Letters, 2018, T'hell with the Editor, September 1, September 8, September 15, October 18

 

The next episode I had with Editor “Ed” involved my response to this letter written by David Eckhardt.

***

Because letter writers Tom Jackson and Mary DeCeault (“No Cherry Picking,” “Some of the ‘Accomplishments’ of Donald Trump,” Aug. 29) have already covered all the left-wing talking points so eloquently, I would like to provide my own truthful perspective.

First, after eight years of unquestioned far-left policies, it is a wonder President Trump could achieve anything with all the ridiculous policies that had been put in place. But as former President Obama liked to do: If you can’t get what you want through Congress, just use a phone and a pen. In doing so, he left the door open for President Trump to void many of our former president’s bad ideas — and for that, I thank him.

As for the 500 (estimated) children not reunited with their parents, it’s on the parents for committing a crime by coming to the U.S. illegally. They knew what they were doing, just as people who commit crimes here and get sent to jail; they, too, get separated from their kids. Unless we do something worse by putting the kids in jail with their parents.

Yes, Trump’s North Korea plan has not panned out too well. But he did get a couple of prisoner’s back home, along with some of our MIAs’ remains (we hope). And it didn’t cost us a dime.

The jury is out on the tax cuts cost. But what we do know is that the economy is going gang busters. Unemployment among all categories is at its lowest in a long, long time. And the GDP is above four percent after being told, for the previous eight years, that we needed to accept a measly two percent GDP or less as the new normal.

As for downsizing the National Monuments and allowing companies to explore for energy? No problem there. In my opinion, they were getting used for vote-getting and fundraising from the eco-extremists like the Sierra Club and other far-left eco groups. And just where is the pollution and environmental damage from this? Take a look at the EPA’s pollution of the Colorado river. As of last year, it still hasn’t paid the bill. (www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation -now/2017/01/13/epa-wont-pay-claims-mine-spill-released-3m-gallons-toxic-water/96555846)

As for the president’s golfing… Wow, I am amazed that anyone could play golf more than President Obama. When it comes to who golfed more, I really don’t care either way.

I could give a longer list of things I think matter, but then the editor would have to give me a whole page — and that is unlikely. So here is a link to the not right-wing Washington Times article (www.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/may/6/giving-trumps-accomplishments-their-due).

That all being said, I would like to see a few less tweets. Personally, I don’t tweet because I think it is silly.

Sept. 1, 2018

***

Below is my response to Eckhardt’s letter. Ed revised it and printed his version without my permission.

***

I saw recently on Facebook a video of a man rescuing six puppies deposited along a desert road somewhere in a Western state. How entirely cruel the owner of those puppies had to have been!

Ah, but the puppies were not human beings; their owner surely would not have abandoned six children.

In that same vein, President Trump and his administration deliberately separated some 500 children from their asylum-seeking parents seeking entrance into our country at the southern border.

His motive? It appears to be to send a message: Come here with your children; you lose them.

How can he and his supporters minimize this horrendously cruel act? Heed David Eckhardt’s words in his Sept. 1 letter. “… it’s on the parents for committing a crime by coming to the U.S. illegally. [Forget the fact that seeking asylum is not a violation of U.S. law.] They knew what they were doing, just as people who commit crimes here and get sent to jail; they, too, get separated from their kids. Unless we do something worse by putting the kids in jail with their parents.”

I am dismayed to suspect that there is a segment of our population that sees Latinos — and anyone else who isn’t “like us” as criminals and rapists, gang members, drug dealers and murderers.

Thank you to our president, Fox News, Newt Gingrich and the rest of the political agitators on the airwaves who have not one scintilla of conscience, reducing “the others” to sub-human status.

That mindset seeks to make it palatable to the general population to separate vulnerable children from their desperate parents in the same way as leaving unwanted puppies to die of thirst and over-exposure.

September 8

***

I sent this email out to several friends.

***

Just so you know. I’ve had it with this guy. He just destroys the heart and soul of a forceful letter. The attachment I have provided illustrates it. He did this to me recently and I called him on it, he apologized for printing his changes without consulting me first. I assumed thereafter that any changes he wanted to make in forthcoming letters that I would send him he would try to negotiate. I said he should leave letters send to him (by anyone) alone. Once again he did what he did previously: print his version of my letter and embarrass me (portraying me as somewhat of a milquetoast that writes awkward sentences) without contacting me previously. I really don’t intend to write any future letters. I would tell him that but I need his good will to print a forthcoming book presentation notice I plan to make.

***

I received two responses.

***

Jenny Velinty: It seems like a lost cause for any kind of balance with the SN and I note letters from Florence are being printed in the RG, [Register-Guard] which is also rapidly stepping right and dumping any opinions but their own.

It looks like a time to circle the wagons, support each other privately, use the Eugene Weekly for print, and get out the vote. The midterms are crucial for derailing this bull on wheels and I hope the fickle Independents have seen the light.

The dems must keep getting background on Kavenaugh and delay the rush to install him and hopefully Obama can make a difference. The news that healthcare costs are contained may help but racism is exploding around the world. People seem ready to throw out all the old guard in their frustration. Only Ruth Ginsberg gets respect.

Rand Dawson: Harold....we know you are not milquetoast....and not nearly as civilized as that letter he printed!! At least he left your name unscathed ....I personally cannot imagine where he gets the time to do that....////Hey--take a break....your talents are too much needed to deny us your wisdom-en-futuro…

***

Here was David Eckhardt’s hissy fit response letter.

***

In response to Harold Titus’ Letter to the Editor “Dehumanizing Others Who Are ‘Not Like Us’” (Sept. 8), which referenced my Sept. 1 letter (“The Real Accomplishments of President Trump”), I am not dehumanizing anyone.

Comparing puppies to children in his letter and then conflating that to what “all” presidents have done to protect our country is contemptible at the least and ignorant at best. As many already know, seeking asylum is not illegal. But crossing our boarder without permission is.

Yet in his letter, Mr. Titus misleads in a way that confuses one with the other.

Following his train of thought, the parents of illegal immigrants have no responsibility for what their actions cause. So, should we just have no borders or laws to deter people from breaking them?

Taking that extreme view to its logical conclusion, we should just suspend all laws that interfere with what a person wants to do.

In his letter, Mr. Titus went on to conflate that members of our brave policing agencies are racist for enforcing our laws, suggesting by way of association that those of us who support policing the laws — including the president — are also racist.

That could not be more wrong, and those who think that way are simply dishonest and, in my opinion, contemptible. To think that all who cross illegally into our country are saints is pure ignorance.

And let’s be clear: No one has said that all illegals are rapists and murders.

But that reality doesn’t fit the narrative, which is to paint those on the “right” as Nazis or Nazi supporters. The intent of letters like that is to stifle dissent through a narrative that accuses those in support of the rule of law as racists.

I, for one, won’t be deterred by that.

In this unperfect world, we are all responsible for our actions and the consequences of those actions. Like it or not, each of us has a responsibility to be aware of — and enforce — the laws that govern us as a republic.

Anyone wishing to come here and become a citizen should be welcomed with open arms. Just one requirement: Do it legally.

