ACCESSIBLE DANCE
Rachael Carnes’ article “Stop Motion” in the Sept. 8 “Spin” issue really nails the two key problems faced by emerging dancers — the lack of both financial and logistical resources.
In my work, marketing performing arts, I see so much creative potential going unrealized due to a lack of adequate resources — rehearsal space, performance venues, production skills and the money to pay for it all. And most small dance companies and solo artists, even if given these resources, lack access to the aggressive type of business management it takes to survive, much less prosper, in today’s arts environment.
Carnes presented great ideas for giving dancers access to the resources they need: great ideas that need to be implemented. Personally, I’m in favor of any solution that includes educating potential audiences to understand and appreciate the art, and want to experience it. By growing our audiences, demand is created, and we will be back on the path to making more dance — local, national and international — available and accessible right here in Eugene.
John Watson, Northwest Screendance Exposition, Eugene
EW REBUTTAL
I used to be a software engineer, and I am now retired. I have come to recognize and accept the feeling of being out of date and not up to speed with current developments (although I’ll admit that the car programming not recognizing the broadside of a semi-truck was not surprising). But it is still a shock to find out that I am out of date and evidently incompetent in other areas — particularly in one in which I took pride in being au courant.
I have been delighting in reading the articles in the Weekly. I have been amazed at their depth (OK, not the Springfield article, and I skipped the doughnuts), thoroughness and research. I enjoy the columnists and their “what can they do to me?” attitudes.
Being able to read Dan Savage and his sane sex-ed is on par with the 1936 Sanger ruling reversing the illegality of parental prophylactics. I thought.
But now I find that I’ve got it all wrong again. Stefan Strek’s letter [Letters, 9/1] says that all the Weekly is good for is toilet paper, packing material and barbecue starting. He took entire stacks of papers intended for wider distribution than just his behind or his packing boxes (is that the solution to the missing papers puzzle?).
I guess I am way behind on what constitutes good local reporting and writing. I’m going to have to double down and scrutinize the paper more carefully — and read more of the advertising and ask my friends to do the same — just to check.
Elena Rae, Eugene
AWESOME ELLIOTT
In my opinion, the Elliott State Forest should not be sold. I am 9 years old. I just learned that the Elliott is getting sold. That makes me mad. I’ve been going to the Elliott since I was a baby and want to keep going there. But that won’t happen if the Elliott gets sold.
Also think about how good the forest is for the environment. It has habitats for lots of creatures. It supplies us with fresh, clean air. Also it’s just really awesome.
Oliver Gonzales, Walton
ARTWALK SUCCESS
Thank you Jessica and the Lane Arts Council for the best ArtWalk ever!
In the 30 years I’ve lived here, that was the best downtown has ever been. I mean, that’s what I’ve dreamed our town could be like. But I was amazed to actually walk into it last night. Kids and old folks, people drawing with chalk on the sidewalk and street, ping pong in the street, Latino families, homeless people and travelers, people dancing to great music, art everywhere, everybody welcome, everyone belonging … Wow! It was wonderful.
Thank you for your work!
Kari Johnson, Eugene
PRICK LEVIN
Ms. Mortensen: I tried to send this directly to Levin w/cc to you but can’t find email for him. You’re the editor.
Stop the incessant insertion of “fuck” and “shit” and “prick,” etc., into (nearly) everything you write. It’s pathetic and sophomoric. You’re better and smarter than this, and your newspaper needs to be better as well.
I remember an article not long ago, a profile I think, that I finished with great pleasure upon realizing the writing and ideas were quite good and weren’t marred with gratuitous obscenities. Really. You have it in you. Your work will be better and your life will be better. And Camilla’s paper and the community will be better.
Victor Congleton, Eugene
LOST RESPECT
Pete Sorenson lost my respect with his endorsement of Hillary Clinton as having a strong progressive voting record and being best qualified candidate, ever, for U.S. president [Letters, 9/1].
Since when do progressives support fracking? Voting for and instigating aggressive wars? Corruption and deceit? Destructive trade deals? Felony voter fraud in the primaries? Prison or worse for Assange and Snowden?
Best qualified candidate ever? Maybe Pete was referring to her qualifications to take over as assassinator-in-chief from President Obama. In Hillary’s “we came, we saw, he died” comments regarding the death of Muammar Gaddafi, we catch a clear glimpse of her wicked soul as she gloats over the horrific death of another human being.
Trisha Driscoll, Pacific Green Party of Oregon, Eugene
SUPPORT STUDENTS
I’m a teacher at 4J’s Early College and Career Options (ECCO) High School, the new alternative program located on the LCC campus. Our school provides a second chance for students who have struggled to find success in traditional high schools.
