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CapitalPress.com
April 15, 2016
Editorials are written by or
approved by members of the
Capital Press Editorial Board.
All other commentary pieces are
the opinions of the authors but
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Opinion
Editorial Board
Publisher
Editor
Managing Editor
Mike O’Brien
Joe Beach
Carl Sampson
opinions@capitalpress.com Online: www.capitalpress.com/opinion
O ur V iew
Congress should speak up against EPA boondoggle
T
he silence has been
deafening. When the
Environmental Protection
Agency’s financial participation
in a smear campaign against
Washington state farmers was
discovered, not a single member
of that state’s congressional
delegation spoke up.
Even more interestingly, the
only two members of Congress
to voice their concerns about the
propriety of nearly $600,000 in
federal money going toward a
public-relations attack on farmers
were from the Midwest.
“We are troubled to learn that
EPA’s financial assistance appears
to improperly fund an advocacy
campaign in Washington state that
unfairly targets and demonizes
farmers and ranchers,” wrote
Kansas Sen. Pat Roberts and
Oklahoma Sen. Jim Inhofe.
“This disturbing billboard is
a bold example of exactly what
America’s farmers and ranchers
complain about all the time: the
EPA has an agenda antagonistic
to producers,” Roberts said in a
separate statement.
One would think that members
of Congress from Washington
state would be leading the charge
to stop such shenanigans, which
were fronted by a coalition of
environmental groups and the
Northwest Indian Fisheries
Commission called What’s
Upstream and funded by the EPA.
Here’s the statement Washington
Sens. Maria Cantwell and Patty
Murray issued about the billboards,
website and advertising: (Nothing).
We’re not picking on
Washington’s two senators. The
rest of the congressional delegation
was silent on the issue, too.
We have to wonder what their
reaction would be if the EPA spent
tax dollars to attack Boeing or
Microsoft. Most likely, the senators
and representatives would have the
EPA administrator on the phone
right now.
Maybe we missed their outrage,
but we can only presume members
of Washington’s congressional
delegation were too busy
elsewhere to allow themselves to
be distracted by a federal agency
using taxpayer money to attack
Washington farmers in an effort to
influence Congress and the state
legislature.
Maybe that’s the way of
the world. When election time
comes around, the politicians pat
farmers and ranchers on the head
— and ask them for campaign
contributions — but when the
going gets tough, well, there are
often other “more important”
things to do.
With a few isolated exceptions,
we see it in Oregon and California,
too. Agriculture is too often forced
to sit in the back of the bus. Only
in Idaho do members of Congress
seem to consistently keep their eye
on agriculture’s interests.
Some say Roberts and Inhofe,
both Republicans, were just using
the What’s Upstream boondoggle
to take a potshot at a high-
profile agency in a Democratic
administration. They see it as a
“R versus D” issue — Republican
versus Democrat.
We see it differently. We see it
is an “R versus W” issue — Right
versus Wrong.
And apparently, any fair-
minded person who’s taken the
time to look at the issue agrees
with us.
We urge West Coast members
of Congress to step up their
efforts to protect farmers and
ranchers from the EPA and other
overzealous federal agencies that
use taxpayer money to try to put
them out of business.
If they need a list of those
agencies, we can provide one.
Terrorism a real threat
to U.S. agriculture
By STEWART TRUELSEN
For the Capital Press
T
Rik Dalvit/For the Capital Press
O ur V iew
Supreme Court to decide strong-arm case
T
he problem with the American
regulatory state is that the
regulators have established
rules designed to force the
compliance of the regulated and to
deprive them of due process in an
impartial court.
A case heard last month by the U.S.
Supreme Court hopefully will build on
earlier decisions that make it easier for
property owners to challenge agency
decisions in federal court.
In Hawkes Co. Inc. v. Corps
of Engineers, the question of
judicial review rests on whether a
determination by the U.S. Army Corps
of Engineers that it has jurisdiction
over property under the Clean Water
Act is a final agency action subject
to challenge, or merely an opinion
a property owner can consider and
disregard, albeit at future peril.