        Printed September 15, 2018, in the Siuslaw News

***

I emailed Editor Ed the following October 18.

***

Certain practices contrary to the welfare of the vast majority of people and the people who perpetuate them need to be called out for what they are. Taking the heat out of the calling diminishes considerably the message to the point that it is no longer worth the doing. No need to talk any further. Your policy is reducing your number of letter writers, I suspect, from both the left and the right.

***

I vowed not to submit another letter to the Siuslaw News until Ed ceased to be its editor.

I did submitted a long letter October 17. Our state representative, Caddy McKeown was up for re-election. Her opponent had said some nasty things about Caddy at a Republican Party rally in Florence. A Democrat had been at the rally and had recorded her words. I had received a transcript of what she had said. I had always written letters of recommendation for Caddy and Arnie Roblan. I felt obliged to do so again, despite my disagreements with Ed. I doubted that he would print the letter, so I sent him a message along with the letter.

***

This is a long letter. Perhaps it could be used in your “guest viewpoint” feature.

If you want to use it, I do not want anything changed. In my last two letters you made considerable (unnecessary in my opinion) changes without my knowledge, causing me to think that instead of putting my name underneath the printed letter you should have stated “based on a letter submitted by Harold Titus.” You should not get to modify a letter writer’s opinion and pass it off as what he precisely thinks. Same goes for how the letter writer expresses himself.

Consequently, I do not want you to print this letter if you feel compelled to make even one change.

***

This was Ed’s response, October 18.

I appreciate your letter and taking the time to share your perspective. That being said, I think we should talk about the difference between Letters to the Rditor and Guest Viewpoints. Letters have specific guidelines that run in each edition along the side of page A4 (Opinion Page). I do allow a certain latitude when it comes to Guest Viewpoints, primarily because they receive a certain prominence based on the writer’s expertise, particular insight or background on the subject. When it comes to Letters, however, in addition to a preferred length (again with which I have some latitude depending on the number of submissions), the following guidelines apply:

“… Letters are subject to editing for length, grammar and clarity. Publication of any letter is not guaranteed and depends on space available and the volume of letters received.

Letters that are anonymous, libelous, argumentative, sarcastic or contain accusations that are unsourced or documented will not be published.

Our objective is to provide letter writers with an opportunity to share a specific insight or perspective in a way that is as concise as possible and devoid of argumentative, sarcastic or inflammatory language. Whatever editing I did was likely done to eliminate those components while still leaving the message intact, such as the difference between “The candidate is unqualified” and “The candidate is ridiculously unqualified.”

Without question, the attached piece would have to be a Guest Viewpoint because of its length and tone. I will tell you that, if specific quotes are included and attributed for or against someone in the Guest Viewpoint (or Letter, for that matter), I require submissions to include the sourcing of those quotes unless they are referring to a quote that has appeared in our own newspaper (which I can easily verify.) This is just due diligence in the interest of fairness. I receive many letters that reference quotes with no attribution or source, and I don’t run them. This would be the case with your submission, in which you reference quotes “recorded by a registered Democrat.”

I don’t need to include that person’s name in the submission, but I at least need to verify it with the individual or hear the recording myself before attributing words to any individual mentioned in a Letter or Guest Viewpoint.

It’s probably not the response you were looking for. However, I have taken the time to explain my position and reasoning in the hope that it will facilitate more of your submissions rather than fewer of them.

***

Expecting its rejection, I sent my letter, slightly revised, to Coos Bay’s The World.

***

Teri Grier’s high talk about providing “compassionate leadership for our coast” is not meant to persuade me and other long-time liberals. Some sort of sorcery is required to erase the images of Mitch McConnell declaring how much huge tax cuts for large corporations and billionaires are going to provide jobs, the White House’s calculated, cruel separation of immigrant children from their asylum-seeking parents, and GOP Secretaries of State purging from their states’ voter rolls probable Democratic Party voters. GOP candidates like Grier have to dissemble hard to try to reverse the growing disregard many voters harbor for today’s Republican Party.

The GOP has always been the water-carriers of big business and the very wealthy. To attain majority support, Republican candidates must assert that their taxation policies benefit the middle and lower economic classes; they must exacerbate wedge issues; they must exploit citizenry fear of and prejudice toward people easily scapegoated; and they must vilify their opponents. Truth goes out the window. Winning is all that matters.

Red Republican Teri Grier opposes cap and trade, the mildest form of reducing CO2 emissions. On her website, she states: “Cap-and-trade is a system designed to raise tax revenue, not reduce greenhouse gas emissions.”

She bemoans the poverty so apparent in rural Oregon and blames Democrats. Corporate employee wages across our county have been stagnant for decades while corporate profits have soared. Which political party has supported this? Which political party opposes minimum wage increases while pushing always to cut taxes that benefit almost exclusively the top one percent? Teri Grier takes the Ayn Rand position that the poor must not be helped. Assisting them, she has said, turns them into babies, strips them of their self-esteem, destroys their motivation.

Grier’s website states that she supports right-wing Measures 104 and 106.

Her attack flyers — typical GOP vilification — portray Caddy McKeown as a horrible person. Surprised?

Caddy McKeown is a moderate, business-oriented Democrat. At a recent forum she stated: "I’m much more concerned about voting for this district than I am about voting for or against a party.”

In 2012 I wrote this in The World. "I want representing me a person who is governed not by expediency, and not by moneyed interests that benefit the few. I want that person guided by fairness and conscience.” That is what I got. That is what I will get if Caddy is re-elected.

Printed in The World October 22, 2018

***

Here are comments e-mailed to me by friends.

***

Karin Radtke: Wow Harold! And just when I was starting to think we might have to call on our local "Weroance" [reference to my novel Alsoomse and Wanchese] to start mediating... Thanks, and will pass this around.

Rand Dawson: wowow....honest to god....!!

Ron Preisler: Your article is excellent as usual. Shame more locals won’t be able to read it. Did you send it to … [Ed] as well?

Igor Kusznirczuk: I would forward to .. [Ed] and thank him for being such a jackass. Nice work.

Rosetta Favors: Good job!!!

Heather Rollins: Very nice.

Jenny Velinty: A-HA! More than one way to get an LTE published! Congrats! The World is the best place for a letter supporting Caddy. They know her quiet get-it-done ways. She’s one of them-treading a cautious but determined path and the longer she stays in office the stronger and wider her influence will be.

Letters, 2018, Let People Write What They Feel and Think, March 31, July 21, July 25

 

Ian Eales and David Eckhardt had a special knack of getting under my skin. Despite the Siuslaw News editor ever ready to edit whatever I wrote, I sent this letter off.

***

Ian Eales (March 24) would have us believe that the revolt of school children against the easy availability of guns is the product of “corrupt politicians, statists and anti-American media” brain-washing. He sees placing restrictions on gun ownership to be the relinquishment of “freedom” to gain “temporary security.”

Anybody shot at – brainwashed or not by ex-teacher liberals like me – will take common sense gun restrictions over the freedom to be riddled with bullets anytime. The school children that marched and protested March 24 are absolutely right. Presumably, Mr. Eales would prefer to have these adolescents shout: “Freedom to have people buy guns that require weak or no background checks! Vote liberals out!”