Many of my students came from schools where class sizes of 30 or more are the norm, often leading to their academic struggles. Due to the smaller classes and increased support services at ECCO, I am able to gain a better understanding of these students’ personal challenges and offer them the kind of one-on-one academic help that allows them to thrive.
I often contemplate the levels of success our district could achieve if all of our schools could reduce class sizes and enjoy the time and support needed to offer all students what we have at ECCO.
This November, Oregon voters have the opportunity to make this a reality by voting to pass Ballot Measure 97. Measure 97 would generate an estimated $3 billion in revenue each year just by making the largest companies — the top 0.3 percent of C corporations — pay their fair share in Oregon taxes. This revenue will go to reinvesting in our public education system so that all students can go to a school where they are set up to succeed.
Every child deserves to go to a school where they receive the resources and attention they deserve. Please join me in supporting Oregon’s students and Oregon’s future by voting yes on 97 this November.
Peter Gallagher, Eugene
RUDE CYCLIST
To the spandex cyclist who added insult to injury:
While passing Skinner Butte Park on a sunny Labor Day afternoon, my party (three humans on two bikes) encountered some slowing due to traffic. The congestion consisted of 10 people, four bikes, a stroller and two dogs. As we negotiated our way past one another, maneuvering carefully to allow everyone adequate space and time to safely continue their various journeys, you came speeding down the path. It would have been enough just that you destabilized a rider, causing her to lose control and end up hitting the pavement, but you saw fit to yell back over your shoulder that she was in the wrong place and should have gotten out of your way.
Her hands will heal, though at present she can neither write nor ride her bike (our family’s main mode of transportation). I know you were well past our little group before the results of your speed had fully developed. I’m sure you didn’t realize the consequences of your actions. But I thought you ought to know. Maybe next time you encounter slowing near a park on a fine holiday afternoon you can also consider the needs of others and reduce your speed to make our multi-use path safer for all.
Mary Kate Land, Eugene
DOUBLE STANDARD
There are advanced plans for a single-story commercial building on the bowling alley lot, Willamette Street.
This single-story building will be right in the area where an urban density plan was about to get forced upon residents. That plan would have elbowed out low-income residents, but a million-dollar investor can show up and the whole well-meaning urban density concept gets pushed aside.
The bowling alley lot is a prime opportunity for erecting a two or three-story building, with apartments above the shops. This might not be what this particular investor’s goal is but Eugene has sold enough of its soul to investors that have no interest in the common good. Indirectly, this type of building contributes to urban sprawl in a big way.
If Eugene grants a permit to the single-story commercial building at Willamette Street, it needs to get accused of double standards.
Ralf Huber, Springfield
SOCIAL MOVEMENT
Now I’m scared: After Hill’s little fauxpas with leaked emails fixing the primaries. The HomeLand Security Department, or Home LSD for short, wants to “protect” the nation’s entire election infrastructure including our local elections from mayor down to the sheriff’s dog catcher. Bernie wouldn’t have done that. America, you made a mistake not recognizing it is up to the people to take the power pyramids apart before it’s too late. The social movement is much bigger than a single leader. Revolutions R US.
Vince Loving, Eugene
STILL SWEATING
I had one of those worrying thoughts the other day, the kind that bring on a cold sweat. What if Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton tied at around 40 percent, each with a slim majority for one or the other? What if the following day it was announced that foreign computer hackers had been detected in several states’ electoral voting systems?
How long would it take before suits were flying around the courts trying to sort out who was the actual winner? What if it ended up at the Supreme Court just like the 2000 election? What if we only had eight Supreme Court justices?
I need another shower. I’m sweating again.
Peter Tildesley, Eugene
WAR ON DRUGS
I just became another victim in the “War on Drugs.”
I was in incredible pain and none of the pain drugs prescribed to me by doctors would dull it. I researched and found that some cannabis-infused balms and tinctures might help.
At the time, they were only available to those who paid a doctor brave enough to write a referral for medical marijuana, paid the state a fee and submitted all of the paperwork.
A total of $400 invested so I could find something that might legally stop the pain. Now the 9th Circuit of the Supreme Court has just ruled that because I became a legal medical marijuana patient, I no longer have the right to own a firearm.
If I answered “yes” on the federal firearms dealer background question “Are you a user of marijuana?” I would be denied.
If I answered “no,” a false answer, I would be guilty of a five-year felony crime.
I have asked my Congressman Peter DeFazio, the Oregon Medical Marijuana Program, the ACLU and various gun lobby groups to help restore my 2nd Amendment rights, and my pleas have fallen on deaf ears. Those on the political left don’t care because they think guns are evil. Those on the political right don’t care because they think cannabis is evil.
By trying to follow the law and order of my country and state, I have been found guilty of a crime and stripped of my rights.
