Letters in the Editor's Mailbag.

Byline: The Register-Guard

Don't raid 911 fund

I agree with The Register-Guard's editors that the Poison Control Center (editorial, May 31) is a necessary part of Oregon's emergency response system, and it would be a travesty to be the only state in the nation without such a valuable resource. I used the center several times when my children were youngsters.

But I take issue with the editors' contention that the 911 tax fund has a surplus. This is a common misconception. The system is in the process of an upgrade that will allow emergency operators the ability to pinpoint and map a wireless call to the 911 system. Those funds are needed to proceed with the upgrade. Had the upgrade been in place last year, a Eugene man would not have died from a knife attack when he was unable to inform an operator of his location.

One could easily argue that the center is an emergency service that should be covered by the 75-cent tax that is placed on monthly telephone bills. However, until the Oregon Legislature repays the $9 million it stole from the 911 fund in a special session to balance the state's deepening budget crisis, I cannot support any more diversions from this fund.

Earlier this session, I sponsored a constitutional referral to the voters that would have prohibited siphoning off 911 funds for anything other than their intended purpose. Unfortunately, Senate Joint Resolution 30 did not make it out of committee.

State Sen. VICKI WALKER 

District 7

Eugene

Security Council had it right

Columnist Jim Hoagland said that Americans weren't duped about the reasons for President Bush's war (Register-Guard, June 1). He said that members of the public showed a steady ability to sort through propaganda and that they were clear-eyed about what they were getting into.

I wish that were true, but polls showed that 54 percent of Americans believed that Saddam Hussein was directly responsible for Sept. 11. They were clearly the victims of presidential propaganda. The president, the CIA and the FBI knew Saddam had nothing to do Sept. 11, or with al-Qaeda.

Another poll showed 60 percent of the people believed that Saddam had nuclear weapons and that there was an imminent threat to the United States. Once again, everyone in the intelligence community knew there was no nuclear program and that Iraq's military was pretty pathetic.

We were told that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction and that if the United Nations didn't uphold Resolution 1441, then we would do it ourselves. Turns out there were no weapons of mass destruction, that Iraq didn't violate 1441 and that the French had better intelligence than we did.

Of course we were duped! The U.N. charter is to avoid war. Eleven out of 15 members of the Security Council were just doing their job. We were wrong, and they were right. We owe them an apology, not punishment.

JERRY BRULE

Eugene

Teach children about freedoms

I disagree with cutting high school journalism and the arts (Register-Guard, June 1). Our military-industrial complex is fully manifesting in a constant state of war at the expense of our children.

Without developed communication skills, especially good reporters and commentators, our democracy does not exist, but the New World Order run by policy from centralized government can exist. We are no longer the equal society we once were. We are divided between authority and submitting citizens.

This social order prevents citizens from being responsible for their institutions, and it is not new. Only the titles have changed, as this is the hierarchy of authority our nation stood against. Technology only improves the efficiency of this old social order. Only when our democracy is defended in the classroom is it defended.

We must stop producing products for industry and return to liberal education. Our most threatening enemy is not overseas but is leading the military-industrial complex that President Eisenhower warned us against and that public education has prepared us for since 1958.

Teach our children about our freedoms and how to defend them with the written and spoken word. There are no classes more important than this.

CAROL SEATON

Eugene

Marine's account was moving

I greatly appreciated Marine Sgt. Danny Young's very informative and touching letter about his experiences in Iraq (Commentary, June 1). My husband and I, along with many other Americans, are very proud of him.

I also appreciate that The Register-Guard published this article.

SANDRA A. REUL

Eugene

Which future for Oregon?

Two divergent visions will determine the fate of Oregon's future. One vision - held by people such as Jim Brown, Gov. Ted Kulongoski's forestry adviser; Marvin Brown, Oregon's new state forester (a former timber industry lobbyist who is not even from Oregon); Mark Rey, director of U.S. Forest Service, and Gail Norton, secretary of interior - is that all of Oregon's forests be one big mono-crop tree plantation and that all salmon come from fish farms and hatcheries.