        Printed March 31, 2018, in the Siuslaw News

***

David Eckhardt wrote the following letter that compelled me to respond. Editor “Ed” edited it substantially without advance warning or negotiation. What resulted was a candid exchange of viewpoints between the two of us. Immediately below is Eckhardt’s letter.

***

So, Siuslaw News editor … thinks we have gone the wrong direction ("We’ve Come a Long Way Since the Dixie Chicks — But In the Wrong Direction," July 18) I suppose it depends on which side of the fence you sit, but I disagree.

As a country music fan, to this day I still don’t listen to the “Dixie Chicks.” Not just because they dissed G.W., but their music generally stinks, IMO.

But let’s get to the real problem here.

It seems that we are supposed to believe anything that comes out of our government. Well, I can’t go there, and anyone paying attention should have a hard time too.

Mr. [James] Clapper [former Director of Intelligence under Obama] lied straight-up, then back tracked and no one seemed to care except me. I will never trust another word from his mouth; just because he is an intelligence official means nothing. Mr. Clinton lied on live TV and was eventually impeached for it. The Senate then failed to do its job — because of politics I suppose. If Clinton says the sky is blue, I want a second opinion.

Oh, let’s not forget Mr. Brenner who, if he hated President Trump any more, his look would burn him to the ground.

And finally, how about the past FBI head, James Comey, and his underlings. He and his underlings say they didn’t let their biases affect their work. I say they are lying straight-up and know it.

Just look at Comey’s family, all female and all Hillary fanatics. They even marched in that supposed (liberal) woman’s march. And I am to believe he didn’t have a bias and didn’t act on it?

Really?

Wow.

How about the point man [Peter] Strzok [FBI agent] and his paramour and all those emails on a government phone? If he said two true words in his testimony it was probably his name. And he said he also did not act on his bias.

So, all these folks were just good old boys and gals doing their level best to adhere to our laws and morals?

What a joke.

What we have seen since Donald Trump became president is, in no small measure, a Democratic Party which lost a supposed safe election and is now going bananas. They call themselves the resistance; I call them deranged.

Even President Obama did not receive this amount of negative coverage for all his lies and half-truths. I personally think the Dem’s have lost their party to the Socialists and are going to be pursuing their agenda in the future. This will manifest itself with single-payer medical, guaranteed income and attacks on capitalism.

Make no mistake: the socialists are as much a danger to our Republic as any Russian ever thought to be.

I hope to God I’m wrong.

David Eckhardt

        Printed July 21, 2018, in the Siuslaw News

***

Here was the response letter that I sent to Ed.

***

“They can’t be fair! Can’t be honest! They’re biased!” now assert Trump’s defenders, attacking our federal intelligence agencies and Special Council Mueller’s investigators.

There is such a thing as being biased for the truth, for valuing honor, integrity, for being committed to the discovery of facts.

Propagandists like Sean Hannity are paid handsomely to incite, distort, erect fantasies built on tall foundations of far-fetched lies. He and Trump have much in common.

We who recognize Trump and his cabinet appointees for what they are are “deranged,” “duped” – according to local resident Trump/GOP loyalist David Eckhardt (Letter July 21). Indeed, we are angry. Furious. That the GOP works assiduously to make our country a Koch brothers’ inspired oligarchy, that it engenders dishonest elections through gerrymandering and voter disenfranchisement, that it lies continuously to ordinary folk about how it has their welfare at heart, that it vilifies, vilifies, vilifies whoever gets in its way, that it places feeding its donors everything they want at the expense of human life is horrific.

Now we have law-breaker Trump: greedy, egotistical, dishonest, dictatorial, cruel, ignorant, stupid. His base loves him. GOP office-holders abide him. Thomas Friedman, in his latest column, (https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/17/opinion/trump-putin-republicans.html) puts it accurately: “… what makes Trump even more powerful and problematic is that this president with no shame is combined with a party with no spine and a major network with no integrity.”

We live in perilous times. Mr. Eckhardt, you are so wrong. We are headed definitely in the worst direction.

***

The letter having my name under it in the July 25 Siuslaw News was substantially different from what I had submitted. I had much to tell Editor Ed.

***

I am displeased with what you did with my letter, printed in today’s newspaper. Attached is a comparison of what I wrote and what you printed. You made quite a few changes, most – in my opinion – counterproductive to what I wanted expressed.

I stated in my letter that “we” are furious. You softened my discontent almost to the point that I appear to be a milquetoast afraid to challenge the very people I wish to criticize. You have me writing “in my opinion” “seems to be,” and “what could prove to be.” I wrote a forceful letter. I intended it to be forceful. I wrote: “Now we have law-breaker Trump: greedy, egotistical, dishonest, dictatorial, cruel, ignorant, stupid.” I wanted all of those adjectives included. I could have added other adjectives like “immoral.” You replaced all of them with three nouns. Trump is far worse a human being than what you have me stating. You hare softened considerably what I wanted to declare without my permission.

Second, your altering of my sentence structure in one glaring instance reflects poorly on my ability to write correctly complex sentences. I refer to the long sentence that begins with these words: “That the GOP works …” I used five noun clauses in a series as the subjects of the sentence, which concludes with the two-word predicate “is horrific.” It is a grammatically constructed sentence. You changed it and omitted “that it” in front of “engenders dishonest elections through gerrymandering and voter disenfranchisement” to make the entire sentence ungrammatical. Because my name is underneath your edited version of my letter, that mistake reflects on me, retired English teacher, not you.

Because you felt that you had to soften the tone of my criticism, you made changes that both weakened the force of my criticism and the style and tightness of my expression. I am embarrassed to have my name under what you printed. Why cannot you just let people – save for using obscenities – write what they feel and think?

I am being hard on you. I know that your intentions are good. I do believe that your editing goes too far.

***

Ed answered.

***

Hi Harold,

I appreciate you taking the time to write, and for communicating your displeasure. Naturally, I’m sorry you felt the revisions clouded or softened your points. While I certainly encourage letter writers to share their perspectives, I am also adamant that our Opinion page not become an extension of Facebook, wherein name calling and emotionally-charged accusations ("...according to local resident Trump/GOP loyalist David Eckhardt…” "Now we have law-breaker Trump: greedy, egotistical, dishonest, dictatorial, cruel, ignorant, stupid…”) become an accepted part of the conversation. The same for presenting opinion as fact (“...the GOP works assiduously to make our country a Koch brothers’ inspired oligarchy…”)

Don’t get me wrong, Harold. Personally, I agree with every assessment made in your letter. But as editor, my main objective is to facilitate conversation and, hopefully, the sharing of opinion and perspectives in a way that moves conversation forward — no easy feat in today’s highly volatile dialogue.

Again, my apologies. In the future, if I have any concerns, I will send you my suggestions ahead of time and explain why. I will not print anything until we can agree on the final draft. I value your input and perspective, Harold, and want to make sure you continue to be a part of this important conversation within our community.

If you have any other questions or concerns, please feel free to call, email or stop by my office any time; my door is always open.

***

My answer.

***

Thank you, … [Ed] for your polite response.

