Public Square welcomes all points of view. Published submissions do not necessarily reflect the views of the Keizertimes.
Welcome back cadet corps
It was announced this week that the U.S. Defense Department’s National Defense Cadet Corps is comng to McNary High School for the new school year beginning in September.
The NDCC will take the place of the Air Force Junior ROTC program, which ended in May. Budget cuts and low enrollment were cited for the local ROTC programs demise.
For those students who thrive in a regimented atmosphere and want to learn how to be leaders, this is the good news.
There are differences between the two programs, but the aim is the same: motivate young people to become better citizens. Enrollment in the cadet program can be the first step for those who seek a career in the armed forces, but it is not requirement.
Drills and color guard duty are some of the tasks completed by the cadets. McNary High School cadets lead in their community, committing themselves to, unself- ishly, volunteer to help others.
Senior Staff Sergeant Stephan Hammond will return in September to oversee the new National Defense Cadet Corps program. Lincoln Isom, a ROTC member, will be the commander for NDCC.
Welcome back, cadets. — LAZ
Support for Stapleton for HD21
To the Editor:
In November, my vote for Oregon House of Representatives District 21 will go enthusiastically to Virginia Stapleton. She is the kind of dedicated, caring, responsive, creative leader the state needs to address a variety of challenges.
Born and raised in Salem, living in Keizer and Salem at various times, she knows the local history and cur- rent issues intimately. She has faced poverty and knows the challenges of being a non-traditional student. She has owned a small business. As a parent, sought to give back by getting involved with her neighborhood. She worked at that level to improve the safety of children walking to Englewood Elementary.
She went on to run for city coun- cil and has served as a Salem City Councilor and most recently as council president, dealing with the myriad of concerns any city faces, starting with the budget.
State tax policies, specifically Measures 5 and 50, have forced cities and school districts across the state to cut services all while demand and need are growing.
The gap forces public entities to seek new sources of revenue in order to keep up.
Virginia is ready to have the tough, necessary conversations about what citizens want to fund and how that can be done fairly so that residents and students get the services and education they need and deserve.
Virginia Stapleton is the representative we need.
Carolyn Homan / Keizer
To the Editor:
I am writing to say why I support electing Virginia Stapleton to the Oregon Legislature.
Virginia is currently serving on the Salem City Council. As such, she has a keen awareness of the needs of everyday people, and wants to take this awareness and experience to the state level. She supports:
- Addressing the affordable hous- ing crisis. She believes Oregon needs to significantly boost housing pro- duction to meet demand, and not lux- ury housing that most of us cannot afford but affordable housing such as single family homes for first time home buyers and public housing to create more low-income housing.
- Addressing mental health services. She believes we are in a mental and behavioral health crisis where children, adolescents and fam- ilies cannot get the help they need because either the services don’t exist or are overtaxed to the point where it takes months just to get a first appointment.
- Funding for cities and school districts. Since the passage of mea- sures 5 and 50, every city and school district across the state has been cut- ting services while at the same time the needs in our communities have escalated. She believes we must have courageous conversations about what we fund and how to do that fairly. For example, Oregon’s tax laws are not adequate nor equitable, so how do we make them so, and Salem needs a payment in lieu of taxes to help offset the $725 million in rev- enue we forgo because of the State owned property in town and how do we obtain that.
- Bringing down transportation costs while bringing up options. She wants to see investment in pub- lic transit such as connecting the Wilsonville WES Line to Salem and in active transportation options such as bike and pedestrian networks.
These are the main issues Virginia will take to the state level once she is elected. I believe she will do an excellent job of representing us, which is why I am supporting her and will vote for her come election time.
Patricia Parvin / Salem
Midwifery needs more attention
By QUINN STODDARD
As a newly minted parent, there were a lot of things I was unaware of. Looking down at my beautiful daughter, I quickly realized things such as changing a diaper, how to recognize hunger or even how to properly hold her were foreign to me. One thing unknown to me, that I am better informed on now though, has to do with who helped my wife deliver our daughter, a midwife.
Our experience, from water breaking to birth was gently guided by the wonderful midwife team at Silverton Legacy Medical Center. They calmly guided us through the entire process and helped my partner feel comfortable and heard throughout her delivery. I was allowed to be intimately involved in both catching and cutting the cord of my daughter after she arrived. Tears were aplenty.
According to the Mayo Clinic, a midwife specializes in women’s reproductive health and childbirth. For pregnant women, they provide care during prenatal visits, attend the birth, and provide care after the baby is born.
