SHOOTING FOR STARBASE

DEAR MERCURY—Speaking as someone who might have ended up sending my daughter to a school in the Portland area below the poverty level before my husband enlisted in the Air Force last year, I think you all at the Mercury need to pull your heads out of your butts when you think of the Portland Starbase program [“Inside Starbase Portland,” Feature, July 15]. When my husband graduated [Air Force] Basic Training last winter, I went to San Antonio for his graduation and when all the graduates were walking downtown in uniform—get this—random people on the streets were shaking their hands, thanking them for their service, and buying them meals and drinks. Why? Because once you get off the West Coast, people respect the military, not constantly give them crap and make their job more difficult. Now that I’ve experienced military life, I’ve realized that there are a ton of opportunities for people from underprivileged families to break the cycle of poverty. Sure, the military ~gasp~ shoots guns and drops bombs, but the fact is some jobs are harder than others and some things in life are ugly.

-Rachel Ollivant

BEST OF WEST LINN

DEAR MERCURY—Just wanted to deliver a poignant “fuck you” to all those who contributed to the excessive, erroneous jabs made at West Linn in last week’s feature article [“Best of Oregon City,” Feature, July 22]. If you’re going to deride West Linn for its wealthy populous and “excess,” may I kindly suggest you look to its neighbors such as Lake Oswego and hell, even Wilsonville, both of whom are far guiltier of housing rich, new-money pricks with no taste? And may I also suggest that if you’re so easily wooed by Oregon City’s mediocre culinary contributions that you please check out delicious West Linn eateries such as Allium, Bugatti’s, Five-O-Three, and Thai Orchid? Traverse the sprawling and lush Mary S. Young State Park; take the awesome, winding, scenic drive down Rosemont Road. And please, whatever you do, in the future, don’t use transparent buzzwords like “hard-working” and “quaint” when describing a place like Oregon City because trust me, anyone with even a Portland Public School education sees right through those sugar-coated terms for what they really mean: kind of trashy and altogether unexciting. If you’re going to so vehemently and pathetically hate on West Linn in the future, you could at least remember to mention the fact that its mayor resigned because she manufactured her college degree from an online diploma mill. That one’s a freebie for ya and is totally worth thorough disparagement.

-Megan

THE MERCURY RESPONDS: Can you idiots in West Linn please shut up? You’re all a bunch of awful, despicable people, and you’re boring us to death.—Eds.

SHIMMERING GEM NUGGETS

DEAREST MERC—The “rift” among pro-pot activists is a minor distraction from the shimmering gem that is Initiative 28 [“Growing Pains,” News, July 22]. It’s simple: patients will be able to choose from the finest green nuggets in a safe and comfortable setting. New jobs will be created at dispensaries, grow-ops, even in the state government, and the business will be kept local in scale. In short, Oregon will have the best medical-marijuana system in the country. Any opposition will come from mustachioed 1970s-holdout police types who are afraid of having to go after real criminals. Don’t forget to vote!

-Conrad J. Burke

WE’LL HAVE what Conrad’s having. Conrad gets two tickets to the Laurelhurst Theater and lunch at No Fish! Go Fish!, where the mustachioed 1970s-holdout types are of a different sort altogether.

21 replies on “Letters to the Editor”

  1. Dear Rachel, you omitted a crucial part of your statement. Let me help you with that: “Sure, the military ~gasp~ shoots guns [at men, women, and children] and drops bombs [on men, women, and children], but the fact is some jobs are harder than others…” There you go. Yay military! Go, go, go! Yay! Thank you for all our freedoms. Where would we be without Korea, Vietnam, Grenada, and Iraq? We’d be freedomless. Yeah!

  2. Dear Rachel,

    Not only do I agree with Maxims&Arrows, BUT even your argument is flimsy and disingenous.

    Texas is an extremely Republican state and I believe San Antonio is one of the redder districts (had you spoke of Houston or Austin, perhaps it would be different), Oregon is a blue state, with Portland being its VERY bluest area. In case you haven’t noticed, we’re pacifists here, they’re pro-war and guns in Texas. Plus, it is hardly only the west coast that takes issue with the military industrial complex—I’m from NYC and most of New England and the Mid-Atlantic lean left and question all the money spent on the military as well.

    That said, your argument that the military lifted your family out of poverty is weak, lame and not exactly new, either: 1) while the air force (BTW, because of the skills it teaches the hardest branch to get into) does train one as a pilot—everybody has known that for about FOEVER! 2) one can be lifted out of poverty through an apprenticeship program, one’s job or a community college. Actually one could argue that if a bank if willing to lend you student loan $$$, THEY are offering you a future.

