Is praising Putin treason?
Reading that Donald Trump called Russian President Vladimir Putin a “genius” for his “savvy” moves in Ukraine raises profound questions. Is that kind of praise coming from a past and future wannabe president of the United States in the midst of a globally significant crisis tantamount to treason?
Shouldn’t we be more outraged that a foreign leader, in particular, a ruthless, totalitarian oligarch like Putin, is freely playing into our political divide? Surely, Putin is testing our resolve as we are his. Surely, he sees NATO’s expansion along his borders as a threat, as we do his troops moving into Ukraine. Isn’t this a perfect time for diplomacy, not sabre rattling and political grandstanding, or worse, ingratiating?
Jack Cooper, Eugene
A more fitting comparison
Putin has compared NATO’s eastward expansion to Germany’s invasion of the USSR during World War II. A more apt comparison would be his invasion of Ukraine to “protect” Russians in the Donbas with Germany’s invasion of Czechoslovakia to “protect” Germans in the Sudetenland.
Lawrence N. Crumb, Eugene
A depraved fan
It takes a depraved person to order the brutal invasion of Ukraine, which has already caused the loss of lives, massive destruction, economic devastation and untold suffering. That special depraved person is Vladimir Putin. And it takes another special depraved person to describe Putin’s actions as “savvy,” “smart” and the product of “genius.” That special depraved person is Donald Trump.
Trump’s repetitive idolization of Putin and Russia is an insult to all who believe in the rule of law and democracy. The United States has been, and always will be, a force for democracy and a foe of totalitarian rule.
Be it Russia, Saudi Arabia or elsewhere, Trump will predictably favor totalitarian rule.
David Jensen, Walterville
War crimes
The attack and invasion of Ukraine is genocide, and the U.N. needs to begin war-criminal proceedings immediately against Putin. Innocent civilians are being targeted and lives lost due to a mad dictator.
Please, citizens of the world, do all we can to help and support the beautiful people of Ukraine. Cindee Robertson, Eugene
A tale of two mandates
Ukraine mandates all males age 18 to 60 remain in Ukraine, take a Kalashnikov into their hands to protect others and defend their right to be free from Russia. Hope: a free country. Risk to them: death.
(A few) U.S. truck drivers object to mask wearing mandates, which protect themselves and others from COVID-19. Taking their steering wheels in their hands, they claim a right to be free from government mandates as they drive to Washington, D.C., for a traffic jam.
Hope: It’s still a free country. Risk to them: a ticket.
Larry Hirons, Eugene
Ukrainians deserve all our support
I’ve not been this upset on a political event for decades. Right-wing news asks, “Why is Russia the problem?” Freedom is OK, but not if it raises my gas prices. This mentality at World War II would have Europe speaking German and the Pacific nations (and Hawaii) speaking Japanese.
What I view as “American values” — proud of flying the flag, a threat to democracy anywhere needs to be challenged, people over politics are being eroded. A group not connected to the conflict, but close to home for many, feeling these events is our Afghanistan War vets. Twenty years, lost friends and family, and when we left, did Afghans fight for their country? No!
Did the president run away? Yes! Billions of dollars were spent and thousands of lives were lost or ruined. Do you feel it was worth your service for a country that lacks the courage to fight for your values? You were duped into believing that your service, as was mine in Vietnam, was moral and a cause worth dying for.
The Ukrainians deserve all the support we can offer.
Don French, Eugene
No, I don’t miss Trump
I saw a bumper sticker with a picture of Donald Trump on it that read, “Do you miss me yet?”
Do I miss the man whose vindictive tweets would make me cringe? The man who withheld foreign aid to blackmail the Ukrainian president into digging up dirt on his political opponent? The man who alienated our allies and humiliated this country in front of the world?
Do I miss the man who bungled the U.S. response to the pandemic then politicized the crisis to attack his opponents? The man who took credit for the Obama/Biden recovery but found someone else to blame for everything that went wrong? The man who openly admired the most brutal dictators and tried to gain the power to emulate them? The man who directed a mob against the Capitol to overturn the 2020 election? Let me return to the original question: Do I miss Trump yet? No! I want him to be held accountable for the damage he did to this country. I want him tried, convicted and locked up for his crimes.
Ukraine is fighting for the kind of democracy and human rights that many in this country are ready to give up.
