KEEPING EUGENE’S STARS IN ALIGNMENT
Where did Eugene Weekly’s Rob Brezsny’s Astrology go? A fun/educational report on what the star alignments mean for us each week. The Emerald Valley without EW’s Astrology viewpoints is like the yellow brick road being chopped up by the Wicked Witch. Can we start a Go Fund Astrology in letters to the editor?
Crossword and Sudoku — do we really need them in our local newspaper? Please let us know what to do so we can continue to be “guided by the stars”?
Mark Niclas
Eugene
Editor’s note: Please do feel free, Mark, to start a campaign at GoFundMe.com to support keeping the astrology column in EW! Or call 541-484-0519 to find out the cost to sponsor the column — or just go to Support.EugeneWeekly.com to donate and support the entire paper. We love printing what readers love.
THANKS FOR ENABLING HONEST DIALOGUE
I want to thank you for running Josh Fattal’s Nov. 30 Viewpoint “The Facts on Palestine.” It was refreshing to hear a highly educated citizen speak bluntly about the situation in Israel-Palestine. It made me feel I’m not alone in feeling outraged and appalled by what is currently happening in Palestine at the hands of the Israeli government in the name of the Jewish state and “peace.”
I’m glad to see our local paper is willing to publish on this issue, and I urge you to continue enabling dialogue on this topic, despite any threats you may be receiving.
This is a moment in history when it is crucial for the voices of ordinary citizens, and perhaps those of American Jews, in particular, to be heard and for us to look soberly at the reality of what our country is supporting. Healing and learning come from authentic expression, honest listening and engaged dialogue, not from silencing, censoring or canceling those who are brave enough to speak out or even those who make a mistake in a public forum.
I appreciate your commitment to publishing what’s real. Stay strong!
Carrie Lipps
Cottage Grove
AH, THOSE GOOD OLD DAYS OF HEALTH CARE
Jill Dougal’s PeaceHealth article (“PeaceHealth Has Lost Its Way”) in the Nov. 30 issue of Eugene Weekly brought back some memories for me from about 12 or 15 years ago, when the then-CEO of RiverBend Hospital happened to blow by my house one day passing out some kind of religious literature. As a result of my wife’s employment at RiverBend, I happened to recognize his face and went out of my way to compliment him on his flashy purple tie.
As I recall, he held his position at the hospital for about three years at something like $750,000 per year (I’ll let you do the math on that). I believe his main job requirements were to run an occasional meeting and write the weekly pep letter for the RiverBend staff. He eventually resigned his position and headed back East looking for another CEO position at a hospital with enough chumps on the hospital board to sign another high dollar contract with him.
Having been around the local Providence medical facilities from the heyday of Sacred Heart University District Hospital in south Eugene, I find it a pity that nowadays the Catholics can’t rustle up enough nuns to run their hospitals. Things were so much more cheery at Providence medical institutions back in the good old days.
Steven Johnston
Creswell
CLIMATE CATASTROPHE AND WAR ARE LINKED. TAKE THE BUS.
Traffic is getting worse while the clock is ticking toward planetary meltdown. To that end, I’m pleased that another mayoral candidate has joined the race in a primary in May: Shanaè Joyce-Stringer vs. Vinis-endorsed candidate Kaarin Knudson. If free public transportation is not on the agenda, what is? More war on the unhoused, aka “safety,” aka “be afraid?”
Truth is, climate catastrophe will happen as long as there is war. War is an economy: burns fuel, uses technology, gets some people rich. Read Matthieu Auzanneau’s Oil, Power, and War for a full geopolitical understanding of the mechanism.
So, unless we stop war, we’re screwed. But Eugene can at least do something. Every city could do something. If every city had free transportation, at least the public sector would compete with the mercenary economy of oil and cars.
The neoliberal establishment in Eugene and every city will say that free public transportation can’t be done, won’t “pencil out.” In balance, they will say that war must be, because, again, it pencils. More dog whistle fear: of math, economic collapse, being forced to the street.
I ride a bike. Bike infrastructure is not the answer. The city of Eugene isn’t doing it fast enough. And most people are not going to ride anyway. This is not Denmark. We aren’t Danish. The public sector has to compete with auto traffic, which is more convenient and cheaper than taking a bus. It can’t stay that way.
Otis Haschemeyer
Eugene
UPLIFTING PERFORMANCE BY UO ENSEMBLE
Last Sunday evening I attended the performance of the University of Oregon Gospel Ensemble. I wish to congratulate the students and their director, Andiel Brown, on a truly uplifting evening. Some of their selections were joyous; others brought me to tears. Chris Schroeppel’s arrangement of “He Won’t Hold You” was incredibly moving. I look forward to the next performance in March. Congratulations!
Laurie Nicholson
Eugene
Online Extra Letters
NOT IN MY NAME
Thank you Josh Fattal for a very appropriate Viewpoint (“The Facts on Palestine,” Nov. 30).
I would ask my fellow citizens of Eugene and beyond, when is it enough? When are you going to stop voting for corporate politicians left or right, who continue the destruction of countries around the world for oil and minerals? When are you going to say to Sens. Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley and Rep. Val Hoyle, “Not in my name”?
Gaza’s gas field does not belong to Exxon. Syria’s gas fields do not belong to the U.S., yet our military is illegally there to steal it.
When are you going to say enough? All my life my country has been bombing and stealing, yet President Joe Biden and Wyden and hundreds of other politicians are still in office supporting the slaughter. Enough!
At a protest at Rep. Hoyle’s office there was a homeless man running around without shoes on a cold day. Hoyle showed up but slunk off around the corner. Oil and bombs trump people to these politicians. Remove them.
Susan Shafroth
Eugene
HOW IS THIS HUMANITARIAN?
I’m confused. Sen. Jeff Merkely recently characterized funding Israel as “emergency humanitarian aid.”
Since when are U.S. taxpayer dollars given to the perpetrator of an ongoing genocide worthy of being called emergency humanitarian aid?
Isn’t it the Palestinian victims who desperately need emergency humanitarian aid, being wantonly murdered, starved and imprisoned, while their homes, hospitals, schools, mosques, libraries, bakeries and businesses are destroyed in the Gaza concentration camp by the apartheid state of Israel?
Pat Driscoll
Eugene
WE CAN ONLY HOPE FOR CLARITY ON GAZA
I am a senior citizen Jewish male. In 1936 my grandfather brought his wife and my mother to the U.S. from Germany. Fortunately, he had the foresight and the resources to see where the tragedy in Germany was heading, or else my mother more than likely would have been murdered in the Nazi death camps.
In last week’s Weekly’s letters (Dec. 7), Joseph Bussel makes clear that not all Jews support the ongoing Israeli military action in Gaza. He acknowledges that war crimes are being perpetrated by Israel and that Israel’s government actions are not by any means fully supported by its citizens. Activists and others there are being actively censored by the current fascist government, among other forms of repression. I was grateful for his letter, as he was able to articulate all this in a manner that I had been unable to.
Many say Israel has the right to defend itself, and there is no doubt in my mind that it does. No Jew anywhere is giving Hamas a pass for their incredibly inhumane and barbaric attack on Oct. 7. Sadly, though, the actions currently run by Israel’s military and government in the short term may achieve their goals but will only result in creating another generation of terrorists from all over the world, along with possibly provoking a much larger global conflict.
I only wish there were some clear answers on how to fix all this horror. Maybe someday some will come. We can only hope for that.