OCR Text |
Show Page A6 - fflfre tEtmeg-ffitthepenhe- -- Thursday, February 3, 2005 ttt Idle Thoughts from Mt. Waas Community Comments by Ollie Harris by Sam Taylor BIGOTRY The Utah Legislature is now in the third week y session, and the usual items are being debated, along with the issues that take so usual share of morality-typ- e while the important items and time much emotion, like spending priorities languish until the waning days in March. Most important spending discussions are discussed in committees and caucuses, many hidden from public view. am feeling really disconnected Increasingly, from what is happening in the state capitol. Maybe it's because am disconnected. If feel detached from legislative happenings, having served there for a couple of terms, cant imagine how the average citizen feels. Partly that is a result of reapportionment in the 1960s, mandated by the U.S. Supreme Court, which took a firm position on the one man, one vote provisions in the Constitution. Those rulings destroyed Utah's historic practice of guaranteeing each of Utahs 29 counties at least one member of the legislature. Those rulings cant be changed although a number of attempts have been made over the years. The rulings also fly in the face of the national legislature, where each of the 50 states in the union are guaranteed two senators. That doesnt change things much, but life after reapportionment in Utah is something we can live with. The sinister culprit these days is not one man, one vote," but what the legislature itself has done to us in gerrymandering legislative districts into areas that dont make any The gerrymandering was sense, people-wisdone to protect political interests. The same has been done on a national basis. The result is what we now have in Utah: a legislature almost locked in to dominance by the Republican Party. have of its annual always proclaimed myself to be a Republican, but I dont believe in unbalanced legislative bodies. The same may be happening to the national House of Representatives. Political caucuses shouldnt be allowed to run rough-sho- d over the rights of the governed. But it comes to districting legislative do when they hot-tick- et 45-da- seats. In Grand County, we find the perfect example. Our county is divided down the middle. The result is, I'd wager to bet, that the majority of our residents dont know who their legislative representatives are. For example, I live in a legislative district represented by John Mathis, a veterinarian who hails from Naples, just outside of Vernal. My neighbors a few blocks west can claim Brad King, an educator from Price, as I I I I odd-shape- d, e. I their representative in the statehouse. It is highly unlikely that any one candidate from Grand County could ever win a seat in the gerrymandered legislature. The same is true all across the nation. In California, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger dropped a bombshell when he proposed in his state of the state message that the responsibility for drawing congressional and state legislative districts be removed from the politicians and given to a panel retired judges. Lines would be sensibly set again for compactness and would keep communities in the same district. Politicians would actually face realistic electoral contests once more. The Terminator" makes more sense to me as a state chief executive all the time. It will take statesmanship action to ever achieve what Arnold wants to do in California. The electorate, however, would be better served than the situation we now find ourselves in. of non-partis- Over the years it has been my practice to cull my books. I do this by walking back and forth before my shelves of books with the determination to throw one of them away. At first it was relatively easy. There were several books that were of little value to me. As it became more and more difficult to decide which books had to go, my criteria for selecting books to discard began to change. It was, and still is, a healthy practice. One book that has continued to escape beis Gustavus Myers History of Bigtossed ing The United States. It was first pubin otry Random lished by House, Inc., in 1943. It was edited and revised by Henry M. subsequently Christman and published by Capricorn Books in 1960. My name and the date written inside the book indicates that I bought it in 1964. A perusal of the table of contents shows that almost no group, race, or religion has escaped the persecutions of prejudice and bigotry. Even the Puritans and Quakers were subject to intense persecution, a carryover from the Old World. It would be difficult to say who was persecuted most in our history, but few were more persecuted than Catholics. Most Utahns are familiar with the persecution heaped upon the early Mormon church. We are taught of the mobbings, lynchings, whippings, the tarring and feathering, and murdering of early Mormons, resulting in their migration to the Great Basin and subsequent colonization of much of the west. I like to think that I am above any degree of bigotry, but Im afraid that there are seeds of prejudice that constantly seek to take root in my heart. For example, I think my latent suspicion toward Germans must come from the years of World War II when uncle Merle lost his leg in Europe. I do not remember specific diatribes but I can imagine that I must have heard my grandparents railing bitterly against Many Trails The weather is some weeks ahead of schedule, by my calendar, a bad omen for this year's fruit crop. In fact, warm days in caused lilacs along the garage to leaf out (and promptly freeze). But the willows should not be this green this early, and fruit trees will follow suit, likely. Hold onto last year's canned fruit. You may not get much this season. mid-Janua- ry -a- ft- The spirit of cooperation among the city and county councils and other local organizations on the subject of facilitating the moving of the Atlas tailings pile away from the Colorado River is something we