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Your story, Tom, is both touching and biting. I found it touching in the sense that those of us who love Moscow, and who love our fellow human beings, can join together to nurture and protect a community of people whose common goal is simply to live in harmony, integrity, and productivity together -- and this incident, with the shameful rhetoric surrounding it, poisons the common well from which we all drink. But your analysis was biting insofar as it provoked in me, and, I hope, in others, the jolting realization that something has gone terribly wrong among us all. It was the "slap" we all need, I think, to rise from the buzz of righteous anger to DO SOMETHING to fight against the tide of ugliness that's been creeping into Moscow, and gathering force, for as long as I've lived here.<BR>
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I love that tolerance is a virtue greatly valued, and almost always practiced, by the decent people of Moscow. But too many, for too long, have esteemed "tolerance" at the expense of courage. Good progressives, honest liberals, and decent communitarians lose nothing by recognizing that there are many things right here among us that simply cannot be tolerated; in fact, they lose much when they refuse to grasp that. Those of us who value community and call ourselves progressives and liberals MUST begin to value integrity and courage even more than the bland, tepid, ignorant and affluence-fed "tolerance" that has left Moscow vulnerable to the seething viciousness manifested in our mailboxes this weekend. <BR>
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There's nothing in my Christian faith or my progressive social views that requires that I tolerate bigotry and hate, and everything inherent in both requires that I vehemently -- and not just privately -- reject it. I hope that my progressive neighbors see, finally, the monster they've "tolerated" and realize that tolerance of the intolerable is no virtue at all.<BR>
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So, Tom, thank you for the call. The perp here IS a thief, and you can count on me to contribute. Granted, I'll probably have very few friends after this post, but I'm willing to put my money where my keyboard is.<BR>
<BR><FONT color=#8064a2><FONT style="FONT-SIZE: 12pt" size=3><FONT face=Verdana>Keely<BR>www.keely-prevailingwinds.com<BR></FONT></FONT></FONT><BR><BR><BR> <BR>
> Date: Mon, 18 Oct 2010 03:01:41 -0700<BR>> From: thansen@moscow.com<BR>> To: vision2020@moscow.com<BR>> Subject: [Vision2020] The Reward Fund<BR>> <BR>> Greetings Visionaires -<BR>> <BR>> As I was laying in bed these past couple hours, I was trying to think of a<BR>> name for the fund; the fund being created later today . . . the funds to<BR>> be made payable to the individual(s) instrumental in the identification<BR>> and subsequent prosecution of the individual(s) responsible for creating<BR>> and distribting the scam postcard.<BR>> <BR>> I have come up with one; a name that reflects exactly what the<BR>> perpertrator did.<BR>> <BR>> Before I fill you in on the fund's name . . .<BR>> <BR>> While serving in Germany in the Army, I came up on orders transferring me<BR>> to Fort Irwin, California.<BR>> <BR>> My wife and I decided to order a new car (a 1982 Chevrolet Cavalier<BR>> Hatchback), which we picked up in Philadelphia and drove across country.<BR>> <BR>> Let me tell you . . . we drove 3,000+ miles across some of the most<BR>> beautiful terrain the NIfty Fity (USA) has to offer . . . from<BR>> Philadelphia, through Virginia . . . West Virginia . . . Tennessee . . .<BR>> Iowa . . . South Dakota . . . Wyoming . . . Montana . . . and into Idaho.<BR>> <BR>> With the exception of that miserable stretch form Sioux Falls to Rapid<BR>> City (South Dakota), I felt that there simply could not be any place more<BR>> beautiful.<BR>> <BR>> That was until we drove over Lookout Pass on I-90 from Montana into Idaho.<BR>> When I first glanced at North Idaho I experienced a feeling of "home". <BR>> The first words I told my wife, upon entering Idaho, were "I am going to<BR>> die of old age here."<BR>> <BR>> Upon retirement from the Army in 1989 my wife and I moved to Pinehurst,<BR>> Idaho in the Silver Valley, where I commuted to and from work in Coeur<BR>> d'Alene and later North Idaho College where I attended classes.<BR>> <BR>> As much as I fell in love with the terrain of North Idaho, I still kinda<BR>> felt that something was missing.<BR>> <BR>> That "something" was a sense of community . . . of "neighborhood"; that<BR>> feeling I enjoyed as a kid growing up in Van Nuys, California . . . that<BR>> sense of neighborhood one experiences while talking with (or about)<BR>> friends down the street . . . the neighborhood store whose customer base<BR>> is so local and firm that it feels like family.<BR>> <BR>> I rediscovered that sense of "community" and "neighborhood" when I<BR>> transferred from North Idaho College to the University of Idaho in 1992.<BR>> <BR>> I sensed the "comunity" and "neighborhood" almost immediately over a few<BR>> beers at Murdock's and the Rathaus; local watering holes long gone. But,<BR>> this community of ours is still a neighborhood that is reflected in places<BR>> like the Moscow Food Co-Op, BookPeople of Moscow, Tri-State, the Corner<BR>> Club, and so on and so on.<BR>> <BR>> That sense of "community" and "neighborhood" is important to me, and<BR>> should be for all of us.<BR>> <BR>> But, that sense of "community" and "neighborhood" was threatened this last<BR>> Saturday morning by nothing more than a postcard, a postcard threatening<BR>> to rob the city of Moscow of its sense of "community" and "neighborhood".<BR>> <BR>> So, when you fine people of the neighborhood send your money to the fund,<BR>> make the checks payable to . . .<BR>> <BR>> "To Catch a Thief"<BR>> <BR>> Seeya round town, Moscow.<BR>> <BR>> Tom Hansen<BR>> Moscow, Idaho<BR>> <BR>> "The Pessimist complains about the wind, the Optimist expects it to change<BR>> and the Realist adjusts his sails."<BR>> <BR>> - Unknown<BR>> <BR>> <BR>> =======================================================<BR>> List services made available by First Step Internet, <BR>> serving the communities of the Palouse since 1994. <BR>> http://www.fsr.net <BR>> mailto:Vision2020@moscow.com<BR>> =======================================================<BR> </body>
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