• If you saw the full-page Trump ad in The Register-Guard on Nov. 20 and also in The Oregonian earlier in the week, you know that the Trump organization hopes to turn Oregon red in 2020. Brad Parscale, Trump’s campaign manager, and Lara Trump, his daughter-in-law, already have met with Republicans in the state. Our Congressman Peter DeFazio is one of their main targets. Those gross full-page ads a year ahead of the election also tell us that the GOP plans to spend more money in this state than any political campaign has ever done. We trust that Oregonians won’t fall for headlines like this from the RG ad: “Socialism Will Destroy Oregon’s Economy.”

• Gratitude was the takeaway word for the City Club of Eugene meeting Nov. 22 on the Student Success Act passed by the Oregon Legislature in 2019 giving $2 billion over the next two years to boost funding of K-12 public education. Process was another takeaway word as explained by 4J superintendent Gustavo Balderas, Springfield schools superintendent Todd Hamilton, Bethel superintendent Chris Parra and Bess Day, director of education for United Way of Lane County. The law requires a complicated process to figure out how to spend the money. Eugene District 4J has already held 38 community meetings asking for suggestions on where $12 million — 5 percent of the budget — should go in the first year. As Balderas put it, “The present system benefits some, not others … we need to benefit all.” The SSA is a welcome start in that direction.

• Speaking of football, or not if you’re a Duck fan, our favorite story last weekend was the Harvard students who held up the Harvard-Yale game to protest inaction on the climate crisis. Too bad Yale won in overtime.

• For more than a decade environmentalists have been fighting the Jordan Cove liquefied natural gas pipeline. On Nov. 21, a contingent of protesters — including  former Oregon Secretary of State Bill Bradbury — went to the Capitol in Salem to let Gov. Kate Brown know they want her to take a position against the 229-mile natural gas pipeline and the export facility planned for the Oregon Coast. Twenty-one of the protesters were arrested as they refused to leave the governor’s office. Brown did come to the Capitol and talk to them. She said she sent a letter to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Oct. 21, opposing its attempts to remove the state’s authority in the permitting process. Jordan Cove is projected to become the largest greenhouse gas emitter in the state. Environmentalists want more from the governor on this climate change issue, and frankly so do we. 

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