I name-called Trump because he deserves it. How can you make a point about name-calling and blatant falsehood made by the far right and the President and his backers and the dishonesty of GOP practices and policy without being direct in your remarks? I do not want to qualify my remarks. I take your point that you don’t want letter upon letter to be nothing more than name-calling. Mine wasn’t. Eckhardt’s and Eales’s letters are also somewhat more than that. That’s fine, as far as I am concerned. What a letter writer affixes his name to should be what he has written– stupid, inaccurate, insightful; whatever it may be. He should be judged and responded to based on what he actually writes. I believe that most readers recognize that what a critical letter writer offers is opinion, something to think about. Perhaps rebut. If somebody wants to challenge my assertion about the Koch brothers’ intentions, I could certainly give factual evidence to support my viewpoint. My letter’s intention was to rebut the Right’s assertion that having a viewpoint contrary to what the Right wants people to believe disqualifies certain individuals as investigators of the President. A secondary viewpoint was to remind people that the GOP, particularly in recent years, has been consistently dishonest in its pronouncements and policy. I don’t make that assertion lightly. Not providing specifics (that would make my letter too long) does not make the statement false. I could write such a letter (sticking strictly to that subject). I have written such letters in the distant past. That I wanted to make broader points should not prohibit me from making generalizations that readers should ponder.

Yes, in the future we can negotiate what I would like to express in print. I won’t like it. To avoid the aggravation, I probably won’t write. But who knows? Eckhardt and Eales boil the blood.

***

I emailed several friends this message.

***

I am especially peeved at the editor of the Siuslaw News for the neutered letter that he printed in today’s (July 25) edition of the Siuslaw News because it has my name under it. The paper used to have editors that allowed you to write what you thought. … {Ed] wants everything muted, everything polite. I am not the person that today’s letter reflects. Such editorial oversight censors forthright viewpoint. I doubt that I will write another letter to this newspaper.

If you are curious, attached are my actual letter, the letter of complaint I sent to … [Ed], and a comparison of what I wrote and what he changed.

***

Here are several responses.

***

Rand Dawson -- Harold....Congratulations for having joined the multitude of former LTE writers who now write with an understanding that maybe...maybe...with luck....their main intros and punch lines will survive in recognizable form....

Please do not let this defer you from further expressing your rage, opinion and insight. We need it all -- more than ever..... We highly value it.....

Jenny Velinty -- Remember you are in the ‘city of Florence’ – a ‘’where IS that ?’’ kind of town to most people despite all the ‘Visioning’ and ‘Motion” the GOP Mayor likes to broadcast. He makes me sea-sick.

Loved your letter to … [Ed]. A good Golden Rule reminder is always right.

Your LTE is more NY Times level and … [Ed] is our local gossip manager.

I was just telling someone who does not get the local SNOOZ about Eckhardt and how his son was killed crossing 101 with his bike. He yelled at ODOT and must be pleased that 5 safety crossings are getting built a decade after his son died.

He continues to boast his hard right views and gets them printed. I wonder if … {Ed] ‘edits’ his LTE’s. I think … [Ed] dotes on Eales, Eckhardt and Cable.

I strongly recommend cooling off at City Lights watching a colorful re-mastering of the BEATLES Yellow Submarine escaping from the blue meanies. It’s simplistic, BP lowering jolly-ness.

Igor Kusznirczuk -- This town is full of weak spineless jellyfish. I would be very pissed if I were you. He is stupid to manipulate letters. I thought there was freedom of speech.

Wende Jarman -- I believe in your outstanding attributes as a great published writer! Shame on … [Ed]!

Rand Dawson -- Harold...i read your original materials showing what he changed....before i replied...

This is how … [Ed] has worked over the last 2 years....Some of my op/eds on healthcare have gone 10+ 'editing' sessions....as he peels away verbage according to his own style schematic....

I finally sat long enough to realize...i had to work thru it....and i do....but with little enthusiasm and less frequency.....and i send him footnoted info to buttress some statements, etc.....

Which, if one considers we (you) are writing op/eds or LTEs....is absurd....But, alas, he owns the inkwell....

And like I say....stamp your foot and thump the table....and still hang in there....God help us if 'our side' slinks away....

Rand Dawson -- Harold....your followups were essential..

Its what he needs to hear....repeatedly...since this is his style to such an extent that many others I talk to have thrown their pencils away....which we simply cannot afford to do.....

he even takes my satire or irony and changes it....which guts the final sentence....and this is for an op/ed.....

Ron Preisler -- Harold,

I agree your letter was certainly better grammatically. … [Ed] must have spent a great deal of time on the changes, so what was published captured at least 90 % of your intent.

We as a town have changed.  I have been at Rotary where I heard some of our conservative members trying to get business owners to pull their advertising because some of his articles didn’t reflect what they wanted to hear, even though it was the truth.

I would not want to be in his shoes.

Thank you for speaking out.

Hugh Schneider -- Isn't amazing just how much temerity is exercised by print editors. I can readily understand your ire; had you wanted to say what … [Ed] had written, I suspect you would have asked him to write the letter ....

Letters, 2017, Thanks for Working with Me, March 2, March 22, May 4, August 12

The Siuslaw News had replaced their temporary editor with their sports columnist. I had immediate difficulty with the man. I will refer to him as Ed (for editor) because I will be providing private messages that we exchanged. I submitted the following for publication March 2.

***

Ian Eales’s letter March 1 attacks teachers, their unions, public education, the Democratic Party, and the building of a new high school in Florence. He asserts the following:

“Schools are failing because they [teachers] expect nothing of the students – and that is what the students deliver.”

“Spending $40 million on a new school will not improve academic performance. … The building will be a monument to mediocrity.”

“Today’s education system is a bloated bureaucracy. Teachers unions overwhelmingly contribute to the Democratic party; the same party responsible for failing inner cities within Chicago, Baltimore, Detroit, Washington D.C., et al.”

“Throwing more money at the problem will not solve it. It is time for a change.”

Mr. Eales knows little about teachers and public education. A public school teacher for 32 years, I know how dedicated the vast majority of teachers are in their work. We teachers know the complexities of student learning better than Bill Gates, Mitch McConnell, or any person who is not a present or past educator.

I loathe what our critics say about us! Corporate know-it-alls and their paid political allies excoriate low student achievement test scores. It’s the teachers! they rant. Bad teachers, teacher tenure, the damn unions! Failing schools! Standardized test scores determine best a teacher’s effectiveness, they declare. (Never mind the deleterious societal effects of poverty, especially in inner cities: terrible living conditions, malnutrition, family dysfunction, parental disengagement. Never mind the considerable, widespread underfunding of schools that makes teaching ever more difficult) Clean house! Out with the bad, in with the good! Hail charter schools! (Hello, Betsy DeVos) Tough, uniform curriculum standards! Demand! Drill! Test!

A certain percentage of the general population has always had (and always will have) a negative opinion of the teaching profession. Teaching is easy, these people declare. It isn’t a full-time profession. Teachers are coddled. They’re overpaid. They whine. The old saying “If you can’t do anything else, teach” goes back to when I began teaching in 1957. Teachers have had to battle this perception for decades. How easy it has been for the champions of privatization – who have produced the films “Waiting for Superman” and “Won’t Back Down” and who have never themselves taught -- to rally uninformed, innately critical people to their cause.

