Tuesday, May 29, 2007

Editorial: "So far so good this wildfire season"

The unnamed Courier editor seems to put an awful lot of store on luck to keep our town from burning down. I'd prefer to rely on informed and alert citizens, good preparation and our fabulous fire-fighters.

Sure, it's a manner of speaking, but it promotes a certain passivity about everything, and I'm sorry, I'm just not down for that, guys. You'll go to any length to eliminate the passive voice from a paragraph, how about from your own thinking?

Wiederaenders: "Never forget what Memorial Day means"

I remember: people died under civilian orders.

It seems to me we're pretty good about celebrating the heroic dead, but we're a little lean on remembering that we civilians sent them to die, and our record of handling that decision well is more than a little spotty. Tim.

A1: "Meeting about plan to restore forests is Wednesday"

Joanna Dodder gives us a cogent heads-up on an opportunity to be involved in fire-related planning and why it's important. Good use of space.

Letters: I did not shoot the deputy

Among three letters on the deputy story, Linda Hunt writes, "It takes great courage for a law-enforcement agency to root out suspected criminal behavior within its ranks," and I have to wonder why in the world this might be accepted as conventional wisdom. If it is, it's pathetic.