    There are many, many ways besides killing people around the world (and possibly getting oneself killed in the process) that can break the cycle of poverty, even in this crappy economy, sorry you drank so much armed forces kool-aid.

    P.S. the military is notorious for their painfully low pay. While on base things are cheaper and an air force pilot will have a (presumably–airlines cut back now a days) decently paying job when his or her tour is done, a civilian might well have completed pilot training, worked a bit as first officer and become a captain in the same time.

  3. WOW, i see that the Military Industrial/Corporate Complex has got YOU thoroughly brain-washed! I suppose you still think that Saddam Hussien was behind 9/11 too, don’t ‘cha? Way to stick up for your husband though, lady. Lemme ask you this: when your “brave” Air Force husband comes home in little zip lock baggies b/c his plane was shot down by Afghani Freedom Fighters & you spend the next 20 years trying to get grievance checks out of the govt., will you still be mindlessly extolling the wonderful virtues of the military?
    And ofcourse they just LOOOVE the military in San Antonio, duh! Hell, that’s practically Bush-country up in dar. But yes, you’re totally right. Some things in life are indeed ugly. And yes, the military does ~ gasp ~ drop bombs. Life can get especially ugly when cowardly fighter pilots drop bombs on innocent civilians. Yes indeed, life can be quite ugly sometimes. But not for YOU, i bet!

  4. If by “Afghani Freedom Fighters” you mean the Taliban, they’ve been killing more Afghans than us. The only freedom they are fighting for is the freedom to beat the shit out of their own women just for being women, stone them to death, and be super assholes to everyone they can. Imagine the Christian Right in this country laying down absolute law based on their religious interpretation. That’s the Taliban for you.

  5. Typical Portland wingnut verbal diarrhea. I’m no fan of the armed robbery writ large that passes for American military adventurism these days, but anyone who uses the phrase “Military Industrial Complex” should put down their Noam Chomsky book and go get a haircut. You idiots are making the rest of us look bad.

  6. “”Military Industrial Complex” should put down their Noam Chomsky book and go get a haircut. You idiots are making the rest of us look bad.”

    The Military/Corporate Industrial Complex is REAL, my friend – Dwight D. Eisenhower himself warned us against such. Was HE a “liberal wingnut”? And what do you have against Noam Chomsky? Try & step outside the Matrix, why don’t you?

  7. Btw, the Taliban (which WE once funded by the $millions in order to fight a proxy war against the Soviets, mind you) is certainly no more hideous than the U.S. Imperial military. And in any case, the Taliban is far more prefered by the Afghan people than the corrupt politicians, war-lords, & out-right criminals the U.S. army has largely replaced them with! Remember, what EXACTLY are we doing in Afghanistan? (hint – it has nothing to do with 9/11)

  8. “The figures in recent years are staggering.

    The number of soldiers committing suicide has increased since 2004, surpassing civilian rates in 2008. Use of prescription drugs has tripled in the past five years; prescription amphetamines use has doubled between 2006 and 2009. One third of soldiers take at least one prescription drug and 14 percent of soldiers are on some form of powerful painkiller.

    Crime is rising every year as well. Each year has seen an increase of 5,000 misdemeanors over the previous year, meaning soldiers are expected to commit around 55,000 such crimes in 2010. Sexual offenses have tripled since 2003. Domestic abuse is up 177 percent in the past six years.

    Non-combat deaths among the force have increased steadily since 2001 to the point where the report says that in 2009 more soldiers died as a result of accidents and “high risk behavior” than at war.”

    http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/army-stress…

  10. What happens when the war comes home? These people have been used and abused. Want to see something really ugly? Just wait until they show up on your doorstep…

  14. What happens when they come home? Post 9-11 GI Bill! Get paid to go to school. 36 months at any state or public university, or other participating institution. Full tuition plus housing allowance (if you’re not too PTSD to study, that is).

  15. The bad news is that our “Military-Industrial Complex” is losing its tenuous grip on the power that it projects across the globe. The good news is that once that happens and we’re relegated to 2nd-tier status in the fashion of Russia before us, all of you comfortable trust-fund yahoos who just want to tear “The Man” down are going to get exactly what you wanted.

  16. The real point Rachel Olivant’s letter makes(and I’m not sure it’s the one she MEANT to make, but she makes it nonetheless)is that, in this country, just about the only way to get out of poverty is to put on a uniform and get trained to kill(and prepared for the possibility of an early, violent death).