Don’t fall for it. Corporate-funded “reform” activists are bent on ridding communities of veteran teachers, privatizing public schools, making education a money-making enterprise for niche businesses, and indoctrinating children with a corporatized, agenda-driven, by-the-numbers culture. A pox on them and their deluded followers.

***

Here was the response that Ed sent to me.

***

Good morning, Harold,

First, I want to say how glad I am that someone rose to the defense of teachers in regard to the Eales letter. Thank you for doing so and, hopefully, sparking a conversation that is going to become increasingly important with the disastrous appointment of Betsy DeVos. I’ll be happy to print your letter in tomorrow’s Opinion page. However, there were a few spots I felt went into a bit of a rant (my guess is that you wrote this very soon after reading Mr. Eales’ letter). Also, the very end “A pox on them and their deluded followers” goes against my rule to avoid sarcasm and name-calling in letters. I think you did a great job of passionately and constructively making your case without the need to add ill wishes and name calling at the end.

Below is a revised version, with some of what I felt were rants removed, along with a re-worked ending.

Please take a look at it. I want to keep your voice and tone while, at the same time, sticking to my objective of maintaining an Opinion page that is respectful in its discourse.

I’m open to discussing the changes if you feel strongly about something I may have cut or revised. I will wait to run it until I hear from you.

Again, many thanks.

***

Here was Ed’s revision.

***

Ian Eales’s Letter to the Editor (March 1) was essentially an attack on teachers, their unions, public education, the Democratic Party and the building of a new high school in Florence. In his letter, he asserts the following:

“Schools are failing because they [teachers] expect nothing of the students — and that is what the students deliver...”

“Spending $40 million on a new school will not improve academic performance. … The building will be a monument to mediocrity...”

“Today’s education system is a bloated bureaucracy. Teachers unions overwhelmingly contribute to the Democratic party; the same party responsible for failing inner cities within Chicago, Baltimore, Detroit, Washington D.C., et al...”

“Throwing more money at the problem will not solve it. It is time for a change.”

I suspect Mr. Eales knows little about teachers and public education. However, as a public school teacher for 32 years, I know how dedicated the vast majority of teachers are in their work.

Teachers know the complexities of student learning better than Bill Gates, Mitch McConnell or any person who is not a present or past educator.

I loathe corporate know-it-alls and their paid political allies, who excoriate low student achievement test scores.

“It’s the teachers!” they rant. “Bad teachers, teacher tenure and the damn unions are the reasons for failing schools.”

They declare that standardized test scores are the best way to determine a teacher’s effectiveness.

Never mind the deleterious societal effects of poverty, especially in inner cities, where students face terrible living conditions, malnutrition, family dysfunction and parental disengagement on a daily basis.

Never mind the considerable, widespread underfunding of schools that makes teaching ever more difficult.

A certain percentage of the general population has always had (and always will have) a negative opinion of the teaching profession.

“Teaching is easy,” they declare. “Teachers are coddled and overpaid.”

Teachers have had to battle this perception for decades. How easy it has been for the champions of privatization — who have produced the films “Waiting for Superman” and “Won’t Back Down” and who have never themselves actually taught in a classroom — to rally uninformed, innately critical people to their cause.

Corporate-funded “reform” activists are bent on ridding communities of veteran teachers, privatizing public schools, making education a money-making enterprise for niche businesses, and indoctrinating children with a corporatized, agenda-driven, by-the-numbers culture emboldened by the appointment of Education Secretary Betsy DeVos.

Don’t fall for it.

***

My response.

***

Thank you for your consideration in emailing to me your suggested changes. I understand your position and the need for shorter letters. However, I believe that a writer’s passion on a particular subject must not be lost for the sake of politeness. I am fine leaving out condemning words about Mr. Eales’s letter and some other changes. Below is what I would consent to have printed. Otherwise, I would prefer that the letter not be printed.

***

I took out some of Ed’s revisions and put back some of what I wanted. Here was Ed’s response.

***

Hi Harold,

Thanks for getting back to me. I couldn’t agree more with you regarding the need for passion in writing, and in identifying a writer’s voice. I think what you’re saying is important and I especially want those who [read] your message — Mr. Eales in particular — to be reached. However, it’s been my experience that references to “our,” “us,” “they” and “them” immediately causes anyone who doesn’t already agree with you to stop reading. That would be a shame. You’ve already mentioned your years as a teacher. “I loath what our critics say” could just as easily be “I loathe what critics say” with the “our” in there.

The only other sticking point is my aversion to generalized quotes without attribution, i.e., “It’s the teachers!” they rant. Who is “they?” It’s unnecessarily argumentative in tone, and could just as effectively be worded “Critics blame bad teachers, teachers’ tenure and unions as the reasons for failing schools.”

If you’ll meet me in the middle with those points, I will compromise with you on the rest…

***

This was part of his new revision.

***

I loathe what critics say about teachers. Corporate know-it-alls and their paid political allies excoriate low student achievement test scores. They blame bad teachers, teacher tenure and unions as the reasons for failing schools, asserting that standardized test scores are the best way to determine a teacher’s effectiveness. Never mind the deleterious societal effects of poverty, especially in inner cities, where students face terrible living conditions, malnutrition, family dysfunction and parental disengagement on a daily basis. Never mind the considerable, widespread underfunding of schools that makes teaching ever more difficult.

A certain percentage of the general population has always had (and always will have) a negative opinion of the teaching profession. The old saying “If you can’t do anything else, teach” goes back when I began teaching in 1957, along with the perceptions that teaching is easy, that teachers are coddled and that they’re overpaid.

How easy it has been for the champions of privatization — who have produced the films “Waiting for Superman” and “Won’t Back Down” and who have never themselves actually taught in a classroom — to rally uninformed, innately critical people to their cause…

***

Ed ended his email with the following statement: “I’ll leave everything before and after those passages.”

***

My response.

***

I’m fine with your removing the personal and possessive pronouns. I respect your viewpoint. I felt that “they” has “our critics” as its antecedent but no matter. Removal of the quotation marks might have been one way of fixing your objection about the use of the generalized attributed speaker. You’ve reworded that section well. I would like to see the paragraph beginning with “A certain percentage” read as follows:

A certain percentage of the general population has always had (and always will have) a negative opinion of the teaching profession. They believe that teaching is easy and that teachers are coddled and overpaid. The old saying “If you can’t do anything else, teach” goes back to when I began teaching in 1957. Teachers have had to battle these perceptions for decades.

I want the second and fourth sentences included because the statements are true and the general public should be informed of it. Leaving them out weakens the purpose of the letter.

Again, I appreciate the time you have invested in communicating with me about your concerns. I have had no other editor do that. Thank you. Although I think I understand your desire as editor to ensure that letters that the newspaper prints do not incite a political flame war between the left and right, I suggest that times and incidents do occur when strong letters need to be directed at the opposition and absorbed by the general readership. If they are not written, the ideology that does not respect truth, that promotes the welfare of the few, that exploits the uninformed, that denigrates and persecutes, prevails. It’s a fine line you walk.

***

Ed’s response.