Michael T. Hinojosa, Drain
ID IMPORTANCE
What good’s your name, actually? Let’s say your ID were suddenly stolen — your identification missing. What are all the things you’d be barred from doing? I can think of many everyday enjoyable activities suddenly going off the grid, business activities coming to a halt, always being stopped at the gate of any concert that’s happening, unable to check into a motel or easily escape any terrible environment, get a legal job, receive most medical assistance, or prove your innocence, all possible effects, consequences, potentially realized circumstances, each naturally compounding, eventually and quite possibly leading to utter devastation.
We have here the beginnings of an explanation for the plight of downtown Eugene’s many impoverished individuals — many with fundamental barriers to recovering their lost ID. What ethical arguments can be made for allowing people to just go ahead and claim new identities?
Michael Hejazi, Eugene
NONE OF THE ABOVE
The 1991 Louisiana gubernatorial election pitted David Duke, a Republican, against Governor Edwin Edwards, a Democrat. The notoriously corrupt Edwards won because a majority were scared a Klansman could become governor. One slogan for Edwards over Duke: “Vote for the crook, it’s important.”
County Commissioner Pete Sorenson wrote in a Sept. 1 EW letter that Hillary Clinton is a “progressive” who is the “best qualified” candidate for president, ever. The “best” was Kennedy, who called off the Cold War, ordered withdrawal from Vietnam and stood up to the generals who wanted nuclear war. Imagine if the legacy of the ’60s was peaceful conversion of the military industrial complex.
The Clinton-Gore administration’s first broken promise was turning on the WTI toxic waste incinerator in East Liverpool, Ohio (March 1993). The website oilempire.us/wti.html has details about the Clintons’ financial ties to WTI. That town will likely vote for Trump, even if Ohio — and the country — picks the alleged lesser evil.
An uncensored examination of the Clinton-Gore administration (1993-2001) includes NAFTA, World Trade Organization, more prisons, welfare “reform,” militarized police, GMO frankenfood, more highways and less Amtrak, and continued aggressive foreign policies.
Is Donald Trump deliberately throwing the election to the Clintons? Or is the establishment using him as a patsy to ensure a win for the distrusted Hillary?
Presidential elections resemble televised wrestling — a bruising contest that is rigged in advance.
If offered lethal injection or the electric chair, “none of the above” is an honorable choice.
Have a nice day!
Mark Robinowitz, Eugene
SUPPORT STANDING ROCK
Right now, thousands of people are gathered in North Dakota, called together by the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. More than 550 tribes plus allies are represented to protect the water from the Dakota Access Pipeline, which would travel thousands of miles and carry crude oil from North Dakota to Illinois. It would cross more than 200 bodies of water, including the Missouri River.
As we know, pipelines are destined to leak, and this threatens the drinking water for millions of people in the region. Pipeline construction is already well under way, and is only temporarily halted by the recent Obama Administration intervention. The pipeline anticipates beginning operation in November.
Here are ways you can support Indigenous leadership: 1. Contact North Dakota Gov. Dalrymple at 701-328-2200 and let him know that you support the peaceful water protectors at Standing Rock, tell him to remove the roadblocks and the National Guard. The peaceful gathering does not warrant military intervention.
2. Donate to the legal defense and general camp funds: sacredstonecamp.org and gofundme.com/sacredstonecamp.
3. If you have funds in Citigroup, TD Securities or Mizuho Bank, consider divesting and let them know you don’t support their funding of this pipeline.
#IStandWithStandingRock #NoDAPL #WaterIsLife #ProtectTheSacred
Heron Brae and Dusty Bloomingheart, Eugene
NOT PLAUSIBLE
On Sept. 8, Jack Dresser had a letter published that was supposed to be about Syria and Clinton. If one was to take the letter seriously, he alleges that the Syrian uprising was an attack by U.S. hired mercenaries. I ask anyone interested to revisit the coverage at that time. Egypt was overthrowing Mubarak and Syria was rising.
The “Twitter revolution” was unfolding. The Eugene Library has some wonderful first-person histories of that time. Obama has many faults but was at that time trying to disengage from Iraq and Afghanistan. It is not plausible that he would then have been organizing an overthrow of Assad. The people of Syria “voted” by staring down the thugs of the regime. Their courage puts us all to shame. It’s estimated that 40,000 children (would Mr. Dresser call them mercenaries, perhaps?) have been barrel-bombed, starved or gassed. The regime of Assad is controlled by the Alawite sect of Islam. They are not secular. Turkey is the closest to a secular country in the Middle East and they are supporting the rebels. Assad stands for genocide against the majority of his country, which rose against him.
Gary Adams, Eugene
CLINTON FOUNDATION
It took less than one minute to answer this: “How much is Chelsea Clinton paid by the Clinton Foundation?” Answer: $0.00.
Dick Ricketts, Eugene