The long standing ripoff of forced savings of tax reserves
for home mortgages w ill come to an end if SB 269 is passed in
this session of the legislature.
I and 35 ot her senators and representatives have sponsored
this legislation because we believe it is unfair for lending
institutions to use people's money for profit yet not pay
interest.
Most people buying homes are required by the banks and
savings and loan associations to pay a monthly tax reserve
payment in addition to their mortgage payment. This reserve
money is invested by the lending institutions, usually at
profit returns far in excess of passbook interest rates.
Senate Bill 2fi9 requires, if the lender requires the borrower
to make a monthly tax reserve payment, that the lender
either pay interest on or capitalize the reserve payment.
Since over $lixi million was paid into lax reserves in
Oregon Inst year, this legislation can mean significant
interest pay ments to Orcgouians.
In Morrow County last year, $52,916 was paid into tax
reserve accounts. Five per cent interest on one-half of this
sum would earn $1,321 interest income for Morrow County
hmiieowiHTS.
I believe SB 2tt) is a fair bill whose lime has come. To
insure its passage. I encourage readers to write to their
resMTlive senators and representatives, urging their
support. The Senate Judiciary Committee will hold a public
hearing at 8:00 a.m., Thursday, March 27.
BLAINE WHIPPLE.
Senator,
Salem.
Wafer project
bids opened
liw bidder on Schedule A
and C of the city's water
improvement project is Sla
deli Pump & Construction Co..
Silverlon, Or., with a bid of
$:I7.32).25.
Schedules A and C includes
const ruction of a new reser
voir and two booster pumps
with automatic control sys
tems. The bids were opened at
Heppner City Mall Monday for
Phase 3 of the project. Seven
contractors submitted bids.
Apparent low bidder on
Schedule B. repair work to
existing reservoirs 1, 2. and 3.
is Weaver Construction Co.,
I'nion Or., with a bid of
SI9.4I9.
The engineer's estimate for
all phases of I he project is
m,im.
Contracts are expected to be
awarded In the low bidders at
the next regular meeting of
the common council, April 7.
"Is It My Imagination Or Has It Recently
Become More Expensive To Be Wealthy?"
Mayor of Hardin an
! DEAR MISTER EDITOR:
With all that's going on in the world I ain't aurprlsed to see
bv the papers where this college professor has done some
serious research in the rimes thut children say when they
jump rope.
She has collected more than 2.000 of them little songs and
sayings, and she has decided that they tell us a heap more
than what children say when they play.
Them jump rope rimes, this University of Connecticut
teacher savs, deal wilh the problems children face when
thev're growing up. And she allows that what sounds like
Innocent noise to most of us actual Is young people telling all
Ihe trouble they've seen. .
Mister Editor, to give you some Idee how little I J
didn't think younguns even Jumped rope these days. I thought
nil they done from the time they could walk was slare at the
TV and listen to that racket they call music.
But even if this professor Is on to somepun, I have doubts
nlxmt where her research is going to lend her. There
chnnct. though, that she'll find out the children know more
about dealing wilh their problems lhan we do. and she could
do fer Ihe country what Ihe monkeys has done fer art.
I see bv the papers where chimps In Portland and gorillers
in Toronto. Canada are selling all the paintings they can turn
out and they're got their zoos offering a hole new line of art. It
looks more and more like all you got to do to make somepun
popular is not understand it.
The monkevs In Portland have sold $2,000 worth of their
paintings, and Iheir keeper said thry's got more orders fer
work lhan they can fill.
I'p in Toronto, folks turned out Inst month fer a showing of
tine art, and Ihe critics was agreed the paintings are real
abstract I figger that's a word they use when they don't have
Ihe foggiest idee what It's about, and to me there is so much
abstract going on in the world no wonder it's popular.
Mister Editor, I ain't no Fort Knox on fads, but it looks to
me like ape art and Jump rope songs ain't all that's gitling
more attention than they deserve In this country right now.
Fellers drawing down Ihe big money on Ihe speaking tours
now is them that can tell us how to run a crooked
Government.
Them ex-convicts thai worked under Nixon is writing
books and telling their stories all over the world. I saw by the
paKT went here one was in England, and he said the
Presidency in America is more like royalty than the British
royalty. I reckon he meant our Guvernmenl is more removed
from the people lhan Kngland's.
Incidental, I see where Willie Hill in Atlanta had to get rid
of his collection. He collected garbage, and he had a hole
houseful til Ihe garbage collector hauled It off. Wonder if he
sees the problems of America In his trash?
Yours truly.
MAYOR ROY.
The
unmethodical
Methodists
H I KSTKItklYHOI YINC
CJcn
I'M ATA. TRANSKEI. SOUTH AFRICA-In the very same
month that Great Britain's Methodist conference voted to
continue supporting Ihe World Council of Churches' (WCC)
financing of African terriorists, another Methodist
conference met here in Africa.
The Methodist Conference of Ihe North Transvaal
designated such church financing of terroiism as ample
justification for Ihe Methodist Church to withdraw from the
WCC.
This North Transvaal Conference is comprised of 10,000
whilesand 20.000 blacks. One of its clergy, the Rev. Fred
Harris, said:
"This is certainly a call for Methodists in Britain to stop
making assumptions on the often false and slanted reports
fed to them by irresponsible radicals who think they know the
mind of the African and are presumptuous enough to think
they are speaking for the African masses."
In the U. S.. one of Ihe leading financial supporters of the
African terriorists Is the National Council of
Churches-whose largest financial supporter is the
Methodist Church.
But here in L'mlata. which in October of 1978 will become
the capital of Ihe Independent nation of Transkei, black
Methodist layman Knowledge Guzana, attorney and leader
of Ihe opposition in Tanskei's Parliament, told this column:
"When South Africa sends its police to defend the borders,
those terrorists shoot both the blacks and whltes-and they
seem to have murdered far more black civilians than white.
This is a kind of 'help' we can well do without."
Guzana. who is one of Africa's most eloquent and
outspoken anll-segregationists, went on to comment:
"I welcome the change in attitude of your Senator
Kennedy, in his no longer supporting the ill-conceived
campaign to withdraw American investments and firms
from South Africa. Such action would hurt blacks most and, if
anything, make the South African government more rigid on
apartheid."
Despite this, the United Methodist Board of Global
Ministries will this spring carry on Just such a campaign, by
using its stockholdings to try to pressure such firms as IBM,
Standard Oil, ITT and Union Carbide.
The U. S. Methodist high command does not want these
firms to invest in the only nation in Africa which (1) attracts
50 per cent of all the continent's foreign investments ; (2) has
never nationalized a foreign company; (3) returns an
average of 15-17 per cent on all Investments; (4) is the only
government in Central or Southern Africa which allows more
than one political party (save only neighboring Botswana ) as
well as an unquestionably free press a sizable segment of
which roasts the government daily.
The predominantly white, non-African Methodists object to
South Africa's racial segregation policies-whlch are rapidly
changing. Meanwhile, -what the non-African Methodist
hierarchs are financing is seen in the cartoon, which shows a
grinning bishop greeting a black terrorist who is hard at
work digging up a road. Caption:
"Laying a land mine that doesn't kill, but only malms?
How clever! After all, we don't want to break the Sixth
Commandment, do we?"
It was precisely this type of mentality which motivated a
school teacher to place a bomb In the waiting room of the
Johannesburg railroad station. He went to the gallows
singing "We shall Overcome."
He overcame, all right. He blew one old lady to bits. And a
seven-year-old girl, who was standing nearby, is curently in
London undergoing the latest in a dozen operations which
have thus far been unable to restore her face, which was
blown off.
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