***

Thanks for working with me on this. I took your last suggestions into account and included them in this final version (below). Please look it over. If you’re good with it, I’ll get it into Wednesday’s paper.

Again, I appreciate your willingness to work with me, and for understanding that thin line I walk each day.

Be well.

***

My response (March 6).

***

One minor change. Instead of “as a public school teacher for 32 years” I would prefer “having been a public school teacher for 32 years.” Otherwise, good to go.

***

Is this what I am to expect now every time I send a letter to him! I thought. Should we letter writers not be the sole authors of what is printed? I am not interested in sharing authorship. Ed, you are printing an “opinion” page. I don’t want your opinions attributed to me!

***

Here is Ian Eales’s March 11 response to my letter. Curiously, he misidentified me.

***

In response to Donald Frerichs’ Letter to the Editor (March 8), he stated “I suspect Mr. Eales knows little about teachers and public education.” When I hire high school graduates who don’t know that one half and 50 percent are the same, I say the education system is failing.

He went on to say, “Never mind the considerable, widespread underfunding of schools…” when, in fact, Oregon spends 53 percent of its budget on education (Governor’s Budget 2017-19).

The country is on the hook for a $1 trillion in student loans ($966 billion Current Debt, plus $334 billion in Delinquent Debt.)

How much is enough?

We spend ever increasing amounts, make the education system larger and more complex and yet performance still declines.

I think Albert Einstein’s “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, but expecting different results” applies here.

According to Mr. Frerichs, began teaching in 1957, two years after Rudolf Flesch published “Why Johnny Can’t Read.”

In the ensuing 60 years, Johnny hasn’t learned to spell or do his sums either.

Very sad.

***

Here is a letter I wrote May 4 that was not printed. I don’t remember if I submitted it or if Ed chose not to publish it. I suspect the latter.

***

The Republican health care plan for America: “Don’t Get Sick.” If you do, “Die Quickly.” These quoted words were on a sign that Florida Congressman Alan Grayson presented on the floor of the House to reinforce a speech he delivered in late September 2009. The Affordable Care Act would be passed into law March 23, 2010. The Republican Party’s cruelty to Americans without influence or money was manifest then and is definitely that now.

“How do they get away with it?” you might ask. Appeals to voters’ greed, vilification of both the opposition’s leaders and the downtrodden, smoke and mirrors, lies, exploitation of man’s insecurities and basest instincts. Imagine any Republican member of Congress running for re-election telling the truth about his denial of global warming: “The devil with future generations! I need the fossil fuel industry’s campaign money to get re-elected. I serve corporations. Always. You think I want to be some two bit lawyer in Palookaville?”

His message to his cronies: “Money, money, money. He who gets it deserves more and more. That’s what makes America great. Now, let’s get together to figure out a few more lies to trick the rubes into voting us in again. To the rubes: “Obama Care? Dying on the vine. Our plan fixes it. Trust us.” And when they find out how bad it is, cue Shawn Hannity and Fox. We’ll blame it all, vociferously, on the Democrats!”

***

Too much sarcasm, Ed?

***

Republican letter writers Ian Eales and David Eckhardt had recently moved to Florence. Over the next several years they were frequent letter writers, their opinions causing me to want to cross swords with them. Here is a letter I wrote referencing Eckhart’s attack on Judy Preisler, the wife of one of my friends, a city councilman.

***

I take exception to several statements David T. Eckhardt made in his August 5 letter critical of Judy Preisler’s August 2 letter regarding the Trump administration’s change of ICE policy that permits its agents to arrest seemingly without exception unauthorized immigrants.

I did not appreciate Mr. Eckhardt’s insult that the Lane County commissioners, the state legislature, and citizens like Mrs. Preisler (and me) are “willfully ignorant of the facts,” that we “make judgments based on feelings.”

“I do not support unfettered and unrestricted hordes of people just coming here,” Mr. Eckhardt declared. This statement infers that immigration across our southern border prior to President Trump’s inauguration was just that: “unfettered” and “unrestricted.” He is wrong. An August 2016 NPR article (http://www.npr.org/2016/08/31/491965912/5-things-to-know-about-obamas-enforcement-of-immigration-laws) discussed President Obama immigration enforcement policy, encapsulated in this statement: “The Obama administration says it doesn't have the resources or the desire to deport millions of immigrants whose only crime was entering the country illegally. So, it has focused its enforcement efforts on particular targets: namely those caught near the border, those who've committed crimes and those who appear to have arrived in 2014 or later.”

Justifying his opposition to the sheltering of unauthorized immigrants, Mr. Eckhardt wrote: “… we are a nation of laws. … It is not our duty to ignore the law or subvert the law as is currently being done in our state and cities.” My ignorant-of-the-facts, bleeding heart response is laws are as good or as bad as the politicians who make them. Our country has suffered awful laws that have cried out for repeal -- slavery, Jim Crow legislation, segregation of schools, and voter disenfranchisement to cite several examples. An additional GOP Senator’s vote two weeks ago to repeal Obamacare would have led to millions of people being deprived of their medical coverage.

There is something very wrong about ICE agents in the middle of the night or any time seizing for deportation unauthorized immigrants who entered this country to escape certain death, who have lived here five or more years, who are the parents of children born here, who become contributing participants in a strong American economy, who have never committed a crime other than having entered the country illegally.

In a democracy, high-minded civil resistance to bad laws and executive branch policy must occur. Especially now, with our President fomenting so much hate.

        Printed August 12, 2017, in the Siuslaw News

***

The editor made two changes. He put quotation marks around “ignorant-of-the-facts” and deleted “bleeding heart” in the middle of the letter and changed the final sentence of the letter to read: “Especially now, with our current President fomenting what I feel is so much hate.”

 

Letters, 2016, Not Enough or Too Much, February 20, February 22, April 23, April 27, September 10, September 16

 

Good quotes:

“Greed dies hard, even when the rivers have turned to soot and the tap water catches fire.” – William Rivers Pitt

“How do you poison a cyanide factory [Fox News]?” – Jon Stewart

“If making our economy and democracy work for the many, rather than for a few at the top, is ‘one issue,’ then this one issue is a necessary precondition for achieving anything else worth achieving.” – Robert Reich

 “She [Hillary Clinton] is the world heavyweight champion of torquing her comments to please whoever she's talking to.” – William Rivers Pitt

I decided to try to make several political points using humor. The last part of comedian Bill Maher’s weekly HBO show “Real Time” features a segment that Maher calls “New Rules.” In the letter below I emulate, clumsily, his “New Rules” delivery.

***

New rules that Bill Maher has my permission to utilize:

TV political campaign reporters must not use the word “resonate” more than three times in one report.

Fox News must not be allowed to polygraph its political commentators. Doing so would break its budget. At any time it would need at least 100 spare machines. Each week Sean Hannity would blow up half of them.

Chris Matthews needs to stop having man-crushes. First, it was W. in 2003. “He's like Eisenhower. He looks great in a military uniform. He looks great in that cowboy costume he wears when he goes West.” Then there was GOP primaries presidential candidate Fred Thompson in 2007. “Can you smell the English leather on this guy, the Agua Velva, the sort of mature man’s shaving cream … after he shaved?” Barack Obama’s speech-making inspired Chris to say, “My, I felt this thrill going up my leg.” Now Chris is pals with John Kasich.