haven't seen in many years. We seem to be a community that is exceptionally fond of controversy. The old rag suggests that if you haven't heard a new rumour by noon, you should make one. It's meant to elicit a chuckle, and it does. But it's also kind of sad. But back to the first statement. It is truly great to see groups sitting down at the table, working at strategies to get the national Congress to appropriate money to move the tailings. Granted, the flooding in the St. George area of Utah, in areas of California, and particular the devastating tsunami halfway around the world from us have raised fear among the people. Perhaps rightly so. Inertia has been our own worst enemy when it has come to the tailings pile. In the first place, the issue has dragged on for years and years now, with seemingly the same arguments be put forth, and either nobody listening or nobody caring. After a while you get kind of worn down, beating your head against the deaf often-diverge- nt wall. Now, everyone percieves that we are finally facing our last good opportunity to get the thing moved. Paraphrasing several speakers at last Wednesday's meeting: Just do it. Spend the money. Move High Country News by Adrien F. Taylor vo it now. Do it right. Questions have been raised from several members of the business community about raising a ruckus and scaring off that golden goose: tour ists. Raising questions is legitimate, but suggesting that we stay quiet on the subject of the pile, just to cultivate the goose, is doing ourselves a disservice in the long run. In next week's issue, we will print a refreshed version of "Write Your Congressman," which has fallen by the wayside for some reason in recent years. That will help locals to express their own opinions to our delegation. We will also run (again) the information about writing to the Department of Energy. -a- ft- Now, for those nature lovers who are going to scream about the photo on page one, I would like to reiterate that we are not advocating slaughter of the predator population in the west side of Moab Valley. One has only to look at Tom's photo so see what magnificent animals mountain lions are. We are, however, concerned about the prospect of a growing population of big cats that are brought up around humans, and thence become unafraid. This mama cougar evidently has a litter somewhere about. Mama is feeding on the bounteous deer population in the area. But the whole setup is reason for concern, simply when one looks at what has happened and is happening in other areas. need to be aware of. Take proper Be noisy. Walk in groups. precautions. It's one we all -- aft- City Market (Kroger) finally laid down the law to us: get a barcode for your product or we will no longer be able to sell your product in our Moab store. I'd call it a first and last warning, as we immediately did what we needed to do. On the bottom left of page 1 of this issue, you will find the barcode that identifies this newspaper. Until they get it into their computer system, they won't be able to use it, but at least we've done our part at this end. It's another welcome to the modern world, I guess. Ije 8 ISSN (UPS) 6309-200Entered as Second class Matter at the Post Office at Moab, Utah under the Act of March 3, 1897. Second class postage paid at Moab, Utah 84532. Official City and County Newspaper. Published each Thursday at: 35 East Center Street, Moab, Grand County, Utah 84532 1538-183- 0) address: editormoabtimes.com P.O. Box 129, Moab, Postmaster: Send changes of address to: The or FAX ail Times-lndepende- 435-259-75- Member f'i7 UTAH UT 84532 435-259-77- NATIONAL NEWSPAPER ASSOCIATION and Carrie Switzer Lisa Church Jeff Richards Marjorie Miller Jeannine Wait Writers on the Range Global warming brings a clash of civilizations by Richard D. Lamm and Buie Seawell Global warming is not just another issue in a long line of environmental problems that have received attention starting with Earth Day 197d. With honor and respect to all the great environmental victories, and to the people who fought for them, we feel that global warming will take a revolution in the way we see ourselves. Adequately confronting global warming will require as much change from us as was required during the transition to the industrial revolution. We must, in effect, learn to live in a whole new world. While there is still much uncertainty about how global warming will impact the earth, we know enough now to start the journey to sustainability. Evidence of global warming is sufficient to hold policymakers guilty of public-polic- y malpractice if they fail to act immediately and vigorously. Historys judgment will be harsh on those who ignore such clear warning signs. Our oceans are wanning, our ice caps and glaciers are melting, our soils are eroding, our rainforests are shrinking, our ocean coral is dying, our fisheries are being depleted, and more and more species are disappearing. We are told by the National Academy of Sciences, the Royal Society and by most of the living Nobel Prize winners that global warming is a reality that we must take seriously. Even the Pentagon, hardly a historic voice for the environment, has issued a report, An Abrupt Climate Change Scenario and Its Implications for U.S. National g Security, laying out a series of possible scenarios for global warming. How can anyone read these reports and return to business as usual? Perhaps because the implications to our everyday lives are so immense that wed rather not comprehend them. One reason the attack on 911 succeeded was that the possibility of crashing planes into skyscrapers was almost beyond imagination. Likewise with global warming: Trying to imagine a world without growing petroleum use, or traditional ways of growing the economy, or where human population must shrink rather than grow comes close to the unimaginable. Historian Barbara Tuchman observed how hard it is for those in charge to react to new realities: When information is relayed to policymakers, they