Donald M. Brasted-Maki, Eugene
Unable to exercise independent thought
Rejoice! The grand hero of the Russian Empire will soon look to the East and free Alaska from the oppression of Nazi-Americans who swindled your true homeland out of those native lands.
Who could have known that after Russia was swindled out of Alaska, oppression would reign over native Russians for decades: mask mandates, hunting and fishing restrictions, vaccination extortion, heavy-handed environmental laws, wildlife policing and land-use restrictions.
Vladimir “Hitler” will soon turn the Russian Empire’s might toward the East to free native Russians languishing in the gulag now called Alaska. Seriously, a large percentage of Russians support Putin’s attack of Ukraine and believe the lie of it being a preemptive move to keep Ukraine from attacking Russia.
Russians, like many ignorant Americans, lack the ability to discern fact from fiction. The one Russian, state-controlled TV network still feeds their people a steady stream of falsehoods to maintain the Putin propaganda program such as our Fox News sells Americans only what some want to hear. Russian culture still suffers from having been ruled autocratically and the people have yet to develop the intellectual ability to truly exercise independent thought and utilize logic and rationality to determine truth.
Don Ehrich, Creswell
Power to the people of Ukraine
Putin, the great genius according to Trump and his Republican enablers, has become the biggest idiot to his people and the whole world. The hero and genius is President Zelensky of Ukraine, who has united the world behind him. Blue and yellow have become the favorite colors of the world. More power to the brave people of Ukraine.
Daniel Morales, Eugene
US decrying Russian invasion is hypocrisy
We all feel dismayed that yet another war has broken out, this time with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. But having said that, the U.S. government is exhibiting the height of hypocrisy speaking out against “Russian aggression” when Russia is merely doing what the U.S. has done time and time again around the world. Vladimir Putin even invoked concern about Ukraine developing weapons of mass destruction — the same exact lie Bush/Cheney used to justify entering Iraq. The U.S. invaded Afghanistan to get Osama bin Laden and then stayed for 20 years. The U.S. did such an abysmal job of winning hearts and minds that upon final U.S. pullout, the Taliban was back in power in less than a week. Two trillion dollars for absolutely nothing! And now millions of Afghans face starvation because of U.S. economic sanctions against their country that we just spent 20 years screwing up. The U.S. opposes Putin because he’s an “authoritarian dictator,” but we support dozens of such dictators around the world, like Saudi Arabia, a country carrying out a horrific genocide against the people of Yemen using arms that the U.S. sold it. That’s just scratching the surface of U.S. foreign policy. Robert Bolman, Eugene
Backing Putin into a corner
This is for those who favor the most severe sanctions possible against Russia for Putin’s brutal, unprovoked invasion of Ukraine. Sanctions can backfire. Eighty years ago, the United States froze U.S. assets of a certain country and embargoed shipments of oil and rubber. The result was Pearl Harbor.
And our embargo and sanctions against Cuba, still in effect today, brought us to the brink of a nuclear exchange with Russia in 1962.
Here’s hoping diplomacy can produce a ceasefire and peace negotiations in Ukraine before sanctions back Putin into a corner from which he can see no alternative to all-out war.
Jim White, Florence
Trump leading the charge
It seems that the invasion of Ukraine is not the foregone conclusion Putin thought it would be. Perhaps those defending their home have more motivation than those trying to steal it. However, I do agree with Donald Trump. If he were the current president, Putin would not be invading Ukraine. Putin would be invading us, with Donald Trump leading the charge.
David Hixson, Springfield
The Putin playbook
Vladimir Putin’s motivation for his attack on Ukraine likely stems from delusions of grandeur, but it isn’t lost on him that Ukraine is valuable in resources, ranking fist in Europe in reserves of uranium ore, second in titanium, second in the world in manganese ores and iron ores.
Agriculturally, Ukraine ranks first in Europe in arable land area, and high in sunflower oil, barley, corn, potatoes, rye and wheat.
Today the world is getting a clear picture of who Putin is: a narcissistic dictator bent on appeasing his ego. In bullying and humiliating his National Security Council into voting for his invasion, Putin reminds us of Trump and the spineless people he surrounds himself with.