Hawkes Co. planned to mine peat
moss on wetland property it owned in
Minnesota. After numerous meetings
with the company and visits to the site,
the Corps concluded that there was a
significant nexus between the site and
the Red River of the North, waters of
the U.S. as defined by the Clean Water
Act, some 120 miles away.
It made a jurisdictional
determination that a permit would be
required before the company could
move forward.
According to the Corps, this left
Hawkes with only three options. It
could abandon the project. It could
perform the necessary environmental
impact studies, which take several
years and cost hundreds of thousands
of dollars, and apply for a permit. It
could ignore the determination and
proceed with the project and defend
itself if prosecuted.
What it could not do is contest
the determination in court because,
according to the Corps, its
jurisdictional determination was
not a final government action under
the Administrative Procedures Act
because it neither compelled Hawkes
to do anything, nor restricted its
actions. In short, the company had
“adequate remedies” available that
preclude litigation.
The Corps is twisting the language
to force compliance without judicial
review. It knows that with such a
determination any reasonable property
owner will either give up entirely
or go through the time and expense
of the permitting process. It would
be extremely foolish to go forward
without a permit and risk criminal
prosecution and the ruinous financial
penalties attached to a possible guilty
verdict.
It’s a cheap bit of extortion, not
unlike how the Chicago mob sells
protection.
The 8th U.S. Circuit Court of
Appeals agreed, in only slightly less
inflammatory tones.
“The Corps’ assertion that the
Revised J.D. is merely advisory
and has no more effect than an
environmental consultant’s opinion
ignores reality,” it wrote.
By not allowing immediate judicial
review, it wrote, the Corps achieves
the result it desires without testing its
assertion of jurisdiction.
In unanimously deciding a similar
case, the Supreme Court was more
direct.
“[T]here is no reason to think that
the Clean Water Act was uniquely
designed to enable the strong-arming
of regulated parties into ‘voluntary
compliance’ without the opportunity
for judicial review....”
We think the court will side with
the plaintiffs. The Corps’ assertion
is clearly a distinction without a
difference.
here are some things
you should not read at
bedtime. One of them is
The Worldwide Threat Assess-
ment by the U.S. Intelligence
Community, an annual report
of threats to the United States.
In testimony before Con-
gress, Director of National In-
telligence James Clapper said,
“In my 50-plus years in the
intelligence business I cannot
recall a more diverse array of
crises and challenges than we
face today.”
Clapper warned that home-
grown extremists are proba-
bly the most significant ter-
rorist threat to the homeland
this year. In other words, the
U.S. faces attacks similar to last
December’s in San Bernardino,
Calif., that left 14 dead and 22
wounded.
The entire report is even
more disturbing. In short, the
United States and its assets
around the world are facing a
multiplicity of threats from ter-
rorist organizations and states
like North Korea. These en-
emies are busy devising new
weapons and strategies.
Hopefully, they will never
get to use them, but make no
mistake about it, no part of our
country or sectors of the econ-
omy are off-limits to terrorists.
This includes rural America and
U.S. agriculture.
Former Georgia Sen. Saxby
Chambliss received the Distin-
guished Service to Agriculture
award from the American Farm
Bureau Federation this year.
In addition to his accomplish-
ments in food and agriculture,
he played an important role in
homeland security and intelli-
gence gathering. He does not
assume terrorists will overlook
U.S. food and agriculture.
“We have to make sure that
America always has a safe sup-
ply of food as well as a safe sup-
ply of water. Those are some-
what easy targets for the terrorist
community to look at,” he says.
“There is no question that food
security is a very vital part of
national security and a vital part
of what we look at from a count-
er-terrorism standpoint in the
Guest
comment
Stewart Truelsen
intelligence community every
day.”