respond in terms of what is already inside their heads and consequently make policy less to fit the facts than to fit the baggage that has accu nation-threatenin- PRESS ASSOCIATION Circulation Manager, T--l Maps Press, Production Manager Staff Writer Contributing Writer Contributing Writer Contributing Writer Contributing Writer Dorothy Anderson Jose Santana, Jed Taylor Ron Drake Ron Georg Oliver Harris A.J. Long mulated since childhood. It is also immensely difficult to see our individual place within the ecological whole. The most cited article in the history of Science magazine helps us understand why. Garrett Hardins The Tragedy in the Commons concluded that when natural resources are held in common, free and available to all for the taking, people steadily increase their exploitation of the common resources until they are exhausted. Every participant in the tragedy pleads not guilty. But the entire system moves toward disaster. The poet W. H. Auden wrote, All life is the question of whether or not to have children, after youve already had them. It is hard for us to see how our automobiles, our airplane travel or our third or fourth child will affect the environment when they bring us so much pleasure, but the impact is shared worldwide. We do not recognize the lifetimes it takes to correct environmental damage or to reverse the damage already done. So it is a surprise to realize that the exhaust from President Kennedys automobile on the day he was assassinated still hasnt fully played out its environmental impact. It takes perhaps 60 or 70 years for todays pollution to reach full impact as greenhouse gases. Like a car braking down, it will take us a significant and perhaps fatal amount of time to brake down our industrial society. It will require foresight not historically present in humankind. What we treat as just another environmental issue is more accurately a clash of civilizations. It is the shift from identifying individual polluters to be stopped to the issue of all of our lifestyles. We can only observe how nearsighted it is that so many people today focus on cultural and religious differences between the West and Islam, when human civilization itself stands on the brink of collapse. Is it naive to hope that like the appearance of an earthbound asteroid or the invasion of extraterrestrial aliens in all those countless, trite science fiction films global warming may be the common cause that finally unites the human enterprise? Whatever it takes, we must begin to focus on the one environmental issue that threatens us all. Richard Lamm and Buie Seawell are contributors to Writers on the Range, a service of High Country News (hcn.org). Both are professors at the University of Denver, Lamm in public policy, and Seawell in business. Letters to the editor policy Samuel J. and Adrien F. Taylor, Publishers Adrien F. Taylor, Editor Sadie Warner, Assistant Editor Tom Taylor Zane Taylor the Germans. Interestingly, I do not harbor any such suspicion toward the Japanese. My thoughts returned to the subject of bigotry when our identical twin daughters were recently its object. You will have to take what I say about the twins with a grain of salt because, after all, I am their father. Stefani and Alicia were born in Moab in 1969. They went from being darling babies to cute girls to beautiful women. They married brothers and live neighbors to each other in Arizona. They have several children between them. We have a ton of twin stories which I wont bore you with here. But, I will say that they have beautiful voices. Their voices are so similar that when they blend them in harmony it is indescribably beautiful. I cannot hear them singing without getting a lump in my throat and a welling of tears in my eyes. In 2003 it was decided in their small, rural community that there would be a Christmas program. The wife of one of the local preachers was in charge. When she heard that Stefani and Alicia were going to sing she said, If the Mormons are going to sing there isnt going to be any program. My initial reaction when I heard about it was, as it usually is when someone messes with my kids, to be on the fight. Fortunately, I always get over it. A couple of weeks ago Barbara and I went to Arizona for a family event. It had been snowing and blowing hard. Near their homes we plowed through about a hundred feet of deep, drifted snow in which a small station wagon was stuck and abandoned. The next day my cousin and I drove through the drift in his The owners of the stuck vehicle were trying to dig it out. My cousin hooked onto them and pulled them free. Later, he laughingly said, We should have told them we were Mormons. They were the ones that wouldnt let Stefani and Alicia sing. But, he pulled them out anyway. The does not necessarily endorse the opinions published in letters and guest editorials. The T--l welcomes opinions from its readers concerning any subject pertinent to Southeastern Utah. Letters should be to the point and must include the writer's name, address and telephone number. Letters may not be used to replace advertisements, or to list and thank sponsors or participants to a particular event Letters will be not be accepted from any cancfidate who has Wed for political office orfrom anyone Writing in support of afNedcanddate. Anything unsigned, of a libelous nature, or containing defamatory statements will not be considered for publication. All letters must be typed or legibly written, and be 400 words or less. Letters are subject to editing. Mai to Letters from the People," P.O. Box 129, Moab, Utah, 84532. Deadline is Monday, 5 p.m. Letters may also be sent to edttorOmoaMmes.com. The via may not accept letters from persons who write more frequently than once every tour weeks. Changes to letters to the edtor after submission will be accepted only in the most extreme circumstances. ; , Times-Independe- nt Mail Room Supervisor Backshop Castle Valley Columnist Columnist Columnist Distribution ail Times-lndepende-nt |