Midwives have similar roles to OB/GYNs but focus on natural techniques for childbirth and reproductive care. A formerly customary practice, midwifing has been reduced in the years since obstetric medicine became more popular, with around 12% of births in the US having a midwife in 2020, according to the Oregon Health & Science University.
This new approach was based on a framework which devalued birth as ceremony and focused instead only on the physical aspect of wellbeing. A focus that may not even be all that much better.
A 2018 National Institutes of Health (NIH) study showed how births managed by midwives were associated with substantially fewer preterm births and labor interventions.
Another 2019 NIH study demonstrated how births managed by midwives were less likely to experience medical interventions, including attempted labor induction; labor augmentation; and use of pain medications, epidural analgesia, and intravenous fluids; and less likely to report pressure to have labor induction or epidural analgesia. While I do not want to denigrate doctors, having come from years in the medical field myself, this more holistic and still fact-based approach to childbirth helped teach me something I didn’t realize I needed to know.
(Quinn Stoddard is a reporter with the Keizertimes.)
Yesterday vs. tomorrow
By GENE H. McINTYRE
While both candidates for president and their running mates reach to grab the “golden ring” on the nation’s most famous political merry-go-round, U.S. voters are already dizzy from watching the “ride.” Meanwhile, the contestants are more and more often characterized as representing yesteryear versus those looking at tomorrow.
For example, a few days ago, MAGA Republican leader Donald J. Trump was advertised by the media as promising to deliver a speech on the economy. Instead, as it turned out, he spoke his well-worn message again, claim- ing the United States is now a Third World country, though it’s not easy to find an American who agrees with his assessment.
Regarding Trump, this “We’ve become a disaster” has been one of his central shticks since he lost the 2020 national election.
Thereby, Trump is delivering again on an act recognized as at least three years old. Of course, he has updated it with new figures from the immediate past years, but it’s mainly the same points—we’re a Third World nation, the 2020 election was stolen from him, crime is up, immigrants are here to take our jobs, and other assorted fears that reference his views of doom and gloom he argues have befallen our nation by the Biden administration.
Accompanying all these gems of misinformation, the Donald apparently finds it also necessary to repeat racial slurs, name-calling and personal insults. (Note to DJT: Since disavowing Project 2025, what may be most helpful to your success is to tell us what you plan to deliver for the American people during your next four years as president.)
The competition has come alive by Vice President Kamala Harris, now the Democratic Party’s candidate for president.
She’s made several personal appearances in what are viewed as key states to the electoral outcome in November where video tapings have captured the images of 12-15 thousand attendees, all of whom, according to Donald Trump, are fakes produced by Artificial Intelligence manipulations.
At these events, candidate Harris has promised to lower health care costs, curb price gouging, (especially regarding food items) and reduce home ownership costs.
Kamala Harris was born an American to an African father and Asian mother immigrants, mak- ing her possibly the most quint- essential representative among children of immigrant families to come recently to America yet succeed at several positions of high national standing.
Related information on American men not wanting a female as president has surprised this writer because our nation so often has been a ground- breaker, especially in modern times, at providing opportunity to newcomers. Further, female heads of state are not a new phenomenon on the world stage with examples readily cited, including, to name but a few, Israel’s Golda Meir, Britain’s Margaret Thatcher and New Zealand’s Jacinda Ardern.
Reassuring for doubters, these and other female nation leaders have done well to outstanding in their leadership roles, also weathering the consequential accompanying criticisms with grace and style befitting a national leader.
The polls see Trump and Harris in a virtual tie where the difference is within the range of statical error. Hence, were the election held today, the count
would be very close, the outcome uncertain. Most Americans like to guess at things of this kind so it’s likely everyone who cares will take a stab at naming the winner. Of course, we all know from past national elections that the nation’s electoral college makes the final decision, not the actual vote count totals.
All of what’s been said and written may come down to one or more debates between the two contenders, the first scheduled on September 10. These outcomes in declaring a winner can be toss-ups or, as the one of considerable fame I remember, Democrat John
F. Kennedy versus Republican Richard M. Nixon in 1960. What’s so curious about that one is that JFK was generally judged the winner not because he scored brilliant takedowns or devasted Nixon but because he came across as relaxed, confident and fresh in presenta- tion; Nixon, however, looked tired, nervous and possibly in need of a shave.
Meanwhile, now, there are several variables that could shake up and influence the out- come of our presidential election in November. Fateful factors this year could be how the Democratic National Convention in Chicago shakes out, warring in the Middle East, especially Israel vs. Hamas in Gaza, and the rise and fall of household price tags for food, fuel and family costs.
(Gene H. McIntyre shares his opinion regularly in the Keizertimes.)