Letters to the Editor - 2/3/2021

To the Editor:

Yesterday I experienced us at our best.

Because of my age, I qualified for a COVID vaccination. We were given clear, explicit instructions on how to find the site (fairgrounds). When we arrived, though the line of cars was long, there was clear signage and both National Guard and volunteer aides. The lines were orderly and there was an assistant at each junction. The person who administered my shot appeared to be about my age but she had volunteered as “it was the right thing to do.”

This is our community at its best. This could be every community. Ours is a rich country — rich in resources, rich because of our diversity (ethnic, sexual orientation, even our differing perspectives re: policy). But our virulent internal divisiveness will keep us from EVER being great.

Janice Druian

To the Editor:

The business community is so important to Sisters’ economy, but climate change brings extremely dry conditions extending and exacerbating fire season, which threaten normal life and business operations here. That’s why it’s so exciting to see the U.S. Chamber speaking up and supporting climate action.

The right climate solutions can unleash the power of the American market on solving this problem. I hope the Sisters Chamber of Commerce agrees with its national counterpart and will urge Representative Cliff Bentz and Senators Wyden and Merkley to support a price on carbon.

Solutions like the Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend Act (EICDA) are market-based approaches with bipartisan support. Members of the new administration, such as Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, have expressed support for this policy approach as well.

Susan Cobb

To the Editor:

When you want to create a pejorative, use a common word with a well-accepted meaning and distort it to fit your purpose. Thus, the current use of “cancel” as in “cancel culture.” (The addition of “culture” adds a delightful frisson of “conspiracy” as in “I know you are all conspiring to silence me.”) Of course, when you create this new use, you don’t have to bother trying to define it.

The result is utter nonsense.

I can cancel my reservations, subscriptions or plans for activities. I am free to adjust my actions based on the behavior of others. For example, I will not seek any dental treatment from the dentist who published his skepticism of the efficacy of wearing masks. But I can’t “cancel” people.

We see the absurd use of this by Senator Hawley, he who gave a raised fist salute to the insurrectionist mob at the Capitol, and whose efforts to subvert our democracy resulted in his publisher declining to publish his latest effort to capture the Trump base, whining about being “canceled” in his published piece in a major newspaper in New York City. Irony appears to be lost on Senator Hawley.

It also results in Editor Cornelius reusing his anecdote from his undergraduate days, to claim some of his classmates were trying to “cancel” him by objecting to his “vigorous” rejection of orthodoxy. I wasn’t there and don’t know, but it does appear that Mr. Cornelius hasn’t considered the possibility that some of these classmates were objecting less to the substance of his comments than the manner in which he voiced them.

When I was a small child, my mama taught me that actions have consequences. Some on the right want to live in a consequence-free world. It’s not going to happen. If you say publicly that you continue to support Trump and his enablers who incited an insurrection, or give support to those who do, don’t be surprised if some of us voice our criticisms. Some of us may even do so “vigorously.”

Michael Wells

To the Editor:

I write in response to Patsy Farr’s Letter to the Editor in The Nugget, January 27:

Patsy, which president are you proud of?

Doug Williams

To the Editor:

One of our fellow readers, “S. McMillan,” posted a letter (The Nugget, January 20) opining that less people died in the year 2020 than in the prior four years.

This writer is either incapable of interpreting data, or intentionally misleading this audience.

While I hold sincere empathy for the small businesses, kids, those who have been quarantined for weeks on end and anyone affected by the mandates instituted by our state and local government, this response is to simply address the misinformation reported by the writer. Oregon DHA has not finished tallying 2020 deaths through December. If we compare the number of deaths from January to November, there were 36,412 deaths in the year 2020, compared to an average of 33,317 from prior years, which is over 3,100 more deaths, or 9 percent more. Nationwide the numbers are worse — over 400,000 more deaths in 2020 than 2019, a 15 percent increase.

This virus has killed more people in under a year than the entirety of World War II.

The fact that the situation is worse nationally shows that the measures Oregon has taken have been effective in preventing some deaths. Out of respect for the deceased and grieving families and friends who have been lost because of this virus, I send this response.

Shawna Palanuk