LETTERS IN THE EDITOR'S MAILBAG.Byline: The Register-Guard Black Hills plant is about money Don't be fooled by the Black Hills photo of a power plant shown on the front page of the Business section (Register-Guard, Jan. 23). None of the six stacks is in operation. It's like showing a sleek bomb without demonstrating its potential devastation. Black Hills' latest proposal for the Coburg power plant is a peaking facility. The company plans to produce and sell electricity only when the price is high. Black Hills' peaking business plan means it plans to profit despite the ever-increasing cost of a limited supply of natural gas. Further, the company doesn't have to sell power to our community if we face a shortage a decade from now. It's typical for peaking plants to sell to the highest bidder HIGHEST BIDDER, contracts. He who, at an auction, offers the greatest price for the property sold. 2. The highest bidder is entitled to have the article sold at his bid, provided there has been no unfairness on his part. . That bidder could be anywhere on the power grid. We'll be breathing the plant's toxins while its newly generated electricity zooms out of our county. A gas-fired power plant in Lamar, Colo., was mothballed because of the high cost of natural gas. The Lamar City Council recently approved an agreement to convert the power plant to coal. Today, that wouldn't be possible in Lane County because of current air quality standards. However, a power plant is built to last decades. Once Black Hills is built, it will be easier to convince authorities that expansion or conversion is necessary. The proposed Coburg power plant is about money. Black Hills' money. But it's our air. Our water. Our rare, high-grade farm soil. Our health. Our children and their children. BARBARA ALLEN Springfield Most workers share health cost According to according to prep. 1. As stated or indicated by; on the authority of: according to historians. 2. In keeping with: according to instructions. 3. The Register-Guard, the Lane Transit District A transit district or transit authority is a special-purpose district organized as either a corporation chartered by statute, or a government agency, created for the purpose of providing public transportation within a specific region. bus drivers' union is holding out because employees don't want to contribute toward their health insurance premium or make certain other concessions regarding their health benefits. I don't have much sympathy for their position. I don't know Don't know (DK, DKed) "Don't know the trade." A Street expression used whenever one party lacks knowledge of a trade or receives conflicting instructions from the other party. of any worker - low paid or high paid - whose employer fully subsidizes group health insurance premiums. As health insurance costs have continued to spiral, all workers and all employers have unfortunately felt it in their pocketbooks. Why should the LTD LTD 1 Laron-type dwarfism 2 Leukotriene D 3 Long-term depression, see there 4. Long-term disability bus drivers be exempt from this reality, unpleasant as it may be? To the LTD bus drivers, I say welcome to the real world. KELLEY BLEWSTER Springfield Bus driving takes physical toll As the spouse of a Lane Transit District driver, I see firsthand the toll that driving a bus takes on a person. Not only is the jostling of the seat difficult, but drivers work odd hours, including split shifts, early mornings, late nights, weekends, holidays; there's no real routine for their bodies to adapt to. They are responsible for safely transporting thousands of people daily, no matter what the weather, and yet must grab restroom and meal breaks on the run. No, it's not a glamorous profession, but it has been providing good, family-wage jobs to more than 260 employees in Lane County. It's critical that, at the very least, they continue their existing contract rather than take a step backward by accepting LTD management's proposal. These are loyal, hard-working people - our friends, family members and neighbors - not greedy people asking for too much. They are trying to hold on to what they've worked hard for, but management's proposal represents substantial economic costs for the workers. LTD management has also pro- posed cuts in the time operators have to do bus safety inspections, cuts in the time they have between shifts (used for sleeping), cuts in vacation as well as decreases to other benefits. LTD managers need to review their strategic plan, because their vision - to be the best transit system in North America North America, third largest continent (1990 est. pop. 365,000,000), c.9,400,000 sq mi (24,346,000 sq km), the northern of the two continents of the Western Hemisphere. - is in danger of becoming a joke. Team LTD is failing its mission. BETSY KELLY Eugene Protesters owe Bush an apology "We are ordinary people ..." Peter Chabarek says of his "stop the war" protest 50 yards from President Bush (Register-Guard, Jan. 23). No, Peter, ordinary people privileged enough to have been invited to an inauguration know how to behave in a manner suitable for the occasion. Chabarek's behavior was akin to having someone show up at his wedding to his wife, Willow, obnoxiously drunk. Chabarek's actions were boorish boor·ish adj. Resembling or characteristic of a boor; rude and clumsy in behavior. boor  ish·ly adv. and infantile at best, narcissistic nar·cis·sism also nar·cismn. 1. Excessive love or admiration of oneself. See Synonyms at conceit. 2. A psychological condition characterized by self-preoccupation, lack of empathy, and unconscious deficits in at worst. The one good thing that came out of it was that he was not arrested, as I suspect he would have regarded it as evidence of honor. Furthermore, it speaks poorly of Rep. Peter DeFazio Peter Anthony DeFazio (born May 27, 1947) is an American politician. He serves as a Democratic U.S. Representative from Oregon, representing the 4th Congressional District and is currently serving his 11th term. that his staff would offer an invitation to someone with a reputation for immature, disruptive behavior. They owe President Bush an apology. BILL ROYLE Brownsville Get facts straight on Plan B pill In a Jan. 21 letter, Kelley L.S. Jordan attempts to explain Plan B - the morning-after pill morn·ing-af·ter pill n. A pill containing an estrogen or a progesterone drug that prevents implantation of a fertilized ovum in the uterus after sexual intercourse. . The letter states in part, "Plan B prevents the woman's egg from implanting into the uterine uterine /uter·ine/ (u´ter-in) pertaining to the uterus. u·ter·ine adj. Of, relating to, or in the region of the uterus. lining to be fertilized fer·til·ize v. fer·til·ized, fer·til·iz·ing, fer·til·iz·es v.tr. 1. To cause the fertilization of (an ovum, for example). 