Now I know why Washington State regularly elects lunatics to office

Oregon Magazine ^ | February 17, 2006 | Thomas H. Lipscomb

[WaterDragon]

I am an independent journalist who just got a good laugh over the latest "courageous stance" adopted by your student senate. Growing up in Oregon, I was always puzzled by why the lovely neighboring state of Washington seemed so heavily influenced by what I thought was a lunatic fringe. On the one hand William Gates and his baby boy Bill had produced two obscene monopolies, Boeing and Microsoft, and on the other your assorted elected officials seemed more at home in 1960s Communist Albania than the Wobblies "One Big Union" of sainted memory in the Northwest.

Now I know what the problem is. I don't know how I could have missed it for so long.

Your action --through something no intelligent student pays any attention to--"student government" --to deny former student, notorious Marine aviation hero, Pappy Boyington a place in "The University of Washington Hall of Fame" says it all. I gather you think he is not a proper role model for today's U of W student. Defending the US in a declared war initiated by a sneak attack on Pearl Harbor seems to be a problem for you. You may well be right. I don't think he has anything in common with you either.

[okie01]

Secondly, where are they going to put this statue? On Washington University land. Land purchased by the taxpayers. Who will fund upkeep of this statue? The landscapers, janitors, etc that are employed by the University of Washington. More tax dollars to fund the upkeep of said statue.

However, consider the savings in grass no longer mowed...

[Veto!]

Washington and Oregon have been throughly CaliPornicated.

Maybe peripherally, but not in any important way.

When I moved to WA from CA in 1981, I felt I'd drifted into some remote shadowy belt of the Milky Way, where all common sense had sunk into a black hole, where excellence was blasphemy, where mediocrity was viewed with suspicion as a far, far rightwing concept, where every person had two left feet and two left hands. Really, CA is much more diverse culturally and politically. Reagan would NEVER have been elected in WA.

[KeyLargo]

Aero News.net
http://www.aero-news.net/index.cfm

Get Thee Behind Me, Pappy Boyington

Sat, 18 Feb '06
Univ of Washington Student Senate Slams "Evil" War Hero
Aero-News Opinion By Kevin R.C. "Hognose" O'Brien

Student senator Jill Edwards spoke for the student body when she "questioned whether it was appropriate to honor a person who killed other people." She "didn’t’ believe a member of the Marine Corps was an example of the sort of person UW wanted to produce."

Ashley Miller agrees. "Too many monuments commemorate white men," she sneered. They should probably tear some down until pygmies, eskimos and victims of gender dysphoria have caught up in the heroism department, then. It might take a while (The white guy, by the way, wasn't all white -- he was part Native American, Sioux specifically. But maybe joining the "evil" Marines bleached the red out of him?)

Jon Lee said he "didn’t want to see a campus inundated with memorials." Hey, they already have a memorial to someone with University values -- the Lincoln Brigade, a group of American Communists who fought in the Spanish Civil War. The survivors used to march in New York City in solidarity with Hitler, and then against him, oddly enough changing direction on June 22, 1941. That's University of Washington values for you.

The occasion: a meeting of the University of Washington student senate, in which Andrew Everett committed the moral equivalent of Danish cartooning, by proposing that the school erect a small statue to Marine Lt. Col. Gregory "Pappy" Boyington, UW '34, who with 28 victories remains the Marine Corps' all-time ace. Boyington grew up in hard circumstances, and long before there was the sort of lavish student aid that makes college an extension of childhood for today's students, put himself through the University and went on to become one of the school's most distinguished alumni.

So Everett and a small group of students and faculty thought it would be a great idea to honor him, and to give today's students a reminder of a hero of days gone by.

As the reaction of Edwards (below right), Miller, and Lee show, it went over like an offer of a golden calf to a synagogue, or a statue of Satan in the Vatican, or, well, a Marine on a modern college campus.

Some students sought compromise. Deirdre Lockman said "the resolution focused more heavily on the negative aspects of war, and should instead focus on more positive aspects, such as the awarding of the Medal of Honor." Yeah, you know, like all guys who won the MOH for acts of genteel kindness, like Audie Murphy, or Bob Howard. (Look 'em up. You in the UW shirt, put down that bong).

Mikhail Smirnoff apparently thought he was seeking middle ground when he "understood the sentiment of not wanting to reward those who fought in the war," but he pointed out that "those who fought in WWII were heros [sic]..." unlike, he helpfully added, those who fight in Iraq. To quote someone with the same last name as young Mikhail, "What a country!"

Defending his decision to diss Boyington, Director of Student Senate Operations Karl D. Smith thought he was going for middle ground, commenting in a regional blog, "We also are home to civil rights leaders such as Gordon Hirabayshi and a major contributor in the eradication of smallpox William Foege, and the Nigerian statesman who worked for peace Alex Ekwueme." Yep, household names all, just like Boyington. I was just wondering today, what's Al Ekwueme up to these days? You hardly hear his name any more. By the way, I am not the Great Punctuator, but I'm willing to send Karl some commas. You know, to bring his writing up to the junior-high-school standard expected at UW.

Smith issued the plaintive call of today's university dweller, confused, intimidated, and relativistic: "How do we decide who is and is not deserving?"

Well, Karl, it looks like you just did, despite your girly-man waffling. Did you say that he was evil for shooting down enemy airplanes?

"I stand by my comments in support of removing the language regarding the Japanese planes shot down." (Geez, the kid talks like a bureaucrat already. He'll be making everyone's life miserable in the DMV some day). "In war, killing is a necessary evil. Because of this I am all the more grateful for those who endure the effects of war.
But I do not believe our honor of him should focus upon the evil, regardless of how necessary."

