HASSO HERING

Whether Governor Kitzhaber vetoes the Indian mascot bill or not — he has until Aug. 19 to decide — the affected schools might consider cutting through all the baloney on this issue on their own.

To refresh your memory, the state Board of Education decided that schools with Indian names and mascots had to ditch them by 2017 or lose state funds. This year the legislature tried to save Indian names by passing Senate Bill 215, which would make schools go through an elaborate process, but Kitzhaber didn’t like it.

Let’s step back a minute. Until this controversy came along, hardly anybody outside of the schools involved cared what their teams called themselves. Yes, the board of education’s decision was wrong because it was based on questionable research about the effects these names have on the psyches of some students. It was wrong because it equated using the names to discrimination against an ethnic group.

Even so, an affected school community now might reasonably say, “Look, if it means that much to you — and on the off chance that we really are offending anyone — let’s quit wasting time and find another name. Our alumni can call themselves whatever they want, but we’ll let our teams pick some new name that everybody likes.” Seems like that’s what reasonable people would say and do. (hh)

From Jim Clausen, via Facebook:  Like the rodeo clown who recently got banned for wearing an Obama mask, this is just an attempt to make people think and speak how the far left wants them to… Our Constitution guarantees the right to freedom of expression – schools and their mascots have enjoyed that liberty for many years, but the left is out to control whatever anyone says or does and these unconstitutional laws are the result.  C’mon Hasso, learn a little about our Constitution and STAND up for it – will ya!?