PAGE A4, KEIZERTIMES, FEBRUARY 24, 2017
KeizerOpinion
KEIZERTIMES.COM
A healthy city
The wheels of government turn
slowly. In many cases that is a good
thing because government bodies need
to assure that policy making and bud-
geting have many moving parts and all
interests and consequences need to be
considered.
There are times when
the wheels of government
do not need to slow to a
crawl, especially when it
concerns free money.
The Healthy Eating Ac-
tive Living (HEAL) Cities
Campaign, funded by Kai-
ser Permanente and other partners, is
designed to play a role in reversing
the trend toward sedentary behavior
(think watching TV and playing vid-
eo games for hours on end) and high
calorie counts.
The project supports cities in ef-
forts to improve the physical envi-
ronment and give residents more
opportunities to be physically active
and eat healthful foods. Keizer is a
fairly healthy community already—
there are the many youth athletic or-
ganizations, plus the sports programs
in all the schools. We are home to
a number of running events. Even
with one grocery store, a majority
of Keizer residents have access to
healthy food with WinCo, Walmart
and other large stores in Salem.
There is always room for improve-
ment in the drive to be the healthiest
community Keizer can be.
To that end the city council needs
to stop nitpicking the HEAL Healthy
Cities program, approve applying for
the designation, move for-
ward and apply for a grant.
We suggest the Keizer
Parks and Recreation Ad-
visory Board, the council
and the Public Works de-
partment work on exercise
kiosks erected around city
parks. Exercise kiosks are
informational signs that have illustra-
tions of how to do specifi c exercises
for runners, walkers, specifi c ages.
They can also include information
about heart rates, pulse numbers and
general information. These types of
kiosks are found in public spaces all
around the nation.
It is not just signs; many cities
incorporate equipment made from
natural materials such as logs. The
equipment is used for leg work, bal-
ancing, push-ups, any number of ex-
ercises a runner or walker may do.
Our former First Lady led the
“Let’s Go!” fi tness campaign. Let’s
go, City of Keizer. Let’s take the free
money (even if it must be matched,
half of it is still free) and be as healthy
as we dare to be.
—LAZ
editorial
Some good bills, some not so good
The past three weeks in the Or-
egon legislature have been fascinat-
ing. In my second term as your state
representative, I should never be sur-
prised by some proposed bills, but I
still am. For instance, in recent days
there have been bills to: make mari-
onberry pie the
offi cial pie of Or-
from the
egon; change the
words of our state
capitol
song, Oregon, My
Oregon; a tax on
Rep.
coffee and a tax on
cars over 20 years
BILL POST
old; an offi cial dog
of Oregon; a ‘no
dogs on lap while driving’ bill and
many others.
Both parties are guilty of some
pretty “frivolous” bills. Just because
a legislator can write a bill doesn’t
mean they have to. The cost to the
taxpayers is enormous for each one
and that’s why I’ve said from day one
“I’m not going to do that.” I have in-
troduced seven good ideas that either
reduce or remove bad laws or bring
about more freedom for Oregonians.
You can see all of them at my legisla-
tive website: oregonlegislature.gov/post.
There has been some misinforma-
tion about some of the bills, though.
For example, House Bill 2365 calls
for a task force to study the transfer of
federal lands to Oregon. I am a chief
sponsor of that bill because I believe
a task force is a good idea. Let’s study
this issue since so many in Oregon on
either side of the fence, are interested
in it. I am not calling for the transfer
of lands, just a study.
Meanwhile the serious work that
needs to be done in the Capitol is
fi nding a way to balance a budget
while not raising taxes or cutting edu-
cation, health care or public safety. I
am very interested in what will come
in the next few weeks and months.
At this time there are at least 30 or
more tax bills that I know of. Orego-
nians spoke loud
and clear (they
voted 59 per-
cent-41 percent
against Measure
97), yet the son of
Measure 97 is one
of the bills intro-
duced. It must be
noted that Or-
egon’s revenue has increased by over
30 percent in the past three biennium
(2011-2017), yet we are told there is
a “shortfall” in the budget. I am fully
aware that infl ation is a reality but
state government must learn to live
within its means. We cannot continue
to spend at the same rates as we have
been doing for the last several years.
