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About The nugget. (Sisters, Or.) 1994-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 20, 2019)
2 Wednesday, February 20, 2019 The Nugget Newspaper, Sisters, Oregon O P I N I O N Editorial… A national emergency Republicans, especially those who style themselves Constitutional Conservatives, should stand up in full-throated opposition to President Trump9s declaration of a national emergency in order to secure funding for a border wall. Regardless of one9s position on border security, this declaration is the wrong course. It abrogates the provisions of Article One of the U.S. Constitution, which explicitly gives power of the purse to Congress. It further empowers an executive branch that has far exceeded the powers envisioned for it by the Founders. It9s especially egregious given that Trump himself says, <I didn9t need to do this, but I9d rather do it much faster.= If he <didn9t need to do this,= it9s not an emergency and the declaration is illegitimate. When President Obama proclaimed that <We9re not just going to be waiting for leg- islation. I9ve got a pen and I9ve got a phone... and I can use that pen to sign executive orders and take executive actions and administra- tive actions,= Constitutional Conservatives rightly raised a hue and cry about executive overreach. They can now demonstrate that they are loyal to principle rather than merely loyal to power by taking the same stand against Trump9s declaration. Some, to their credit, already have. If principle isn9t enough to appeal to them, perhaps they should contemplate the prospect of, oh, say, a President Kamala Harris cit- ing the Trump precedent to declare <national emergencies= over healthcare, climate change, shootings or any other issue she deems fit. Making an outcry won9t mean much then, will it? Jim Cornelius, Editor in Chief Letters to the Editor… The Nugget welcomes contributions from its readers, which must include the writer9s name, address and phone number. Let- ters to the Editor is an open forum for the community and contains unsolicited opinions not necessarily shared by the Editor. The Nugget reserves the right to edit, omit, respond or ask for a response to letters submitted to the Editor. Letters should be no longer than 300 words. Unpublished items are not acknowledged or returned. The deadline for all letters is noon Monday. To the Editor: I want to thank the Sisters Chamber of Commerce and its members for the unex- pected honor of being chosen and awarded the Presidents Award. When I heard my name announced at the Chamber Dinner & Awards, I was speechless and humbled by such an honor. I also want to thank the Sisters community for allowing me to capture so many wonderful and exciting moments in their daily lives. I am so lucky to be surrounded by so many wonder- ful people and organizations that make up the greater Sisters community and be allowed to capture so many awesome moments. I especially want to thank my beauti- ful wife, Marlene, for the amazing encour- agement and support that I am given. I also want to thank our local newspaper for their encouragement, acknowledgement and sup- port. God bless all those that live here and those whose lives I have touched. Go Outlaws! Jerry Baldock Outlaws Photography s s s To the Editor: Pete Rathbun has been a familiar face at Sisters Folk Festival for more than 10 years. Amidst organizational changes that are cur- rently underway, Pete has decided step down at the Folk Festival and accept an offer in a new industry. Sisters Folk Festival is very thankful to See LETTERS on page 23 Sisters Weather Forecast Courtesy of the National Weather Service, Pendleton, Oregon Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday Snow Showers Partly Cloudy AM Clouds/PM Sun Snow Showers 35/21 33/12 38/26 36/26 Sunday Monday Snow Showers Snow Showers 36/25 36/24 The Nugget Newspaper, LLC Website: www.nuggetnews.com 442 E. Main Ave., P.O. Box 698, Sisters, Oregon 97759 Tel: 541-549-9941 | Fax: 541-549-9940 | editor@nuggetnews.com Postmaster: Send address changes to The Nugget Newspaper, P.O. Box 698, Sisters, OR 97759. Third Class Postage Paid at Sisters, Oregon. Editor in Chief: Jim Cornelius Production Manager: Leith Easterling Graphic Design: Jess Draper Community Marketing Partners: Patti Jo Beal & Vicki Curlett Classifieds & Circulation: Lisa May Proofreader: Pete Rathbun Owner: J. Louis Mullen The Nugget is mailed to residents within the Sisters School District; subscriptions are available outside delivery area. Third-class postage: one year, $45; six months (or less), $25. First-class postage: one year, $85; six months, $55. Published Weekly. ©2019 The Nugget Newspaper, LLC. