Remember lessons of The Great Depression of '30s

I am over 90 years old, and I can still remember the effects of the first recession economically and on human morale. There were no jobs available, banks shut down so that savings were lost; there was no Federal Deposit Insurance to protect them. Stock brokers were wiped out, and stock holders - especially those who bought on margin - were financially destroyed.

Herbert Hoover was president then, and he was helpless and the public was hopeless. The federal government offered no remedy, and business was stagnant. Veterans from the first World War were standing on downtown street corners trying to sell apples for ten cents and pencils for a nickel, if there were any buyers.

Unemployed men were stealing rides on empty box cars going anywhere they might be able to get a job. We called them hoboes. I can recall how they would knock on our back door and ask if we could give them a meal. My Mother never refused them.

Then came the election of 1932 and victory of the Democratic candidate Franklin D. Roosevelt. The Republican party members forecast a national calamity, and with much hand-wringing and crocodile tears, they forecast the death of democracy and the birth of a socialist state. Instead, they got jobs and a restored economy. The public works projects gave us dams on the Columbia and Colorado rivers, a trans-continental highway system and plenty of jobs.

Does history repeat itself? Yes, Virginia, it sure does.

Norman Bolker, Corvallis

Will Bush become Dems' perennial scapegoat?

You would think that after their man won the presidential election that Corvallis' uber-liberals would be content to help him achieve his goals and temper their vehement outpourings against the Bush administration. Alas, such does not seem to be the case, as is evidenced by John Barry's letter of Feb. 9, "Bush did far more harm than ever he did good."

Mr. Barry goes on and on about all the lies President Bush supposedly told to get us into war. Certainly things were said by the administration that turned out not to be true, especially about Iraq's capability for WMDs, but were those lies or just beliefs based on erroneous intelligence? I believe the latter, but I have no proof and neither does anyone else.

Secretary of State Gen. Colin Powell was one person who was stating the case for Iraq having WMDs, yet I don't hear anyone calling him a liar.

If you want to find a recent presidential liar, you need go no further than Bill Clinton. We KNOW he lied because he did it to a grand jury; it is right there in black and white. How he avoided jail time, I will never understand.

People like Mr. Barry hate President Bush and will continue to blame him for everything but the Chicago fire. It is sad that so much negative energy is wasted on Bush blaming when it could be used for something positive. Four years from now, when we still have problems, who are these people going to blame for them? You got it: George Bush.

Jay Burreson, Corvallis

Why install screens over jet engine intakes?

After watching the news about Capt. "Sulley" and his landing on the Hudson, I wish to suggest that they use screens of sufficient strength and small enough holes that birds cannot go through. Put the screens on the engines. That should save many lives.

Julie Jirel Reed, Corvallis

Stimulus ignores 'little people' to empower greed

Regarding President Obama's stimulus legislation: This is a devastation of greed like we've never seen before!

This package indebts monstrous amounts for the top elected interests only, i.e. highways and government buildings improvement, the ever-failing socialized medicine, GE's appointment over electricity, entertainment, news, Congress's personal-interest "pork," etc. Our economic foundation, the private sector, is ignored!

A lower/livable income-tax rate is essential for the existence of our suppliers of jobs and interrelated products such as food, clothing, goods, services, buildings, repairs, housing, entertainment, medical care, etc.! They reflect the power of a "buyer's market," i.e. buying from those who offer the best product price-wise. That's the sound-reciprocating coordination of good citizens that sinks Socialist countries.

Income tax received, from our business's yearly profit and the owner(s) and employees' salaries, is the revenue for this foundation's upper floors - cities, counties, states and federal government. Business profits, after taxes, go toward future expansion that benefits both the payer and the government! If the tax rate/cost is too high, profit lowers and government gets less. It's elementary arithmetic!

The IRS doesn't let businesses avoid paying. That's the penchant of the wealthy, who can afford the fines.

Both Reagan and Bush remedied bad recessions quickly by lowering taxes. Tossing money here and there sadly smacks of showtime, power and change. But it's illogical! Nothing can be built from the top down. Perhaps the 12-year long 1929 depression fiasco is what they want!

Joan Wheeler, Corvallis

Reject urban renewal district proposal in May

Community groups are currently hearing a sales pitch to vote for an "urban renewal district in downtown Corvallis." The map of such a proposal is neither "downtown" nor urban.

It includes the Crystal Lake area, with its soccer fields for youth. As park land, it needs protection, not development.

Nothing is said or included about Ninth Street's commercial coming of age.

Omitted also is South Third Street to Airport Road. We are assured that this state/county/

city tax grab for "improvements" is finite, that "only" $5 million will be used per year.

We are lulled into this questionable hope that tax dollars for public education will be raid-proof. This pitch is unfortunately timed in the face of recession/depression. It could hardly come as a worse "selling" job, with general consensus that K- through graduate- universities will again face cutbacks and that the city's largest employer - Oregon State University - is threatened to lose multi-millions by the Legislature.

Talk on, sweet lips.

As Saroyan famously said, "There's no foundation, all the way down the line."

When will Sen. Frank Morse and Rep. Sara Gelser awake to get citizen priorities right?

Voters, vote this initiative down in May. Yes, we can. Yes, we should. Yes, we will.

Marilyn Dilles, Corvallis