They hope a change in state law will give the governor the power to stop the overseas deployments.
Part of a national Bring the Guard Home campaign, the state effort is gaining some traction. This month, legislators introduced a bill that limits when state soldiers can be called up for national service. They also have crafted resolutions that call on Gov. Ted Kulongoski to withhold troop deployment to Iraq.
"It's a tactic that hasn't been tried before," said Leah Bolger, a 20-year Navy veteran and member of the Corvallis Veterans for Peace chapter. "It addresses the legal aspects of the authorization for the use of military force."
Under federal law, the National Guard has two commanders in chief: the governor and the president, said Maj. Mike Braibish, an Oregon Army National Guard spokesman.
Governors deploy soldiers for a range of activities within their states - search and rescue, firefighting and flood control are common missions here.
Under the U.S. Constitution, the president can call them up when Congress has authorized the use of military force, Braibish said. The system exists because the Founding Fathers didn't envision a nation with the standing Army that the country has today, Braibish said.
So the Constitution allowed for calling up state militias to "execute the laws of the union, suppress insurrections and repel invasions."
Activists say Congress' 2002 authorization for the use of force in Iraq has expired because the goals - hunting for weapons of mass destruction, and reining in Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's oppressive regime - have been achieved.
They say the authorization for the use of force in the general war on terror constitutes a perpetual call-up that places an unreasonable burden on Guard troops, many of whom are on their second, third or fourth deployments.
Last week, HB 2556, designed to act on this legal theory, was introduced in Salem, although its sponsors--not to mention the governor--are by no means on the same page about whether it can succeed:
The Oregon legislation, sponsored by Portland Rep. Chip Shields, has seven House co-sponsors, including Rep. Chris Edwards of Eugene.
Edwards said he supports the legislation because Oregon is particularly vulnerable to the kind of natural disasters that require the aid of the National Guard.
"I absolutely support our troops and their service, but I believe strongly in Oregon local control. They are critical to our emergency preparedness," he said. "Without the National Guard here in Oregon we are not adequately prepared for a catastrophic event such as an earthquake, major flooding or a tsunami. Those are very real scenarios here."
Springfield Sen. Bill Morrisette is among the six senators who also support the bill, but not because he believes the governor could override a federal order calling up the troops.
"I think it's a symbolic thing more than anything," Morrisette said.
Morrisette said he believes Oregon's soldiers should not continue to be exposed to a war they aren't adequately trained for or equipped to fight, particularly when Iraq has billions in oil revenue to fight its own battles.
As chairman of the Health and Human Services Committee, Morrisette said he is particularly concerned about injured soldiers, many who come home with traumatic brain injuries that result from land mine explosions.
Like Edwards, Morrisette said he worries about the state's ability to respond to natural catastrophes.
The Oregon military is without its fleet of 12 Blackhawk helicopters, which were all deployed to Iraq in January.
The state is left with an older loaner Blackhawk from Idaho, five CH 47 cargo helicopters, and four OH-58 Kiowa helicopters, Braibish said.
Gov. Ted Kulongoski, while concerned about the burden the deployments put on families and soldiers, doesn't believe any change in state legislation will allow him to keep soldiers home, spokesman Rem Nivens said.
"The governor has no power to stop the deployments," Nivens said.
Meanwhile, 3500 members of the Oregon National Guard are scheduled for deployment to Iraq in July, 2009, six months after George Bush departed from office. That will leave the 3rd Battalion, consisting of Guard units from Hood River, The Dalles, Hermiston, Pendleton, La Grande, Redmond, Baker City and Ontario, as one of the few outfits still available in Oregon for the state's needs.
Skydiving is one of those things I doubt if I have the nerve to do, but I wish I'd had the nerve to have done (if you follow me). Therefore I can only say I'm just flat-out in awe of this Roseburg woman:
Noelle Williamson programs computers and spends some of her free time bungee jumping or skydiving from airplanes.
She doesn't let the fact that she's blind slow her down.
"It's something I've dealt with my whole life," the 25-year-old Roseburg woman says. "I'm used to it." [...]
"I think flying is a lot of fun," Williamson said.
She often attempts thrilling experiences on her birthday. On her most recent one, she bungee jumped from a bridge over a Washington canyon with [colleague Keri] Schumaker and family members in attendance.
"You can't think about it or you'll get nervous," she said.
No kidding. I'm just sitting here in a coffee shop, and thinking about it is making me nervous.
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Prices at the pump creep back up again, up a hair over 9 to $2.135/gal. (AAA of Oregon puts the average statewide price at $2.05/gal, and the average nationwide at $1.93/gal.)
Cheapest reported pump price: $1.89/gal, at the Costco at 3031 Killdeer Ave SE & Pacific Blvd SE, in Albany.
Highest reported pump price: $2.39/gal from (wait for it!) the HP Car Wash, 1796 Willamette St & W 18th Ave, in Eugene.
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Heads up, TJ: iPhone users have their special chance to celebrate the Oregon Sesquicentennial beginning February 28th. That's when an updated version of the Oregon Trail game joins other classics like Tetris and Scrabble by becoming available at the App Store.
Find food! Avoid dysentery! Win through against impossible odds to settle in the Willamette Valley! And all with the speed of 3G wireless technology!
Bundled with the billions of dollars going to Medicaid, schools and infrastructure projects are more than $30 billion in grants for which states must compete. Kulongoski announced Wednesday in Portland that a new council, the Oregon Way Advisory Group, would help ensure that Oregon gets its share of the money.