Lastly, I continue to fi ght the
dreaded “emergency clause” that is on
so many bills (meaning the bill would
not allow for a ballot measure). It’s still
a big problem as well as is the fairly
new tactic of introducing “committee
bills” with no name attached. I am in
favor of open and transparent govern-
ment and have called on my fellow
legislators to think along those lines.
Thank you for allowing me to
serve you in the Oregon legislature.
Please stop by and say “hello” some
time.
Food bank
thanks Keizer
dollar we receive, we can
buy three dollars’ worth
of food. Core foods that
we like to keep on our
pantry shelves that offer
basic nutrition are peanut
butter, tuna fi sh, macaro-
ni and cheese, pasta, pasta
sauce, canned fruits and vegetables,
soups and cold cereal.
Donation barrels can be found at
Uptown Music and Tony’s Kingdom
of Comics.
For more information call Curt at
503-871-9100.
Curt McCormack, director
Keizer Community Food Bank
(Bill Post represents House Dis-
trict 25. He can be reached at 503-
986-1425 or via email at rep.bill-
post@state.or.us.)
letters
To the Editor:
On behalf of the Keizer
Community Food Bank I
want to thank the Keizer
community for their con-
tinued support of the food bank dur-
ing the 2016 year.
Special thanks to Uptown Music,
Tony’s Kingdom of Comics, Keizer
Elks (both men and ladies), Habitat
for Humanity Recycle Store, Safe-
way, 7-11, and you, the community.
We are continually grateful for the
ongoing support of our food minis-
try program. In most cases, for every
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America’s sacred fi re must not be doused
By MICHAEL GERSON
“Well, I preach the Church with-
out Christ,” says a vivid Flannery
O’Connor character named Hazel
Motes. “I’m member and preacher to
that church where the blind don’t see
and the lame don’t walk and what’s
dead stays that way.”
At the heart of Donald Trump’s
public rhetoric is a similar
emptiness. He is a president
who preaches America with-
out exceptionalism. He is
the leader of the free world
who seldom mentions free-
dom. He belongs to a politi-
cal faith in which America’s
political miracle is only for
us, and dissidents and demo-
cratic activists are on their own, and
those who are oppressed stay that way.
Trump’s rhetorical rejection of in-
ternationalism is an aberration from
America’s bipartisan, post-World War
II foreign policy consensus. It is also a
culmination of recent trends.
During the Barack Obama years,
America retreated from internation-
alism in practice. At fi rst, this may
have been a reaction against George
W. Bush’s foreign policy. But Obama’s
tendency became a habit, and the hab-
it hardened into a conviction. He put
consistent emphasis on the risks of ac-
tion and the limits of American power.
In the revolt against Syrian President
Bashar al-Assad, following the Russian
invasion of the Ukraine, as Russian in-
fl uence returned to the Middle East,
America inaction was taken as accom-
modation. “The fear of making things
worse has paralyzed the United States
from trying to make things better,” said
Russian dissident Garry Kasparov in
recent congressional testimony.
This geostrategic retreat is con-
sistent with a broader political trend.
Summarizing recent survey data, re-
searchers Roberto Stefan Foa and
Yascha Mounk conclude: “Citizens in
a number of supposedly consolidated
democracies in North America and
Western Europe have not
only grown more critical
of their political leaders.
Rather, they have also be-
come more cynical about
the value of democracy
as a political system, less
hopeful that anything
they do might infl uence
public policy, and more
willing to express support for authori-
tarian alternatives.”
This is a sobering development
—the deconsolidation of support for
liberal democracy itself. Both America
and Europe are seeing the rise of lead-
ers who have chosen to ride this trend
rather than buck it. Trump’s version of
strongman democracy and his aban-
donment of the language of liberal
democracy are only imaginable in this
environment.
This shift has outward-facing con-
sequences. Dissidents and democratic
activists—often driven by a stubborn,
defi ant passion—are not going to give
up because America loses its ideo-
logical nerve. But regimes tempted
to crack down on them have greater
confi dence in impunity. America is
now less likely to criticize their “way
of life,” even when these regimes evan-
gelize with the gallows.
