Letters in the Editor's Mailbag.

Byline: The Register-Guard

Tax avoidance legal

While I am no fan of John Musumeci and his history of business dealings, I must strongly criticize The Register-Guard with the unfair characterization made in the Jan. 10 story titled "Arlie buying property to avoid taxes."

The newspaper sensationalized tax avoidance as though it were illegal. Musumeci is using a bona fide, IRS-approved, legal business option to shelter his profits. What savvy business, private or corporate, wouldn't do the same?

Perhaps The Register-Guard should learn to differentiate tax avoidance from tax evasion. One is legal. The other is not. Such treatment of the story made Musumeci's legal affairs appear to be immoral at best and, at worst, illegal. Neither is true. Shame on you!

DANUTA PFEIFFER Junction City 

Teachers convey values

If Ed Brown (letters, Jan. 12) was looking to make an intelligent statement, he missed.

Brown claims that schools are not teaching U.S. history but, instead, anti-Americanism and that if this persists, young men will continue to fly planes into buildings. A lack of education in patriotism, however, does not seem to be what compelled 15-year-old Charles Bishop to fly a plane into a building earlier this month. If Brown had bothered to pick up a newspaper, he would have learned that Bishop was not only an honor student (I'm guessing this includes a good grade in history, which, by the way, is still taught in and required in high school), but that Bishop also aspired to be in the U.S. Air Force. I am willing to bet that Bishop was a very confused young man looking for his own identity, and did not take the actions he did due to lack of knowledge about his national identity.

Instead of taking his time to write such letters to the editor, Brown should try using his time volunteering at a local school or mentoring a student. He might not only learn that teachers still teach history, but that most teachers try their best to teach values like tolerance and respect. Brown might also learn that young people are not apt to fly planes into buildings on account of their lack of patriotism.

AMELIA ADAMSAK Eugene

Resource not sufficient

The Jan. 8 article regarding the Lane County Board of Commissioners' upcoming decision on Eugene Sand & Gravel's River Road gravel pit application revealed some of the politics involved in this quasi-judicial process. Anna Morrison's ex-parte contact with Eugene Sand President Mike Alltucker, while legal (assuming she discloses all contacts and issues discussed), can understandably be seen as underhanded and shady in the eyes of the opposition, particularly because she now seems ready to reverse her position in favor of Eugene Sand.

On Dec. 4, the commissioners voted to deny Eugene Sand's application to re-zone the proposed farmland area. Their decision stated that the potential gravel resource is not significant enough to balance the loss of prime farmland under Goal 5 state land-use rules. This issue alone defeats the application, regardless of whether Eugene Sand can meet the other criteria (dust, noise, traffic) to be discussed in an upcoming meeting.

Determining the significance of the gravel resource is a mathematical, nonsubjective process. Because the commissioners already decided in their quasi-judicial process that the gravel resource is not significant, they cannot reasonably change that decision in the future. They may decide that Eugene Sand has proven that the company can mitigate potential problems. But without a significant resource, the application fails. If, following her discussion with Alltucker, Morrison votes to accept the proposal, her reasons would be highly suspect. An insignificant resource is an insignificant resource. In a quasi-judicial proceeding, I expect judicial objectivity from my county commissioner.

PETER REED Eugene

America makes mistakes

Ed Brown's succinctness (letters, Jan. 12) is the only thing I am grateful for. His final thought - "Our schools don't teach our history and the Constitution. We must stop undermining the family values of most parents" - makes me question whether Brown has done any reading of U.S. history of his own.

America's history and its Constitution have paved the way for countless Native American deaths and one of the most atrocious blunders in America's history, the Civil War. Let Brown not forget that it was our founding fathers, brilliant as they may have been, who sat pondering the value of the African-American as property. Nor should we forget that those same founding fathers, after much debate, decided that one slave would equal three-fifths of a person. Three-fifths of a person!

This is the kind of thing one can find with minimal research into America's history. So, maybe with a little digging into America's history, Brown may well find ample reason why anti-American sentiment has penetrated so deeply into some parts of the world. My only hope is that he learns that America makes mistakes as profound as those made by anyone else.

KYLE MALLORY Eugene

LETTERS LOG

Letters received in past week: 179

Letters published: 67

What's on readers' minds: No single topic dominated Mailbag during the past week. We received 14 letters about PeaceHealth's $34 million purchase of 160 acres in north Springfield for a new regional medical center and related developments. Thirteen readers wrote about Eugene Sand & Gravel's proposal to locate a mining operation off River Road north of Santa Clara and the decision by Lane County commissioners to reconsider their earlier denial of the company's application. We also received 10 letters on the state of Oregon's efforts to deal with a projected $720 million budget shortfall, 10 about Enron's collapse and the corporation's influence in the Bush administration, and eight about evolution.

- The Register-Guard

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