Current Issue :: April 4, 2008 :: Contents
Cover Story
‘It’s time’
For those who were there, it will go down in the memory books as vintage Erik Sten. Alone, in front of a standing-room-only audience of skeptics, critics and outright adversaries, Sten braced against the wave of animosity and frustration with such a mix of personal convictions and political frankness that even the most pissed-off had to give pause for what was at stake.
Editorial
Take the whole mess with you, Jackson
Columns
Lessons of our journey reach halfway around the world
I thought I would do something different with this week's column and tell you about some of the Japanese folks that make up part of our walking contigent. At the outset we had more than 30 people from Japan among us; as visas run out we lose one or two a week.
For this videographer, power comes in filming the truth
The lack of sincerity and lack of importance concerning coverage of the anti-war movement goes many times unnoticed or reported, which, in turn, opened my door to get up and outside and turn on my camera. The fact that the Big News Stations were not reporting upset me enough to do it myself.
Director’s Desk
Street Roots is under construction, literally. The building Street Roots resides on Northwest Davis Street in Old Town is getting a facelift. Last week, Sisters Of The Road was kind enough to let us sell newspapers to vendors for three days while a temporary wall was constructed in the front of our office.
News
Middaugh: Don’t contract out public safety
Jim Middaugh’s political career stretches back to the 1980s when he worked for congressmen Jim Weaver and Peter DeFazio. His career has combined political and environmental advocacy, working with the Oregon Natural Resources Council, among other groups. More recently, he has been the chief of staff for City Commissioner Erik Sten, and he hopes to replace Sten as Commissioner No. 2.
New mental health coalition organizes survivors for reform
As far as David Oaks is concerned, it’s no coincidence that “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest,” Ken Kesey’s novel about the dark side of the psychiatric system, takes place in Oregon. Forty-six years after the book’s publication, Oaks — who was himself institutionalized and involuntarily medicated in the 1970s — has serious reservations about Oregon’s public mental health system. He isn’t the only one with concerns, but the state, he says, isn’t listening.