If Hillary Clinton wants to have Democrats and Independents believe that she is a truthful person, she needs to stop her GOP-style, fact-exaggerated smears of Bernie Sanders, who wants a single-payer medical insurance system. "We had enough of a fight to get to the Affordable Care Act. So I don’t want to rip it up and start over." You don’t have to cancel the ACA, Hillary, before you set about trying to legislate single payer.

        Printed February 20, 2016, in the Siuslaw News

***

The Siuslaw News had a new editor, somebody promoted from the ranks of employees. He had changed the wording of my second paragraph, which had been “Any TV political campaign reporter who uses the word “resonate” more than three times in one report must be shot.” I was miffed. I sent this email to him.

***

Siuslaw News Editor:

“Any TV political campaign reporter who uses the word “resonate” more than three times in one report must be shot.” Too strong? Really?

When I write a letter to the editor (I’ve been doing it since 2003), I try to make it interesting. The letter that you printed today was intended to be humorous as well as intended to make two points. Exaggeration is an important element of humor. Surely readers would not have taken “must be shot” seriously. You took the joke right out of that paragraph.

Of course you have the right to edit submitted letters. I used to write quite a few of them, as Bob Serra and Theresa Baer could attest. The last two years I have been less motivated to write. Regardless, when I do write a letter, I want it to be entirely mine, not a collaboration. In the future, if you want to edit anything I submit, don’t print any of it.

He responded February 22.

***

Hi Harold,

I’m sorry you feel that way. After reading your letter, I felt that part was inappropriate — even as a joke — and took it out. Obviously, humor is subjective, so we’ll have to agree to disagree on this issue. But I will take your advice and not print any more of your letters that I consider unfit for the paper. Below is a copy of our letters policy as an FYI.

Sincerely,
...
Editor
Siuslaw News

***

I answered.

***

R...,

First, thank you for responding. Second, I do not question your responsibility to choose what to print, edit, or reject. My only thought is that being too circumspect in what you select could lead to a preponderance of dull letters and, eventually, a decline of letters submitted.

***

The year began to wear. Political debate after political debate. I was not pleased with how both parties’ presidential candidate debates were going. I was no fan of Hillary Clinton; I felt the need to communicate that.

***

Watching the Democratic Party Presidential Candidates debate April 14, I finalized several conclusions.

Early on, Bernie said that he was doing well because he was telling Americans the truth. One of Hillary’s major weaknesses is the perception shared by many that she is shifty, that like her husband she places expediency above integrity. [Her husband] Bill, a leader of the Democratic Leadership Council of the 1990s, a “new Democratic,” was a friend of large corporations. He vigorously promoted NAFTA. He signed into law the GOP legislative repeal of Glass-Steagall, which separated commercial banks from investment banks. Because a majority of Americans now recognize the great injury done to them by large corporations and because Bernie Sanders is her primary season challenger, Hillary has become suddenly a critic of the TPP trade agreement, the Keystone XL pipeline project, big banks, the fossil fuel industry, and Big Pharma. It was expedient for her both to support the invasion of Iraq in 2003 and to declare in 2007 that that decision had been a mistake. It is expedient for her now to campaign as a progressive Democrat and to wrap herself around President Obama to curtail Bernie’s criticism of certain policies that she asserts she and the president share.

Needing also to separate herself from Bernie, she portrays herself as a pragmatic doer. She agrees with Bernie’s diagnoses (because she has to), but “his numbers don’t add up.” He makes promises; she delivers! (Read Robert Parry’s article about Hillary’s past decision-making http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/35578-is-hillary-clinton-qualified) Her preference of a $12 an hour minimum wage and her declaration that natural gas -- its quantity the result of fracking -- is the bridge to clean energy are examples of Democratic Party incrementalism, a cutting around the edges of a serious problem, for corporations a protective backfire to arrest a raging forest fire. By donating campaign funds and paying speaking fees to Democratic Party enablers, corporations are able to hedge their bets.

Bernie declared that we should be thinking big, not small. His reference to European countries that provide their citizens the health care, work benefits, and education that we do not is a telling indictment of the virulent economic system that controls the levers of American political power. To the argument that Congress would never enact Bernie’s policies, I answer, “They didn’t Obama’s. Why would they Hillary’s?” If we ever break the exploitive stranglehold locked upon us, it will be due to a movement started by a straight-arrow champion of regular people, not by an individual who will do whatever it takes – pander, employ three-quarter falsehood attacks, change policy positions – to win a presidential election.

        Printed April 23, 2016, in the Siuslaw News

***

William Rivers Pitt in an article printed April 27 on truthout.com expressed far more eloquently than I the two choices we would have come November.

***

You have the rich braggart with an inferiority complex so large it dwarfs Saturn using racism, sexism, nationalism and a generalized fear of The Other to elbow his way toward the nomination. You have the rich political aristocrat who votes for war, total surveillance and thinks fracking is the greatest thing since glazed donuts trying to pass herself off as some sort of transformative populist while cashing Wall Street checks by the fistful.

It is madness, but it is madness by design. The Republican Party and its media allies have spent several decades fomenting a sense of terror within their voting ranks -- fear of the immigrant, fear of the Black man, fear of a woman's power to choose, fear of the terrorist hiding under the bed. They have diligently trashed the basic functions of government so they can go on the Sunday talk shows and blather about how government doesn't work. The Democrats, for their part, have been in full moral retreat over those same decades, fleeing the legacy of FDR and their own alleged principles to such a vast degree that a candidate who voted like a conservative every time the chips were down is about to grab the brass ring.

This is the best we can do, really? This is what we have become. The only reason people will vote for Trump in the general election is because they have been trained to be afraid. The only reason people will vote for Clinton in the general election is to thwart Comb-Over Mussolini and his dreams of glory; once again, people will be voting against instead of voting for, because "she can win," allegedly.

***

The Presidential candidate of both parties established, I remained silent. Unlike presidential election years past, I was not canvassing door-to-door for anyone, nor was I making political phone calls. I stapled several economic charts on a wall in the FADC’s campaign office in Florence, but that was the entirety of my contributions. Two club members were in the main room of the office when I was leaving, the club’s chair Karin Radtke and a woman probably in her seventies who was forever politically active (Seemed she always had a petition in her purse that she wanted people to sign). As I exited through the threshold of the door, I heard her voice declare: “Isn’t that man going to do anything?!” I heard Karin respond,” He will write letters.” I wrote Karin this letter September 10.

***

Karin,

I feel I need to write this letter to clarify my limited involvement in this political campaign. I would not communicate this to any other person. I do so because of my respect for you and my realization of the burden of responsibility that you bare.

I decided after I stepped down as chair that I would no longer canvas or make telephone calls. I had done more than enough, especially in 2008, 2010, and January 2011 (Measures 66 and 68). I did it out of a sense of responsibility. It does not matter whether the calls are easy ones or calls to non-affiliated or Republican spouses of listed Democrats. I won’t do them. Opinionated, judgmental individuals like … [my critic] “Is that man going to do anything?!” … can complain all they want.