This shift also has inward-facing
other
views
consequences. A nation that ceases to
speak for human rights may become
less confi dent in civil rights. This type
of relativism—this neutrality between
freedom and authoritarianism—is eas-
ily imported across the border.
But we are not there yet. And the
Trump administration itself is divided
on these matters. Stephen Bannon cer-
tainly has the president’s ear and con-
trol of the speechwriting shop, which
is strategic high ground. His ethno-
nationalists are anxious to get a run-
ning start on the road that would take
America toward dishonor and failure.
But the Defense and State Depart-
ments are headed by committed inter-
nationalists who understand that the
growth of freedom and the spread of
prosperity are essential to long-term
global stability and American security.
The tools of internationalism—a
strong military, strong alliances, strong
international institutions, strong sup-
port for global development and de-
mocracy promotion—have a consid-
erable cost. “Such investment,” said
Kasparov, “is far more moral and far
cheaper than the cycle of terror, war,
refugees and military intervention that
results when America leaves a vacuum
of power.”
In assuming this calling of leader-
ship, it is not ethnicity that grips the
American imagination and justifi es
sacrifi ce; it is the animating ideals of
the country. And it is a national ad-
vantage that our deepest beliefs are in
accord with the durable hopes of hu-
manity.
We will not fi nd security, only dark-
ness, by dousing America’s sacred fi re.
(Washington Post Writers Group)
One agreement is fi rst step to a functioning country
February 20 was President’s Day.
On this day in 1792 the Postal Ser-
vice Act was signed into law by
George Washington. It was felt that a
universal and affordable delivery ser-
vice would help to include everyone
in participatory democracy.
Universal delivery was mandated
with the specifi c idea of all citizens
having equal access to news and in-
formation regardless of income level.
Getting information about
current affairs through the
US Postal Service seems
quaint in the smartphone
age but the idea of everyone
sharing in the cost of having
an informed citizenry seems
more important than ever.
My thirty years in the
postal service made me believe it is
a microcosm of America. Postal em-
ployees are mainly a hard-working,
decent bunch of men and women
trying to provide timely and accurate
service. There are conservatives and
liberals. There are religious beliefs of
every stripe and some without. There
are lots of outstanding employees and
some that drain on the performance.
There are cheerful employees and
crabby. All that is set aside toward the
common cause of getting the mail
delivered.
The recent presidential elec-
tion showed all that we, as a nation,
have lost in sharing a common cause.
Though we have been willing to
form up sides and despise each other
I doubt there is much difference in
what a “liberal” and a “conservative”
want for their families and future.
What is it that has put us at each oth-
er’s throats?
First and most important is the
realization that Congress has aban-
doned us. Since we’ve let stand the
idea that money is free speech it is
money that is heard in Washington,
DC, not speech. If money is speech
then without money you are speech-
less. If Congress is infl uenced by the
voices with money then legislation
will always be crafted to protect and
increase wealth of the one percent.
President Trump was elected as
angry reaction to the abandonment
of middle class America by Congress.
Hillary Clinton was rightly perceived
as ensuring more of the same. There
is no explanation for
voters’ belief that a bil-
lionaire would somehow
be the champion of the
working man. The ap-
pointment of a full deck
of Wall Street tycoons
and billionaires to Cabi-
net positions does not
bode well for increasing the fortunes
of working class America.
During the course of the recent
election it seemed like wishful think-
ing that simply choosing the right
president could fi x things. The Presi-
a box
of
soap
dent has a lot of infl uence but it is
Congress that has brought consensus
government to a grinding halt in fe-
alty to their largest donors. The Pres-
ident can bluster and name names but
legislators seem unaffected as long as
campaign donations keep rolling in.
It’s hard to see how we might
regain the attention of our legisla-
tors short of storming the walls with
pitchforks and torches. As long as we
are paralyzed by our divisions so will
Congress be. Are there some things
that we all agree would make Amer-
ica remain great? We’ll never know
unless we talk to each other as equal
partners. That is the defi nition of par-
ticipatory democracy. That means we
must trust a shared source of infor-
mation. That is no longer delivered
by the Postal Service. There is no
longer a universally trusted source of
national news. That is pulling us apart.
(Don Vowell gets on his soapbox
regularly in the Keizertimes.)