2. ." It's too bad such writers don't do some very simple, basic research before writing such nonsense. A quick search of www.webmd.com under pregnancy reveals this explanation (among many others): "About two weeks after your menstrual period, your ovary ovary, ductless gland of the female in which the ova (female reproductive cells) are produced. In vertebrate animals the ovary also secretes the sex hormones estrogen and progesterone, which control the development of the sexual organs and the secondary sexual releases an egg into the fallopian tube fallopian tube (fəlō`pēən), either of a pair of tubes extending from the uterus to the paired ovaries in the human female, also called oviducts, technically known as the uterine tube. (ovulation ovulation /ovu·la·tion/ (ov?u-la´shun) the discharge of a secondary oocyte from a graafian follicle.ov´ulatory o·vu·la·tion n. The discharge of an ovum from the ovary. ). Your actual pregnancy begins at the time the egg is fertilized by a sperm cell. During the following week, the fertilized egg grows into a microscopic ball of cells (blastocyst blastocyst /blas·to·cyst/ (-sist) the mammalian conceptus in the postmorula stage, consisting of an embryoblast (inner cell mass) and a thin trophoblast layer enclosing a blastocyst cavity. ), which implants on the wall of your uterus." So apparently what Plan B is preventing from implanting into the uterine lining is, in fact, a fertilized egg. Regardless of one's views on the Plan B pill, it's good to at least get the basic facts correct before making a judgment. SUSAN SWANDER Waldport Iraq has no Sept. 11 connection Heath A. Wilkinson (letters, Jan. 26) wonders why we see no pictures of the Sept. 11 attacks rather than constant photos of the devastation we're causing in Iraq. It might be the three years that have passed since the Sept. 11 attacks. If Wilkinson really wants to see those pictures again, I still have all the newspapers from the weeks following Sept. 11, and I'll be glad to let him see them. None of us is likely to forget that day, but it hardly qualifies as news three years later. No matter how many times members of the Bush administration use Sept. 11 and Iraq in the same sentence, they are not related. The fact is that our government, in our names, attacked a country that was no threat to us. People who feel qualified to lecture others about the evils of moral relativity now see nothing wrong with killing thousands of innocent Iraqis just because someone else killed thousands of innocent Americans. Furthermore, it is not only Iraqis who are being killed and maimed maim tr.v. maimed, maim·ing, maims 1. To disable or disfigure, usually by depriving of the use of a limb or other part of the body. See Synonyms at batter1. 2. in this immoral war. No matter how hard the administration tries to conceal the fact, our own soldiers are losing their lives and limbs in this fiasco. Perhaps eventually he will be allowed to see those photos, and his compassion can be released from hibernation. CAROL STILL Eugene Nominees for best Bush movie The list of film titles gracing the top of the front page (Register-Guard, Jan. 26) could easily have been not only Oscar nominees but also a commentary on President Bush's first term in office. To wit: "Finding Neverland" - a fantasy story about weapons of mass destruction Weapons that are capable of a high order of destruction and/or of being used in such a manner as to destroy large numbers of people. Weapons of mass destruction can be high explosives or nuclear, biological, chemical, and radiological weapons, but exclude the means of transporting or in Iraq, smoking guns and mushroom clouds told and retold re·told v. Past tense and past participle of retell. by the White House troupe of storytellers George Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and Condoleezza Rice. "The Aviator" - a tragicomedy tragicomedy Literary genre consisting of dramas that combine elements of tragedy and comedy. Plautus coined the Latin word tragicocomoedia to denote a play in which gods and mortals, masters and slaves reverse the roles traditionally assigned to them. , subtitled "Mission Accomplished," featuring a faux-flyboy on an aircraft carrier whose memorable line in the film is, "Bring 'em on!" "Million Dollar Baby" - Bush's Operation Iraqi Liberation (OIL) war that goes way over budget and needs to be renamed the "Trillion Billion Million Dollar Baby." "Ray" - blinded by ideology, arrogance and power, the president marches his troops into Neverland without a "ray" of hope for bringing them home Bringing Them Home is the title of the Australian "Report of the National Inquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children from Their Families". for years and years to come. "Sideways" - where truth, civil liberties and the Geneva Conventions Geneva Conventions, series of treaties signed (1864–1949) in Geneva, Switzerland, providing for humane treatment of combatants and civilians in wartime. have gone under the Bush admin- istration. Unfortunately for us and the rest of the world, the bad political movie playing in the West Wing and East Wing of the White House will continue to run for another four years, long after the Academy Awards ceremony on Feb. 27 for the five films nominated for best picture. Wake me when it's over. KAREN MYERS Eugene District supports school choice Once again, The Register-Guard has printed Nancy Willard's uninformed and misguided rantings about the injustices caused by the Eugene School District's alternative school program (letters, Jan. 26). Gazing into the crystal ball of her own mind and totally ignoring reality, Willard has sounded the death knell of the alternative school system as we know it. While school district officials have pledged their support of our neighborhood schools, they will not dismantle our alternative schools. The Executive Summary of Results of the 4J Elementary School Parents Survey concludes with this sentence: "There is no support for dramatic changes in the School Choice Program." The alternative schools will not "enter a spiral of decline," as Willard states. I'm sure this will greatly disappoint Willard, but this is the reality of the situation. DAVE A file sharing program from Thursby Software Systems, Inc., Arlington, TX (www.thursby.com) that allows a Macintosh to share files with a PC. Designed specifically for and needing installation only on the Mac, DAVE works with Microsoft's native SMB/CIFS file sharing protocols and uses TAUBE Eugene |
|
||||||||||||||||
Printer friendly
Cite/link
Email
Feedback
Reader Opinion