Bailout? Where's outcry over fat defense budget?

There has much justifiable moaning about the proposed bailout scheme. I can agree that those financial "fat cats" should not be rewarded by us taxpayers for their mistakes. But if we are talking responsible oversight and fiscal responsibility, let's not stop there. The House just passed a $612 billion defense authorization bill for 2009. And guess what? Not a peep of protest from the media or the public.

Annual spending on "national security" - meaning the defense budget plus all military expenditures hidden in the budgets for the departments of energy, state, treasury, veterans affairs, the CIA and numerous other places in the executive branch - already exceeds 1 trillion dollars annually. These bloated expenditures reek of waste and irresponsible behavior every bit as bad as the proposed bailout.

There have been few signs of an urge to inquire into the blatant relationship between our extravagant military and weapons expenditures, our excessively expensive failed wars abroad and the financial catastrophe on Wall Street.

Perhaps too many of us, both in and out of government, have been brainwashed to justify a "military solution" to our problems rather than a gentler "diplomatic approach." When will we finally realize that military overkill is prohibitively expensive, morally and physically destructive, and risky as hell? Nor does it in any way that I can think of have anything to do with national security or supporting our troops.

John G. Booker, Philomath

More about roots, idealism of the GOP

Marc Stewart's response to my Sept. 30 letter reveals a few misconceptions about conservatism that need to be addressed.

When the Republican party was formed in 1854, conservatives flocked to its banner and remain there to this day. The conservatives then, and now, believed very firmly in the ideals outlined in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, and have indeed been "struggling to fundamentally change an entire society" to make those ideals fully applicable to all members of that society.

For example, from its founding, the Republican party opposed slavery based on the Declaration's very clear statement that all men are created equal. The first Republican president, Abraham Lincoln, combined with a Republican Congress to end it forever and ultimately make the freedmen citizens. Were any of them alive today, they would be horrified to be considered anything but a conservative.

The second misconception is Mr. Stewart's assumption that whoever is not a liberal is automatically a conservative, and that is not valid. In his mind, those manning the fire hoses were surely not liberals, so they MUST be conservatives. Not true, we don't do that, and we also don't accuse liberals of doing that. You can rightly label the men on the hoses a lot of different things - rednecks, bigots and Democrats would all be accurate - but they were NOT conservatives.

With respect to the idea of passing off the accomplishments of liberals as the work of conservatives, I would point out again the voting records I listed in my previous letter.

John Brenan, Corvallis

Wild turkeys' eco impact not clear

Perhaps the Great Philomath Turkey Debate will be better informed if we bring in a fundamental fact that was missing from your reporter's story:

Wild turkeys are not native to Oregon. They are native to the eastern United States. They were introduced as a game species in Oregon in the 1960s and 1970s by Oregon Department of Fish & Wildlife, as a way to increase hunting tag revenues. Since then they have thrived to the point where their numbers have become an arguable nuisance in some residential areas. Their impacts on Oregon's native flora and fauna are not yet well understood.

As a rural resident who has enjoyed the curious behaviors exhibited by wild turkeys, but who has also chafed at the task of scraping tar-like turkey residue off the front porch, and, more importantly, worries about their potential impact on our native ecosystem, I'm neutral on the merits of killing these birds versus leaving them alone. However, so far as local residents engage in this debate, they should be fully informed as to how this exotic species turned up in Oregon.

Joel Geier, Past field notes editor, Audubon Society of Corvallis

Congress should kill Wall Street bailout

I am extremely outraged by George Bush's attempt to defraud the American public. Congress should kill the bailout. It's nothing more than a Ponzi scheme to enrich George Bush's friends and backers. What stupidity - helping "rescue" his cronies, while the homeowners whose homes are being foreclosed are left twisting in the wind.

Bush lied to us about the Iraq war. Shame on him. He is lying to us now about the need for the bailout. Shame on us if we are again gullible. It is unconscionable and immoral for Congress to replace the lost "play money" of the millionaire and billionaire investors while at the same time refusing to materially and immediately help the hard working American families keep a roof over their heads.

Not only kill the bill, but kill the idea and investigate who is really behind the plot to rob us of not billions, but trillions.

I want Congress to take effective action in favor of the home owners and let us know by e-mail exactly what action they took. We don't need platitudes; we need bills passed with money attached, to help the homeowner, not the financial institutions that knowingly took the risks.

James E. Miller, Corvallis

'Big Oil' telling lies to drill in the wild

A tall tale from Big Oil has been floating around the media recently. Their mission is to make destroying pristine wilderness sound reasonable.

They tell us: "We're only going to drill in 2,000 acres of the Arctic Refuge - We swear!"

But Big Oil's "2,000 acres" will sprawl across the entire Arctic Refuge, just like 1,800 acres of Turnpike slices all across New Jersey.

A network of drill sites, pipelines, roads, airstrips and other infrastructure will effectively destroy one of the most important wildlife sites in North America.

And all for what? A 4-cent drop per gallon of gas that we won't even see for nearly 20 years.

Rep. Boehlert said it best in 2003: "It is only a few thousand acres, they say. That is like saying, do not worry, the tumor is only in your lungs. The drilling will have impacts that will affect wildlife throughout the area."

If we buy the myth, we'll end up getting short-changed.

Paris Tirone, Corvallis

Ads against Merkley are not telling truth

Don't believe the dishonest and misleading advertising besmirching Jeff Merkley's character.

Oregon House Speaker Jeff Merkley is an honest, highly competent legislator, whose heart is with those of us in the lower and middle-income groups - not the giant corporations and their lobbyists. He will make a great U.S. senator!

Speaker Merkley is the son of a Roseburg sawmill worker. With hard work, the help of scholarships, and his own moxie, Jeff graduated from college and managed to travel in Africa, Israel, and Nicaragua during his youth and young adulthood.

Following graduate school, Merkley worked as a national security analyst for the Pentagon and later for Congress, then moved back to Oregon, where he worked as the head of Habitat for Humanity in Portland for years and was elected to the Oregon House.

Rising to speaker of the House, Merkley helped to create thousands of family-wage jobs, and The Oregonian called Jeff Merkley's session as speaker, "Oregon's most productive in a generation." Speaker Merkley is now running against Republican U.S. Sen. Gordon Smith, who was born wealthy and has supported President Bush's policies 90 percent of the time.

Rachel Ozretich, Corvallis