Give us ‘This Modern World’
I couldn’t care less about the F-word, but I’d gladly trade in a Savage Love for the occasional This Modern World.
Leo Muzzy
Eugene
Editor’s Note: Your wish is our command — we have brought back This Modern World, aka Tom Tomorrow.
ODOC’s Injustices
I would like to applaud the viewpoint by Hunter Briggs on inmate mail service (EW, 2/27). As one who has corresponded with various inmates over several years and in different states, including the infamous Red Onion prison in Virginia, I am acquainted with severe restrictions on letters.
But I had not known that the Oregon Department of Corrections (which has never corrected anything I know of, including itself) had chosen to fall in line with other states, with the same drug interdiction excuses for separating inmates from the outside world. It is both pointless and inhumane to disallow postcards, birthday or Christmas cards, or any special communication from family or friends.
Drugs and relentless racism rarely, if ever, enter a prison by means of the post office. Clean up your own injustices, ODOC, don’t make them worse.
Patricia Spicer
Eugene
Thank You, 4J
Many thanks to the Eugene 4J School Board for joining the lawsuit against the recent federal order banning any mention of race in education.
The federal order is another ill-thought-out ideological attack from this administration. There is no thought about how complex this issue is or how unclear the order is. Can a school have a Black or Latino student support group? Can we teach about the Civil Rights Movement? Or even the Civil War?
Donald Trump’s goal with this order is to whip up racial division and fears that expanding equity hurts us. He’s wrong, and misrepresenting equity. Justice and equal opportunity for all — women, communities of color, all of us — expands democracy. His federal order is bad for democracy
Board chair Jenny Jonak stated: “This is not a time to sit on the sidelines.” That is so true! Being silent implies acquiescence and will only make things worse. Thanks for speaking up, 4J.
Joy Marshall
Eugene
From the Master Gardener
Several months ago I said in a radio broadcast that using paper has an environmental impact and that reading online — when possible and practical — could reduce that impact. EW took my comment about one cellulose paper being enough as an implication that EW was not worth picking up.
Nothing could be further from the truth. EW is (almost) the only source of meaningful local journalism. Journalism that looks at an issue, sorts out the details and prints the truth. EW’s coverage of the environment is second to none. And that brings us back full circle. Readers, please support this fine publication, but try to pick up and pass on one copy, or use an environmentally friendly(er) click to access this quality paper when you can.
John Fischer
Eugene
A Special Thanks to EW
The Interfaith Alliance/Indigenous Advocacy team organized its first event on Jan. 21 at the Unitarian Universalist Church in Eugene. Our program included the film We Ride for Her and speaker Marta Lu Clifford, a citizen of the Confederated Tribes of the Grande Ronde. Each cast a spotlight on the topic missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls. However, we recognize that Eugene Weekly’s decision to give the event a little more coverage than the calendar listing was partly responsible for attracting an audience of 150 that night. We thank Emma J Nelson for providing additional coverage on the MMIW crisis.
Chris Cunningham
Eugene
A Tour of the Jail
An elderly couple recently toured the Lane County Corrections Division (jail). Capacity is 411, usually with 300 in residence, 90 percent male. It’s loud, dark and unpleasant. The most dangerous/unstable are in single cells. No bars. Just a window at the door for constant monitoring by cameras and guards. Suicide prevention a a big deal throughout the jail.
Usually within a day or two, the new prisoner is evaluated by a visiting judge, often with attorneys present, and many prisoners are released to the streets with their promise to appear at trial. Often the release includes an ankle bracelet. Not uncommonly, the sentence is continuing with the bracelet and a promise to go through a treatment program.
Our savvy guide, with 22 years jail experience, estimates 90 percent of their guests are druggies, most of it fentanyl laced. He shakes his head. Not optimistic about their/our future. His future is retirement in Alaska.
There are two state mental hospitals in Oregon, both horribly jammed with long wait times. The criminals go to one, the non-druggie, the desperately ill to the other. Too often those poor souls are sifted through the system and finally dumped on motels or the streets of Eugene.
Oregon, so wonderful and caring, so perfectly liberal, refuses to tax itself/focus on the basic, decent, truly needed services.
Don McLean
Eugene
DIY Roads are Good
Laura Shoe and others (EW Viewpoint, 2/20) might have cause to sue their realtors for not disclosing that the road their houses are on is an LAR (local access road) before they bought their houses.
When I moved into the neighborhood, it was obvious that the road used DIY maintenance. I thought of that as a plus because the condition of the road discouraged it from being used as a thoroughfare.
Several years after I moved in, the city put in a sewer in the River Road area. As part of the deal to use our street for one of the lines, the city paved the road. Because of this, the road didn’t need maintenance for quite a while, and the owners forgot about their responsibility for upkeep. There are now some potholes that slow down traffic.
The authors declare that it is unfair to LAR residents to pay the same taxes as those with publicly maintained roads, but I think that the lower property value gives us lower property taxes.
My fear is that bringing the county in will result in a situation such as the recent improvement on Ayres Road to bring it up to code. The owners on that stretch of road were hit with five-figure bills that forced some homeowners to give up their homes.
I think the residents should be able to get together and make repairs for less than what the government would charge.
Power (and responsibility) to the people.
Steve Hiatt
Eugene
An Old Trick, Don’t Fall for It
When I heard that the Chamber of Commerce was leading a petition to recall the fire fee, I had questions.
What is the benefit to the business community of opposing stable funding for community centers, libraries and pools (along with park maintenance, downtown cleanup efforts and much more)? Won’t that be a direct blow to working families and to our city’s ability to attract residents — directly at odds with the Chamber’s stated goals of retaining talent and improving access to childcare?