The group will give particular attention to projects that include "green" technology, which the governor hopes will give Oregon and edge in the race for cash. The Obama administration has cited those sorts of advancements as goals of the stimulus package.
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"Even in difficult times, sometimes things happen. Good things." Kulongoski said. "We have an opportunity before us."
Though Congress has yet to approve a final stimulus bill, both the House and Senate versions have included billions of dollars for competitive construction grants. Those dollars, Kulongoski said, could and should go to Oregon projects, including school construction in Vernonia, solar panel-installation along highways and a new sustainable prison.
Rural counties in Oregon - the nation's top recipient of an unusual federal subsidy - will have to raise taxes and take other painful steps to prepare for the day when it ends, a governor's task force said.
That day will be about New Year's Day of 2012, and it could mean higher property taxes and other local fees for a region whose bounty of timber has long enabled local officials to keep the tax rates low.
After environmental restrictions in the 1990s began to curtail timber harvests and the revenue that flowed to local governments, the federal government stepped in with safety-net payments that have been consistently renewed despite repeated warnings they would cease.
But a task force organized by Gov. Ted Kulongoski said Thursday that the Congress is likely to let those payments lapse in three years, resulting in "unavoidable and dire consequences."
Six Oregon counties, including Lane, the home of Eugene and the University of Oregon, "may be unable to meet the most elemental needs of public health and safety within a year or two after these payments terminate," it said.
Even with their share of Oregon's $210 million allotment this year, many of Oregon's timber-reliant counties have been struggling to provide sheriff's patrols, keep jails and libraries open, fund schools and maintain roads.
"We had someone with auto industry experience give us a basic explanation about 18 months ago, but that sparked a curiosity," said Chuck Duble, the senior volunteer Newberg firefighter who organized the event. "The problem at the time was, a lot of manufacturers didn't have hybrids on the lot for us to look at and we wanted to carry the training further. We need to know how to access the hybrid system without injuring passengers or ourselves, or damaging our equipment."
"The battery pack in our cars consists of 200 nickel-metal hydride cells - basically, a bunch of flashlight batteries," [Ford spokesman Steve] Hennesey said. "It generates about 330 volts, so we've built in a number of safety features - for instance, all the current-bearing components are painted bright orange in our cars. Other manufacturers also use bright colors."
Such markings are necessary because, other than badges on the exterior of the vehicle, there is often little to distinguish a hybrid model from its gas-only equivalent. "We also have a logo on the plastic engine cover, but that's likely to be busted by the time you guys show up," Hennesey said.
Simply removing the ignition key is enough to deactivate the high-voltage system, but hybrid vehicles also feature an easily accessible "service plug," containing the main fuse for the electric motor, which can also be removed to switch off the current. In Ford cars, it is located in the trunk compartment.
Many newer-model cars also have an accelerometer which shuts off the fuel pump when the airbags are triggered, Hennesy added, which in hybrid cars also serves as an emergency shutoff for the electric motor. As a last resort, first responders can simply cut the cables to the 12-volt battery for the gasoline engine, which will also trip relays for the electric engine.
In fact, electric shock is the major risk that rescuers face -- nickel-metal hydride batteries are `dry cells,' meaning they contain almost no corrosive chemicals, compared to the standard lead-acid 12-volt car battery.
So now you know. It's always something.
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StS True Animal Story: This isn't one of our typical winsome True Animal Stories; it's about abandoned horses turning up across the state.
The bad news is that it happens at all, and is happening more because the economy is forcing some people to make cruel choices. The good news is that someone's working to do something about it:
Animal rescue activists had plenty of examples to give to the Oregon Senate Judiciary Committee at a hearing this week.
They said more horses have been turning up in recent months, including one abandoned horse that was found wandering on a golf course in Tigard.
Nine halter-broken, domestic horses were found abandoned on federal desert land east of the Cascades.
In Linn County, a horse rescue group was called to pick up a stray horse that had been hit by a truck.
Near Klamath Falls, a woman came home to discover several horses turned loose in her pasture.
Scott Beckstead, the founder of a horse sanctuary south of Eugene, blamed the recession.
"In these hard economic times, people are struggling to take care of their horses, and some people are doing irresponsible things and just simply turning them loose," said Beckstead, who founded Duchess Sanctuary, which opened last summer in northern Douglas County.
As livestock under Oregon law, horses can be legally abandoned by their owners.
Senate Bill 398 would define horses as domestic animals, meaning that owners would face felony charges by abandoning them.
State Sen. Floyd Prozanski, D-Eugene, said he was optimistic about the chances of approval for the proposed law.
Unlike other bills that set higher criminal standards, Prozanski said this one is unlikely to drive up court or jail costs for taxpayers because it should work as an incentive for to find alternatives to abandoning the animals.
Beckstead, the senior Oregon director for the Humane Society of the United States, said the bill is backed by a coalition of veterinary and equine organizations.
He said the recently formed Oregon Horse Welfare Council has formed a "hay bank" for struggling horse owners. Modeled after food banks that help people feed their families in lean times, the hay bank collects donations to provide feed for such horses.
"It's more cost effective to just take someone $500 worth of hay than it is to wait until the horses are starving," Beckstead said.
Say it with me, people: Horses are beautiful, wonderful creatures; they're not lifestyle accessories. If you can't afford to keep one, find it a good home with someone who can. It's the same lecture any parent would give a 7-year-old who wants a goldfish: You have a responsibility to take care of it.
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