Yeah... make a resolution about Gramps Boyington, just don't mention that he was a Marine, and skip the bit about 28 planes he shot down.

It might offend airplane-Americans. ("He's really famous for something, but we can't tell you what, because this is a university, and we have to keep a lid on the information"). If this is the courage that they inculcate at UW, Boyington must have had all of his already, on the day he got there.

Or just maybe the campus has changed in seventy-two years.

The University of Washington student senate is a strange organization, with many seats reserved for particular races, ethnicities, and extracurricular activities. The seat that Jill Edwards represents belongs to -- I am not making this up -- the Honors Croquet League, which appears to be the pinnacle of the deep- thinking Miss Edwards's accomplishments at UW. (A personal page notes that she posed in a swimsuit for a calendar of UW women -- I won't comment but every male who reads this and sees her picture will make a snap judgment on what the dating scene is like at UW. Swimsuit, croquet, knowledge of history half as deep as a bird bath: she's the complete package, men).

Boyington died in 1988 and is buried in Arlington -- which is the national cemetery in Washington, DC, where we bury people that most in the nation think are heroes -- which detail we spell out for any of those suffering from a Washington (University of) education.
FMI: www.washington.edu, www.acepilots.com/usmc_boyington.html

[econjack]

Yep, I knew that. I was just repeating what WaterDragon said.

[Snardius]

I didn't realize Washington State had elections.

We don't. We decide who we want to win and count the votes until we get the desired result.

[Snardius]

Regardless of what you may think ... Oregon and Washington are actually more liberal politically than California.

Actually, the I-5 corridor is more liberal than California. The rest of the state is comfortably conservative.

[Snardius]

Reagan would NEVER have been elected in WA.

Perhaps not, but we do stand as the state who elected a model for all Democrats, Scoop Jackson.

[Spunky]

PING! "Your action --through something no intelligent student pays any attention to--"student government" --to deny former student, notorious Marine aviation hero, Pappy Boyington a place in "The University of Washington Hall of Fame" says it all."

[WaterDragon]

if you checked his student records I am more than certain you would have found the kind of letters from the Deans of his day that would have confirmed your thinking: "Boyington thinks too much on his own

There are plenty of Boyington's ilk in the Northwest....they just need to get together and make the sacrifices required to provide desperately needed leadership to Americans here.

[sionnsar]

Thanks to Spunky for the ping.

Evergreen State ping

FReepmail sionnsar if you want on or off this ping list.

Ping sionnsar if you see a Washington state related thread.

[lonestar]

I guess they flunked history.

Do you think they've ever seen a relevant history book? My guess is they have those who mention Oprah and Martin Luther King but not George Washington or Abe Lincoln.

[Brian Allen]

<< Regardless of what you may think ... Oregon and Washington are actually more liberal politically than California. >>

But my beautiful Skagit County, thank God, its population topped off, as it is, with former Tar-Heels and [This] one former Masterton Moriori, stands out as a red County to Washington's Blue 'Bull!'

[Scotsman will be Free]

I live in eastern Washington, which is mostly conservative. However, King, Pearce, and Snohomish counties, which are west of the Cascade mountains, rule the state. They are heavily liberal. I consider Seattle to be the northernmost suburb of San Francisco. We in eastern Washington have long wished to secede from Washington state.
The last time that I was at the University of Wa. they had an area called "Red Square". The bulletin boards were all covered with leftist, whacko, commie crap.

[Brian Allen]

<< I live in Eastern Washington ... >>

Sedro-Wooley, in Washington's beautiful Skagit Valley, is my bailiwick. [Take Highway 20 - it'll blow you away!]

[holyscroller]

"However, King, Pearce, and Snohomish counties, which are west of the Cascade mountains, rule the state. They are heavily liberal."

Watch for the initiative coming out in a few days which will allow the creation of new counties, and will hopefully allow us to break up King County. Eastern Washington should really get behind this so we can kill the King County dragon.

[Robert357]

Come on already. The UW Student Senate proved how stupid some of their members were were by opening their mouths.

All the students on the UW campus have learned a very valuable lesson, you leaders will impact your life and if you have stupid leaders you may end up with bad results.

I can't wait for the UW fund raising campaigns to figure out that the stupid UW student Senate made a lot of old live white guys, folks who gave money and think positively of the military, hold back on their UW donations. Likewise, I wonder how the Washington State Legislature is going to be in handing out money from our collective wallets to the UW to keep tuition down after this flap.

I think that some students, staff and faculty are in for a more bitter reality associated with students electing stupid leaders.

[sionnsar]

Come on already.

Ummm... was that a response to someone else's post? #50 was just a ping. *\;-)

I can't wait for the UW fund raising campaigns to figure out that the stupid UW student Senate made a lot of old live white guys, folks who gave money and think positively of the military, hold back on their UW donations.

Yup. There's a reason why my alma mater hasn't received a dime from me... and unless they repudiate the past 35 years, they never will.

[Robert357]

The "come on already" comment was to no one in particular and to everyone. I was trying to indicate that the damage has been done and the consequences will be real for that damage.

According to my first cut at 2005 federal taxes, I am showing itemized deductions associated with gifts to the UW. Not only do I give money, but I also give of my time by siting on an committee that advices one department.

As an old (but not retired and still living) rich (but not filthy rich) white guy, I took offense at the comments by the UW student senator. This coming year, I may be more selective in my giving to the UW and each time I am asked to give I may reference the UW Senator comments about enough statues of "rich white dead guys" and ask the person asking for money why I should give, when student leadership has such an attitude.