I’m inclined to think that what the Chamber is opposed to is the idea of businesses contributing financially to the stability and well-being of the communities that they earn their living in and profit from, and they are prepared to mount a campaign to convince regular people to vote against their own best interests. Why does this sound familiar? The parallels between this action and the indiscriminate gutting of public services at the federal level by business interests in the name of “efficiency” are hard to ignore. To me, the attempt to channel citizens’ valid concerns about corruption and waste into this recall is a trick, and I encourage the people of Eugene not to fall for it.
Stephanie Ponto
Eugene
ONLINE EXTRA LETTERS
A Boycott is Virtue Signaling
For decades, I’ve worked mightily to buck the consumer identity, to live simply, to keep my dollars local and to not shop the national brands.
Still, I was unable to endorse or engage in the Feb. 28 24-hour economic blackout. Given our culture’s addiction to shopping and our resistance to living within our means, my concerns are twofold.
First, shoppers’ one-day holdout only delays purchases, giving victory to “corporations and banks who only care about their bottom line,” as boycott promoters put it.
Second, blackout participants score virtue points while changing neither themselves nor the system.
My nonparticipation asks something of me: to write and speak up about what is asked of us: First, to shed our “consumer” identity. Second, to stop supporting big-brand retail, restaurants and services. Third, to live simply, within our means and Earth’s limits.
A one-day shopping boycott is a baby step. But our times call not for baby steps but for being “all in” with our moral instincts and our agency to act on our deepest convictions. Creative nonviolent resistance as a way of life is our only credible option to bring about sustainable change, healing of the Earth and truly transformative justice.
If I want big retail to permanently change their ways, then I first must permanently change my ways. Otherwise, I’m an enabler of all forms of destruction.
Mary Sharon Moore
Springfield
Put a Maple Leaf on Us
So the Trump regime wants to annex Canada? I have a much better idea — we should ask Canada to annex Oregon and the rest of the Pacific Coast as we voted blue and want nothing to do with the Trump/Musk fascist coup currently under way in D.C. This would be good for Canada as it would double their population and triple their economy so they would effectively become the second largest economy after China, while Trump’s U.S. would drop to number three or four. And we will benefit from attaining Canadian citizenship which would give us all access to Canadian universal health care and a still-functioning democracy.
The email address for Seattle Canadian Consulate is Seatlg@international.gc.ca.
Let’s send lots of requests for Canadian annexation of Oregon and the Pacific Coast so we can have Canadian citizenship and leave the Trump nightmare behind!
Chris Ellis
Cottage Grove
Does Anyone Have a Solid Plan?
In the Feb. 13 edition (EW, Slant), you compared the removal of the civilians of Gaza from an active war zone to the Nazi plan to relocate the Jewish people of Europe to an island off the coast of Africa.
If I lived in Gaza, I would leave. What about you, EW? Would you leave? Would you prefer to live in a place of rubble, with no electricity, little water and the only food you have is doled out to you? How about your children and the rest of your family? Would you wish it upon them?
What is it you want for Gaza? Do you even have any thoughts? How does it sound if the hostages are released and Israel stops attacking and peace prevails? Of course that is nonsense.
Hamas is sworn to destroy Israel and the people of Gaza are considered the most radical in the world. How can they not be when they are taught to kill Jews from their first day in school.
What is your plan, EW? Do you even care about the people of Gaza?
Norman Bellitt
Springfield
We are a Common People
Existential despair. It is when we humans question if our lives have meaning, we wonder if the future holds anything but global warming hell and political irrelevance.
They say that we humans can pretty much adjust to anything, given enough time, but I really fear that the next step for this country is what happened in Nazi Germany, for fear that cannot be fought turns into subservient “dear leader” worship. Just look at what happened to the once fairly respectable Republican Party.
However, I think of Martin Luther King Jr., who helped lead African Americans toward a future that was, when he started, just a hope. But that dream became a reality, thanks to his providing leadership throughout the darkness. We in America need leaders like that to stand and call for people to march with them, behind them, so that this American family doesn’t break apart.
I define “god” as “spirit, that which is generated by common people on a common journey.” Using that definition, an atheist like me can join with a Catholic or Lutheran in common cause. With that spirit, within that journey, our lives really do have meaning. Without that spirit of a common people on a common journey, despair tears us apart at every breath.
Like it or not, we who value our democracy and the rule of law are facing an enemy who wants to convince us that there is no such thing as a common people.
Hugh Massengill
Eugene
Pray for us All
Fascism seems to be taking over the country day by day. I have never used that word lightly. God, I pray I am very wrong.
On live television at the White House, Donald Trump and JD Vance ganged up verbally on Volodymyr Zelensky like the mafia tag team that they are. There are ugly and terrible consequences for the world. Our president is definitely a Vladimir Putin asset or agent. He is Putin’s puppy, and JD is his pit bull. One nasty giant puppy who wants to chew Ukraine as his slipper. Between that, tariffs and the dismantling of our civil government, as well as possibly the economy, Trump is achieving in weeks what Russia and the old Soviet Union tried to accomplish in almost a century, weakening their rival (and sometimes enemy) into a pal of kleptocracy.
The exact “why” may never be known, but the reality is changing the country and world as we know it. Pray for solutions, and work to stop the hostile neo-Nazi takeover. It might take millions of us citizens marching and rallying every Saturday for as long as it takes to turn this constitutional crisis around and restore sanity. Reform yes, destruction no.
Morri Hudson
Eugene
The Wrong Direction
The U.S. government should be operated more like a service organization; paid for and responsible to the taxpayers.
We are now more like an international real estate investment company, expecting a return on all investments. Our foreign aid is now looked upon as a money-losing investment.
Humanity and goodwill never appear on a bookkeeper’s ledger.
So as we abandon our goodwill and friends, other countries (China) will step in and finish the work we have started.