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On the GOP and compassion Today, one of my favorite cartoons, "Non Sequitur," showed a Diogenes type walking down the street with a sign that read, "Looking for a compassionate Republican." So it is with the other side's measure of our compassion. I laughed at the gut level, but also saw the dilemma buried in this snapshot. Where, in fact, does compassion for our fellow man start and end? As a young man, I saw a landlord in a melodrama. He delivered those unforgettable lines as he confronted a single mother holding a baby, "Pay the rent or get out!" The poor woman looked at the blizzard outside and replied, "But I have no money." The waxed moustache twitched as the landlord spoke. "Then get out!" As a kid, I wondered how anyone could be so heartless and unforgiving. Twenty-five years later, and after having paid my dues as a renter, I saw an investment opportunity and became a landlord in a small way. I walked both in the shoes of the lessee and the lessor. Within a year, I had met and dealt with the truly honest and upright and also the unfortunate, the hopeless, the flakes. I learned that having uncritical compassion could be emotionally draining and financially a disaster. After another 20 years of renting space, I realized there is, indeed, a predatory class of individuals who depend on an abundance of eligible suckers. Anyone "established" is fair game because the world owes them a living for reasons which they cannot explain; indeed, few even bother to try. It is from this foundry of experience that this Republican mindset is cast, and may explain in part why the GOP resists throwing tax money away like sand down a rat hole. Al Day Ashland NEW Click here to visit the Daily Tidings archives. Email your... Technical questions & comments to: WebMaster Daily Tidings editorial comments & questions to: Editor Visit our other Western Oregon Newspapers... | Albany Democrat-Herald | Corvallis Gazette-Times | Lebanon Express | Newport News-Times | | Ashland Daily Tidings | Gresham Outlook | Springfield News | Ashland Daily Tidings 1661 Siskiyou Blvd. Ashland, OR 97520 Telephone 541-482-3456 © Copyright 1997, 1998, 1999 Lee Northwest Publishing