LETTERS IN THE EDITOR'S MAILBAG.Byline: The Register-Guard Silencing youth forum is wrong Pulling the plug on the Wayne Morse Youth Program is an ill-advised response to the conditions on the Wayne Morse Plaza (Register-Guard, April 10). How fortunate for Eugene that in 1970 similar government efforts failed to pull the plug on the hippies who were selling handcrafted hand·craft n. Variant of handicraft. tr.v. hand·craft·ed, hand·craft·ing, hand·crafts To fashion or make by hand. hand·craft items on the nice, pristine newly built downtown mall. Had they succeeded, the Saturday Market, an enduring Eugene hallmark and a proving ground for more than 10,000 budding entrepreneurs over the last 37 years, would never have lasted through its first season. Closing down an open forum for youth because of the unrelated messy activities that generally surround active public spaces is like cancelling the University of Oregon's football season because of the illegal and abusive alcohol-related activities in the parking lots. Or like building a 700-mile border fence: It looks good, but it doesn't solve the problem - it only moves it around. A few Father's Days ago, my wife gave me a quote by Ellen Goodman: "The central struggle of parenthood is to let our hopes for our children outweigh our fears." This is good advice for our public officials as well. Iana Matthews-Harris and her friends have created a forum for the youthful expressions of today - which may well serve as the seeds of society's ideas tomorrow. Mitigating the illegal activities taking place at the Lane County Courthouse requires the efforts of all concerned. It's too easy and too shortsighted short·sight·ed adj. 1. Nearsighted; myopic. 2. Lacking foresight. short  sight to just pull the plug.
BILL GOLDSMITH Eugene What would J. Edgar Hoover Noun 1. J. Edgar Hoover - United States lawyer who was director of the FBI for 48 years (1895-1972) John Edgar Hoover, Hoover do? What, pray tell, could be wrong with the illegal National Security Agency wiretaps intended to stop the bad guys? Nothing that has not happened before, when information dirt was used against citizens of all stripes for political purposes. Lest we forget Lest We Forget is a phrase popularised in 1887, by Rudyard Kipling; it formed the refrain of his poem Recessional. As a title, it may refer to any of:
RICK GROSSCUP Eugene 'Get a life' remark out of line Richard Patman (letters, April 15) makes a couple of arguably good points, but then goes too far in suggesting that Eugene City Councilor coun·cil·or also coun·cil·lor n. A member of a council, as one convened to advise a governor. See Usage Note at council. coun Bonny Bettman "get a life." I'm not a constituent of hers, but I have a good impression of her from the paper. It appears to me that she has a life: Unlike many politicians, she has a life working hard to serve her constituents and their wishes. We need more like her. GIL GIL Global Interpreter Lock (to protect Python objects from being modified from multiple threads at once) GIL Gerenciador de Informações Locais (Brasil) CAMPBELL Eugene Save funding for defibrillators As a National Athletic Trainer Association certified and Oregon registered athletic trainer, I am concerned that President Bush has proposed to eliminate an important federal program to place automated external defibrillators in rural areas. I know, first-hand, that immediate CPR Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation (CPR) Definition Cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) is a procedure to support and maintain breathing and circulation for a person who has stopped breathing (respiratory arrest) and/or whose heart has stopped (cardiac and early defibrillation Defibrillation Definition Defibrillation is a process in which an electronic device sends an electric shock to the heart to stop an extremely rapid, irregular heartbeat, and restore the normal heart rhythm. can more than double a victim's chance of survival. On Nov. 5, 2005, Bill Jansen suffered a cardiac arrest cardiac arrest n. Abbr. CA A sudden cessation of cardiac function, resulting in loss of effective circulation. Cardiac arrest A condition in which the heart stops functioning. at Roseburg High School Roseburg High School is the only high school in Roseburg, Oregon, United States. Shooting incident At 7:45 a.m. on February 23 2006, 14-year-old freshman Vincent Wayne Leodoro shot and wounded a fellow student, 16-year-old sophomore Joseph Monti, using a 10mm pistol. , where I am the athletic trainer. Fortunately, the school has an AED AED - Automated Engineering Design , which I am trained to use. After taking necessary precautions, I attached the AED to Jansen's chest and shocked him twice. Thankfully, his heart rate returned. Without the AED, Jansen would not be alive today. According to the American Heart Association American Heart Association (AHA), n.pr a national voluntary health agency that has the goal of increasing public and medical awareness of cardiovascular diseases and stroke, and thereby reducing the number of associated deaths and disabilities. , there are 450,000 cardiac arrests a year. Only one in five receive bystander CPR and even fewer receive AED treatment. The Rural and Community Access to Emergency Devices Program provides grants to purchase AEDs for public places. The program also supplies training to lay rescuers and first responders. The American Heart Association notes survival rates are as high as 40 percent in communities with aggressive AED placement. We need more AEDs in rural Oregon where the nearest ambulance could be miles away from a cardiac arrest victim. In order to reduce death from cardiac arrests, this program must be fully funded. KEVIN COLLINS Roseburg Prayer editorial appreciated Despite the somewhat light-hearted dismissal by Robert Weiss (letters, April 11) of the editorial "The efficacy of prayer" as an April Fool's joke (humour, event) April Fool's Joke - (AFJ) Elaborate April Fool's hoaxes are a long-established tradition on Usenet and Internet; see kremvax for an example. In fact, April Fool's Day is the *only* seasonal holiday marked by customary observances on the hacker networks. , I'm sure there are many others besides myself who thought it was excellent. An April Fool's joke is something like the anonymous message left on my voice mail by a young woman calling from a bar late