Besides not wanting to, I won’t because making calls, etc. would take away time I need to write. I am 82. I have been researching and writing a novel [my second] since 2013. I am 28 chapters into the first draft, approximately 400 pages. I am getting near the end of it. Then I will need at least a year to prepare it for publication. This project is particularly important to me.

I am amazed how my scheduled writing time gets co-opted by other things. Ideally, I would write between noon and 2 pm and between 4 and 6 daily. Going to the store, meeting medical appointments, writing and posting something on my blog site, doing household chores (I have 9 windows I have to wash before October), doing other things not foreseen but that matter continually interfere. I had planned to write a 15 page chapter by the end of this week. As I write this letter, I have written only 2 pages.

I regret not being of much help. I will try to write two or three letters others can claim. Having been in your place, I know the displeasure of having to recruit people to do unpleasant work. I also know that it is human nature to believe that those who take on unusual responsibility love doing it and should continue to do it until they drop. I am certain you feel the pressure from Eugene and elsewhere that you must continue to produce results. Most unfair!

Please know that I appreciate immensely what you have done and what you continue to do. When you finally decide to stop doing this, do not be surprised that nobody will volunteer to replace you. I cannot blame them. They had better recognize fully, however, your service.

***

Did I not have the right to determine how I used my time and energy. Who was this woman to determine what I should do? I did write a letter, the one below, Mitch McConnell in particular the target of my wrath.

***

We have been hearing a lot recently about politicians lying. One lie dwarfs all.

“It’s Obama’s economy,” we hear Republican flaks repeat. “He’s botched it. We will create jobs, grow the economy!” They count on our lack of attention to or memory of important political/economic events of the past decade.

How many of you actually recall the major 2008 GOP-induced economic meltdown and, afterward, how the GOP obstructed the President’s and the Democratic House and Senate’s attempts to stimulate the economy?

The first two years of Obama’s presidency Mitch McConnell repeatedly used the Senate rule that a minimum of 60 votes were required to defeat the filibuster of any bill brought to the Senate floor for a vote. During most of those two years the Senate consisted of 58 Democrats, 40 Republicans, and two independents. Several of those 58 Democratic senators voted consistently with the Republicans. To reach the 60 vote threshold, Democrats had to gain the support of the two independents (one of them Democrat turncoat Joe Lieberman) and at least two or three “moderate” Republicans. The Affordable Care Act (“Obama Care”), the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (the “stimulus package”), and the Wall Street Reform Act (which included the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau) managed to slip through after Democrats made bill-weakening concessions. Virtually everything else passed by the Democratic Party-controlled House was successfully filibustered. By the end of 2014, the GOP Senate had used the filibuster rule over 500 times.

Here are a few of the bills – all of which would have benefited working class Americans -- that McConnell’s minions stopped. Infrastructure building; equal pay for women; an increased minimum wage; stoppage of corporate tax breaks for moving jobs and production facilities out of the country; a rehiring of 400,000 teachers, firefighters, paramedics and police officers; student loan reform; an extension of unemployment benefits for the long-term unemployed; legislation to help working people join labor unions; the requirement that millionaires pay a comparable tax rate to middle-class Americans, the repeal of Big Oil tax subsidies.

When the Republicans won control of the House in 2010, President Obama’s hopes for improving the lot of ordinary Americans were dashed. Everything the GOP-controlled House thereafter passed was designed either to profit large corporations and the super wealthy or weaken the support system for destitute Americans. Additionally, GOP House and Senate leaders sought to acquire what they wanted by shutting down once and later threatening to shut down the operations of the government.

For seven and a half years the Republican Party has sabotaged the national economy all the while presuming that it could win national elections by pinning the blame for stunted recovery on Congressional Democrats and our President. Liars.

        Printed September 10, 2016 in the Siuslaw News

***

The following letter, written September 16, never got printed.

***

Are we going to elect again the worst the Republican Party has to offer?

We had eight years of George W. Bush. Wars in the Middle East that continue unabated. Significant tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy. Substantial deficit spending. Whatever corporate America wants it gets leads to 2008’s Great Recession. Destruction of the environment. Insufficient revenue, the slashing of social programs and economic aid benefits for the underclass but pork for the military/industrial complex. Leave No Child Behind. The death of class action law suits and labor unions. Bankruptcy protection for corporations but not students. No-bid contracts. Privatize, privatize. “Mushroom clouds,” frighten, lie. Rig elections. Show the world we are quite willing to elect an ignoramus. "Rarely is the question asked: ‘Is our children learning?’”

Now, Trump. Bellicose. Selfish. Dishonest. Disgusting. A “liar, liar, pants on fire” just about every sentence. Racist, sexist, fear-inducer, inciter of hate. Egotist. Uninformed. Unstable. Manifestly dangerous. Heading the party that Harry Truman called the Guardians of Privilege. Therefore, a Geo. W. redo. This time, show the world we are quite willing to elect a fascist.

***

At our club’s October meeting my critic, seated across the room from me, everybody attending, complimented my September 10 letter. I took it as an apology.

***

How did I feel about Trump’s victory? I wrote the following, not to be sent to any newspaper but to document my opinions.

***

Banjo-strumming ignoramuses crawled out from under their back-woods and back-fields rocks to be the difference in electing as our President the most noxious, dishonest, selfish, despicable public figure imaginable.

The Republican Party’s strategy of obstructing every Congressional Democratic Party legislative attempt the past eight years to improve the lives of all Americans (including the ignoramuses) and of blaming the lack of such improvement on Obama and Hillary Clinton’s supposed “status-quo” agenda worked fantastically! Selfishness, dishonesty, callousness, vindictiveness, ignorance – Fox News well knows -- are formidable allies.

But Trump?!

The elites and financial backers of the mainstream Democratic Party must also be blamed. “Yes, let’s bring back the 1990s” when Bill Clinton helped create the corporate-friendly New Democrats. We got from them NAFTA, the end of traditional welfare, cops on every corner, and the repeal of Glass-Steagall. Clinton’s presidency looked good because the existing technology bubble was generating better jobs, increased tax revenue, and a deficit surplus. Those better years were illusory. Everybody who has bothered to read knows that Hillary has had ties with Wall Street. Bill and Hillary have profited handsomely from Bill’s presidency and concomitant connections and Hillary’s anticipated ascendancy. The Republicans hammered Hillary about this and her apparent lack of trustworthiness -- they the epitome of corporate-bought subservience! Would she have quelled the doubts of liberals like me? She might indeed have tried to accomplish all that she had promised. We will never know. Would Bernie Sanders have been a better candidate? Yes! His genuineness was palpable. He did not have heavy baggage burdening him. His adamant message of large-scale, constructive, principled change appealed to the disaffected.

Now we may see Rudy Giuliani or Chris Christie Attorney General and Newt Gingrich Secretary of State and heaven knows what additional stupidity, cruelty, and vindictiveness that could result. Trump has brought out of a majority of the electorate the worst of human fallibilities. We must fight this fiercely the next four years hoping all the while that the Democratic Party, or an alternative party, produces an excellent candidate that can win and that corporate dominance will subsequently be destroyed.