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part without written permission is prohibited. All advertising which appears in The Nugget is the property of The Nugget and may not be used without explicit permission. The Nugget Newspaper, Inc. assumes no liability or responsibility for information contained in advertisements, articles, stories, lists, calendar etc. within this publication. All submissions to The Nugget Newspaper will be treated as uncondition- ally assigned for publication and copyrighting purposes and subject to The Nugget Newspaper9s unrestricted right to edit and comment editorially, that all rights are currently available, and that the material in no way infringes upon the rights of any person. The publisher assumes no responsibility for return or safety of artwork, photos, or manuscripts. nugget_2019-02-20.indd 2 Jonah Goldberg Donald Trump can9t win in 2020 but the Democrats can lose, and they seem determined to give it their best shot. Just going by the num- bers, barring a compelling independent candidacy of someone likely to siphon votes from the Democratic column, it seems impossible for Trump to get re-elected. Of course, it9s not impos- sible, because we never get to the future as the crow flies. In the heat of an election, many Trump-skeptical Republicans and Republican-leaning vot- ers will come home. But if that happens, it almost surely won9t happen because Trump moderated his behavior. If the president could pivot to a more <presiden- tial= persona he would have done it already. When Brit- ish Prime Minister Marga- ret Thatcher was confronted with calls to turn away from her market-liberat- ing reforms, she famously declared, <The lady9s not for turning.= Trump, while a very different kind of leader, could give a speech declar- ing, <The man is not for pivoting.= So, the only variable in the binary presidential elec- tion lies on the left side of the ledger. If the Democrats present a face that is scarier than the reality show of the previous four years, many Americans could vote against the Democrats rather than for the Republicans. That process is already starting. Erick Erickson, a prominent <Never Trump= conservative in 2016 and a Trump critic since then, announced on Monday that he will be voting for Trump in 2020. Democrats would be wise to pay attention. Erickson hasn9t suddenly fallen in love with Trump; he9s grown deci- sively horrified by the Dem- ocrats. And I can9t blame him. Just last week, Demo- crats unveiled the Green New Deal, a wild-eyed fan- tasy of an agenda that would cost trillions, destroy whole industries and serve as a Tro- jan horse for socialism. Not long before that, Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) cavalierly admitted that <Medicare for all= would wipe out the insurance poli- cies of more than a 100 million Americans. She has done some backpedal- ing since, but other leading Democrats remain commit- ted, including Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand of New York, who recently said eliminat- ing private insurance was an <urgent goal.= The scandals unravel- ing the Democratic Party in Virginia have obscured the fact that the controversy started because someone was appalled by Gov. Ralph Northam9s defense of legis- lation that seemed to support the right to terminate the life of delivered babies. There9s ample room to criticize the way Trump has handled immigration and shoved all his chips into the center of the table for his wall, but some of the Demo- crats9 rhetoric about immi- gration 4 the need to abolish Immigration and Customs Enforcement, for example 4 hasn9t made them appear like a reasonable alternative. A host of other story lines, largely ignored or down- played by the mainstream media, have caught the atten- tion of conservatives none- theless, from increasingly open hostility to Catholic judicial nominees to greater tolerance for anti-Semitic rhetoric. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) seems to grasp that it9s in her party9s interest not to go overboard in response to Trump, but col- lectively it9s as if the Demo- crats think the savvy political response to the radicalism they see in Trumpism is an alternatively radical agenda. The problem is that Trump9s actual agenda (so far) hasn9t been as radical as the disori- entating nature of his norm- defying personal conduct and obvious contempt for institutional safeguards has led many liberals to believe. In many respects the par- ties are mirroring each other, as the incentive structure on both sides is geared toward the extremes. Politics is no longer about capturing the center where most voters gravitate, but revving up the ranks of the most passion- ate. Faced with that reality, enough Americans may hold their noses and vote against the devil they don9t know. © 2019 Tribune Content Agency, LLC Opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the writer and are not necessarily shared by the Editor or The Nugget Newspaper. 2/19/19 10:56 AM