that evening, saying in a very sultry voice, "Hey baby, I can't wait to meet you." As much as I would like to believe she was being sincere, common sense tells me she was just having some fun with her friends and her cell phone. But there might be a metaphor here. Perhaps the petitioning kind of prayer is like leaving a message on your senator's voice mail. You may not get a direct answer but you hope it has some effect and, if enough people feel the same way, it probably does. Or maybe it doesn't, but you still feel better for at least trying. The other kind of prayer mentioned in the editorial - attuning ourselves to some higher will or purpose - might be a little like saying, "If I'm really supposed to meet that anonymous caller, she'll call back again." Or in my case, the proper state of mind would be more like, "Thank you, God, for helping me not be a 62-year-old fool who wants to be 26 again." Actually, I'm still working on that last one. EDWIN STUART Stuart, British royal family Stuart or Stewart, royal family that ruled Scotland and England. The Stuart lineage began in a family of hereditary stewards of Scotland, the earliest of whom was Walter (d. Eugene Some can't afford to fix cars With respect to Michael Denny (letters, April 5) and the latest complaint-fest over smoky cars, there are a lot of folks who live in Eugene and Lane County as a whole who honestly and simply cannot afford to pay out the average $75 to $180 to fix the problem. I know I certainly can't. Judging from Denny's last two sentences, that doesn't matter. It's not his problem. This goes along with the current theme of how to treat the poor in America. We'll just avert our eyes, pretend like you don't exist, selectively add additional taxes, fees and charges or just outright take away needed programs and when we open our eyes, poof! All of you will hopefully have disappeared. In this case, to solve one problem, we potentially take away a form of transportation for a group of people. How constructive. AARON R. DURLAND Eugene Illegal immigrants have rights In response to Robert L. Cook Robert L. Cook (December 10 1952) is a computer graphics researcher and developer, and the co-creator of the RenderMan rendering software. Cook was born in Knoxville, Tennessee and educated at Duke University and Cornell University. III's April 12 letter, it is important to understand that while the application of all constitutional rights and privileges to illegal immigrants is questionable, illegal immigrants actually do have some rights according to the 14th amendment: "Nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws Noun 1. equal protection of the laws - a right guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment to the US Constitution and by the due-process clause of the Fifth Amendment ." This means that illegal immigrants have the rights guaranteed in the Fifth, Sixth, Seventh, and Eighth amendments. All people, natural-born, naturalized nat·u·ral·ize v. nat·u·ral·ized, nat·u·ral·iz·ing, nat·u·ral·iz·es v.tr. 1. To grant full citizenship to (one of foreign birth). 2. To adopt (something foreign) into general use. , visitors and illegal immigrants within the borders of the United States The United States shares international borders with two nations:
Whether the remaining rights - those presumably pre·sum·a·ble adj. That can be presumed or taken for granted; reasonable as a supposition: presumable causes of the disaster. referred to in Cook's letter - stated in the Constitution are applicable under the 14th amendment is a decision that ultimately rests with the Supreme Court. MARY HANSEN Florence Don't teach kids to kill animals My parents read me a story in the paper about showing kids how to shoot turkeys. I was very, very sad and horrified hor·ri·fy tr.v. hor·ri·fied, hor·ri·fy·ing, hor·ri·fies 1. To cause to feel horror. See Synonyms at dismay. 2. To cause unpleasant surprise to; shock. that people would show kids how to shoot turkeys. They should think how they would feel if they were turkeys and they got shot. There is no reason why people should have to shoot animals. They could do a different hobby that doesn't hurt anyone. I am 7 years old. SAVANNA savanna or savannah (both: səvăn`ə), tropical or subtropical grassland lying on the margin of the trade wind belts. COEN COEN Comité Electoral Nacional (Peru) COEN Combinations of Evolutionary Computation and Neural Networks (Symposium) Eugene Two items were worth reading As an avid daily reader of The Register-Guard's editorial page, I seldom find anything to compliment the editors about. However, the April 11 edition had two articles I feel were most excellent. One was by columnist Kathleen Parker, the other a guest viewpoint by Todd Huffman. Both contained wonderful thoughts that should be recommended reading for all readers prior to their writing the usual one-sided thoughts most try to convey. This also includes the newspaper's editors. LLOYD BISSELL Eugene Immigration immigration, entrance of a person (an alien) into a new country for the purpose of establishing permanent residence. Motives for immigration, like those for migration generally, are often economic, although religious or political factors may be very important. debate a diversion Leave it to the Bush administration to create another situation causing so much emotion that no one is talking about the Iraq war, taxes, health care, bird flu, the hurricanes and now Iran. The issue of immigration reform is not a pertinent matter. People who have been living here and helping our economies are now being ostracized. For what reason? Suddenly this has become a problem? I don't get it. In my opinion, this administration has accomplished another smoke-screen to avoid real problems. JUDY GALL Eugene Iraq invasion was still wrong In response to Robert Boyer's comments in his April 4 letter "Don't forget Saddam killed kids," I would say: Yes, he no doubt did, but does that justify this war and the ensuing deaths of thousands more people? Instead of relying on our righteous ideas, what's really happening in Iraq? Are the lives of most Iraqis more secure, stable and prosperous now? Could we have intervened in a wiser way to help the Iraqi people? When considering our current actions in Iraq, the old phrase "Two wrongs don't make a right" comes to mind. RICHARD MARLATT Creswell |
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