    This should sicken all of us. It should make us all work to make this a country where we give people a real chance without forcing them to join the war machine. We should make this a country where you don’t have to kill to live. We should make it a place where nobody’s excluded and nobody’s written off. That’s far more important than saying rude things to Rachel, whose path was imposed on her and her family by the anti-human, anti-dignity, and anti-LIFE(in the real sense, not the abortion sense)values of the system under which we live.

    No one should HAVE to make the choice Rachel and her husband made.

  17. No one’s path is imposed on them.

    @sailorjeffy, I meant what happens to US.

    @ Rip Fart Hustler, we should all be so lucky as to have trust funds and travel. Meanwhile, bugger off Uncle Tom.

  18. AlaskanNow, while I agree that it’s a terrible thing to have to turn to the War Machine to lift one’s self out of poverty—MY previous comment pointed out that joining the military is hardly the only option. It seems to me that Rachel’s simply a more conservative person, who’s wanting to justify her choice—so she’s up on her soap box, proclaiming the glorious virtues of the military.

    Just as it was in the mid to late 70’s and beyond, there are a plethora of alternatives to joining as enlisted personnel. Rachel and Mr. Rachel simply weren’t intelligent enough to see through their recruiter’s BS. On some level, they probably now regret it. Why would she otherwise read a commie pinko rag like The Mercury? Especially from TEXAS???

  19. And this is why the military targets low income schools for its nefarious “science program,” AlaskanNow. I agree. I don’t think she meant to actually reinforce the argument against what the military does. It does, however, reflect the emotional, psychological, and intellectual impact of structural violence. The military-industrial complex is not so much a cabal as it is a banal system of beliefs and practices that benefit its wealth and prosperity. Those who participate and perpetuate its existence do so by keeping people like Rachel ignorant, poor, and subservient by promising them a sense of power, belonging, and reward. Good dog.

  20. Wow, what a wonderful, accepting, generous, and forgiving community in the greater Portland area. Whether you want to support the troops or not, the least you can do is accept their choice to serve the country you apparently have such distaste for. While the OP has issues looking past the blinders and making such silly assumptions that no one on the west coast supports our military, at least you, the keepers of all that is politically correct, can remind us all of what is right and wrong. How dare anyone have a differing opinion from yours.

    To the OP, take everything with a grain of salt, support your husband for deciding to serve his country, and while respecting the views of such closed minded North-westerners, accept them for who they are. It’s the American thing to do. Remember however, not all Northwest people are this way.

    Seattle Sends

  21. You know, I think the big thing people miss when it comes to the military “defending our freedom” is how much energy our troops put into keeping our bases and borders stable. Besides deploying overseas, there’s plenty of men and women in uniform hanging around on US bases doing paperwork, fixing stuff, making ID cards, giving kids check-ups, passing out basketballs at the fitness center, but are still combat trained and qualified on some big guns. On our base, once in awhile they get to do things called “exercises!” This means they get to pop on gas masks or pretend to have missile attacks and practice what they would need to do if someone tries to attack us. There’s guys on the flightline trying to fix airplanes with big chem suits on in the middle of the night and medical troops practicing how to deal with the injured. These “exercises” and “inspections” are a huge deal, everyone works extra hours, but it’s a part of base life.

    And if you’re thinking, “We never get attacked, so what’s the point?” Stuff like that is why no one screws with us! The last time someone attacked US soil they highjacked commercial airplanes because they couldn’t match our resources or man power to engage an actual military attack. Terrorists have to fight dirty because they know they’d get their butts kicked if they came over here and tried to take us on. You remember how Japan sent balloons with bombs to the West Coast during WWII? Notice how they didn’t send PEOPLE?

    If someone wanted to attack our base in South Dakota with the least amount of trouble, they’d have to get through Canada (who probably would let us know at least), and past a least three other Air Force bases, but we’re still trying to get ready if it does happen. The military spends a lot of time figuring out how to make sure an attack on US soil remains unheard of.

    I’m not saying our military can’t be beat…any country can fall. And there are some countries that are a threat and could give us a run for our money if we get into it with them, which is why diplomacy is as important as keeping our military equipped. But although it’s great to try to get along, not everyone plays nice, and sometimes you have to hit back.

    Anyway, reason why the Portland Mercury can write whatever it pleases is because America says we have freedom of press, and millions of men and women have sworn to protect that right. And the whole world knows that for every American troop has off in a desert, there’s many more back home, and they’re trained and prepared to step up in case someone decides to try to take those rights from us. We may not be a perfect government (which doesn’t exist anyway) but what we have now is probably nicer than what some of our enemies would have in mind for us.

    And that’s why a lot of Americans from all backgrounds sign up.

    🙂 Rachel O.

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