After 9/11, agro-terrorism
became more of a concern. A
white paper written in 2002 by
University of Minnesota eco-
nomics professor C. Ford Runge
outlined threats to livestock and
crops from biological weapons.
Among top concerns were
the introduction of foot-and-
mouth disease in feedlots and
the spread of deadly pathogens,
like anthrax, on fruit and vegeta-
bles. Another threat was the con-
tamination of corn and soybean
oil to disrupt all downstream
users and manufacturers of pro-
cessed foods.
Runge concluded in 2002
that it would be hard for terror-
ists to do serious damage to the
American food system because
of its diffuse nature. It’s so big
and spread out.
However, it would still be
possible for terrorists to cause
widespread consumer pan-
ic, loss of trade and economic
harm.
The current threat analysis
raises greater concern for weap-
ons of mass destruction, like
ones that could be used against
agricultural production and wa-
ter supplies.
The report says, “Research
in genome editing conducted
by countries with different
regulatory or ethical stan-
dards than those of Western
countries probably increas-
es the risk of the creation of
potentially harmful biological
agents or products.”
That is why Farm Bureau
continues to support protect-
ing our nation’s food, fiber
and water supply and critical
industrial agricultural materi-
als, in addition to encouraging
farmers and public agencies
to recognize the importance
of adopting biosecurity mea-
sures.
Stewart Truelsen, a food
and agriculture freelance
writer, is a regular contrib-
utor to the Farm Bureau’s
Focus on Agriculture series.
Readers’ views
Coming together
to find solutions
for public lands
It has become clear over
the past few months that we
all love the Owyhee Can-
yonlands. Whether it is how
we make our living through
ranching and grazing, for
hunting and fishing, or hiking
and rafting, this place has a
special meaning for all of us.
And whether we live in De-
schutes, Multnomah or Mal-
heur County like me, how
the Owyhee is protected is
important to all of us.
As Oregonians, we all
want to be part of the dia-
logue about the future of the
Owyhee. That’s why recent
comments by individuals
with no connection to the
longstanding work to come
together on permanently pro-
tecting the Owyhee (Capital
Press editorial, March 24,
2016) were so disappointing.
I choose to live and work
in Malheur County, and I
love the Owyhee. I want to
see it protected for future
generations, and that is why
I am calling on our Sens. Ron
Wyden and Jeff Merkley to
introduce legislation to safe-
guard its rivers, canyons and
sagebrush expanses.
As Oregonians, we should
come together to discuss
solutions that will protect all
of the area’s values and uses
for both current and future
generations. There are many
diverse views on the protec-
tion of the Owyhee Canyon-
lands. In fact, the Coalition
to protect the Owyhee num-
bers in the thousands, buoyed
by veterans, small business
owners and citizens from
every corner of the state, not
just a voice or two.
Efforts to permanently
protect Oregon’s Owyhee
Canyonlands have been
ongoing for decades. The
Owyhee Coalition has and
will continue to reach out to
Oregonians across the state
— including Malheur Coun-
ty and Eastern Oregon — to
try to address the diverse
views we all have about the
future of our public lands. By
focusing on our shared love
for this place and working to-
gether, we can find solutions
to ensure the Owyhee of to-
day will be the one we all
pass on to our children and
grandchildren.
Tim Davis
Ontario, Ore.
Carbon tax hurts
working class most
Here we go again. Al-
exandra Amonette believes
global warming is caused by
our greenhouse gas emissions
from the use of fossil fuel.
I believe it is caused by
the sun. Neither theory can be
proved. So we are at square
one. Except she wants the gov-
ernment to create a new bu-
reaucracy to tax the businesses
that supply fossil fuel. Then
give that money back to the
consumers who use the energy
derived tax.
Where is the common sense
in that? The businesses will
just pass the cost of the new
tax on to the working class,
the low income and retired se-
niors. The 1 percent will not be
affected by this tax, only us 99
percent. Thanks a lot for your
compassion, Alexandra, are
you one of the 1 percent?
Larry Pederson
Carson City, Nev.