The developers' vision, that of people like the Gang of Nine, is not much different. Their vision for Oregon's Coast and other valuable lands is unbridled development and sprawl in the name of growth and personal profit.

The opposite vision of Oregon is one of protecting the remaining native forests, restoring the damage done by 100 years of industrial logging on 90 percent of Oregon's forest lands and enhancing the remaining wild salmon runs. Development and sprawl would be limited by ecological, agrarian and societal safeguards.

The first settlers to Oregon had similar radical conservative visions. They believed in simple living, independence and living off the bounty of Oregon's fertile soils and rivers without destroying them. We, as Oregonians, will decide the fate of our state either by speaking up for the vision of an ecologically balanced and livable Oregon or sit silent and let the greedy few turn the state of Oregon (and its people) into one enslaved by exploitation and personal greed.

SHANNON WILSON

Eugene

Workers must resist changes

The Bush administration is well on its way to creating an aristocracy. In a last-minute stealthy move, the administration eliminated wage earners in the $10,000 to $26,000 income range from the child credit portion of the tax cut bill. This means that people in that income range will not be given the $400 to $900 credit per child that is offered higher income brackets.

Again, it's the bait-and-switch prestidigitation form of fooling voters. The deletion of lower income earners was done in order to cover the millions it will cost for the break in dividend and capital gains taxes that investors will now receive under President Bush's tax bill. The president and his wealthy cohorts will gain a great deal from these tax law changes.

Another bill that Senate Republicans have deceitfully named the "Family Time and Workplace Flexibility Act" eliminates overtime compensation and employers would be given the choice to substitute overtime pay for compensatory time and would decide when or even if workers will be permitted to take the comp time earned. This labor-unfriendly proposal also allows companies to reclassify any laborers as managers with no raise in pay and thus no overtime, because managers are not allowed overtime.

Big business is lobbying hard for these rule changes that remove virtually all protections previously provided to workers. Our laboring predecessors fought hard for these protections with their blood, sweat and tears. Members of America's workforce must encourage their legislators to repeal and reject these harmful changes.

RITA BABAUTA KILEY

Junction City 

Paging Rupert Murdoch

Federal regulators relaxed decades-old rules restricting media ownership recently, permitting companies to buy more television stations and own a newspaper and a broadcast outlet in the same city.

My husband and I are hoping that Rupert Murdoch will buy The Register-Guard and fire the entire editorial staff.

MARGARET and

BILL TRIMBLE

Florence

U.S. troops are world's finest 

After reading Marine Sgt. Danny Young's simple but eloquent essay, "Oregon Marine is proud to serve" (Commentary, June 1), all I can say is that Americans should be proud to have such outstanding individuals in our armed forces.

Whatever our feelings about the war or the Bush administration's planning and conduct of it, our troops are the world's finest. Let us never use or waste them foolishly.

And from one vet to another, let me be the first to say, "Well done, bro'. Welcome home."

MICHAEL E. PETERSON

Eugene

Moving toward a better world

Henriette Foss's May 25 letter makes a lot of sense. Her five steps for getting out of our current terrorist mess are quite reasonable. She ends with the question, "What do we have to lose?" What we have to lose if we implement her steps is the current trend toward fascism and more wars. Such a loss would result in a huge gain for Americans and for the rest of the world, enabling us to proceed toward better, more peaceful and more democratic governments everywhere.

Bill Lynch's May 27 letter is an excellent description of the deep problems associated with 21st century American political and military bungling by a bought majority in Washington, D.C. If we do not have real campaign and election reforms soon, we can kiss democracy goodbye in the United States, and, by conquest, in the rest of the world, as well.

And Wojtek Szalecki's May 28 letter reveals the moral bankruptcy of many Americans by saying it is fine to kill 12,637 people in Iraq if we can do it on the cheap. It would be even cheaper per person if we nuked the entire population of Baghdad! But we must not embrace this might-is-right folly.

BOB D. SAXTON

Eugene