Let this be a wake-up call to anyone tempted to vote for Trump in our next election; their modus operandi is identical: Lie, cheat, bully and lie again. Thomas Lincoln, Springfield
Food as human right
My wife and I are volunteers for BurritoBrigade.org We have been working to find a location for an industrial kitchen that can be shared, warehouse space and walk-ins to store the rescued food we receive and enough space to run our Waste to Taste free grocery store.
I have been trying to open doors with city officials for excess property and funding that might be available, asking nonprofits for leads or any other nonprofit project where we can coexist. We have looked at anything commercially viable for our plans. We make burritos at FOOD for Lane County and assorted churches when FFLC cannot host us.
We have been blessed to have the support of the Sonrise Church on Irvington for our Waste to Taste free store and this location also serves as our warehouse where pantry hosts can pick up supplies for the 40 Little Free neighborhood pantries. I implore our community leaders to look at the big picture. We cannot move people without a full range of services, but especially for those who have no way to prepare food. This is our duty to our fellow community members who are less fortunate than us. Food is a basic human right.
Chris Calise, Eugene
People new to Eugene are to blame for housing density changes
HB 2001 is well-intentioned, but poorly crafted public policy meant to solve our housing crisis. The city of Eugene may well make this bad policy worse by allowing an unprecedented, largely unrestricted residential up-zoning that will have dire consequences for livability. The details always matter in public policy, but few seem to want to do the necessary work to get it right. Most Eugeneans have no idea what outsized and inappropriate development may be coming to roost next door.
The causes of our housing crisis are many, beginning with global overpopulation and our extremely mobile American populace. Many of the folks demanding local housing density at-all-costs moved here fairly recently and seemingly fail to see their integral role in the problem. The more our local population grows as a result of these newcomers, the tighter our housing market becomes and the higher housing prices climb. None of these issues will be relieved by HB 2001 or Eugene’s proposed response to it, particularly the shortage of affordable housing.
I urge my fellow citizens to get informed, read the fine print and encourage neighbors and friends to join them in advocating for a better local response to HB 2001 by the city of Eugene.
Tom Happy, Eugene
What do you mean wrong place, wrong time?
Watching the TV report about the Sweet Home student who was assaulted by five students as he walked home from school left me questioning the report. I was disappointed to hear “He was at the wrong place at the wrong time.” How can a student walking home from school be in the wrong place? Where would a “right” place be? Wrong time to walk home after school? What is the right time to walk home after school? Is it asking too much to direct the focus of the report on those who have been arrested and charged for being wrong? The victim did nothing wrong. Shirley Gauthier, Springfield
The vision of science
Eugene deserves a grand facility serving youth and families, adult learners and explorers. EWEB’s space, with parking, access to the river, is a wonderful resource.
One opportunity is to create and support community engagement, innovation and creativity. The best models for this are the Exploratorium: the Museum of Science, Art and Human Perception in San Francisco and the Science Museum of St. Paul Minnesota. And in the case of the community resources on the Mississippi River in St. Paul, they have taken on a broad view of being a member for the whole community, and when you walk in, it shows!
SMM’s statement says:
Mission: We exist to … turn on the science: Inspire learning. Inform policy. Improve lives.
Vision: We envision … A world where everyone has the power to use science to make lives better.
Values: We value … Collaboration: We get the job done together.
Equity: We reject oppressive norms and practice authentic inclusion to achieve collective liberation.
Learning: We are curious and take risks to grow.
This will take a community vision, gathering great local stories, to create rich connections throughout the community.
Are we capable?
Ryan Collay, Eugene
Root, root, root for science center
It seems that both the city and county have the same answer on how to spend our taxpayer dollars: subsidize or waive taxes for businesses who want to add expensive venues (a new baseball park at the fairgrounds) or high-end boutique shops and apartments downtown.
Other than Little League Baseball or school sports, the baseball leagues are a “for-profit” entity, yet they want us to give them corporate welfare to keep them going. If our taxes pay for their new field, will we then be able to attend their games free of charge?
Obviously, there is no “one size fits all” solution to these situations, but one very viable option was on the front page of The R-G this morning (Feb. 23) when it was announced that the Eugene Science Center is contemplating moving to the old EWEB building. If you have ever been to OMSI in Portland, you can just imagine how positive a science center in downtown Eugene could turn into the crowning jewel of the whole downtown re-development project. The Eugene Science Center has proved to be educational, affordable and accessible for “all” of us, not just those who have a fat wallet.
Jennifer Wootan-Mellone, Eugene
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